droqen

would have really appreciated an 'as i said in my last book'-type heads up so that i could read the chapter without having a lingering voice in the back of my head going: "this sounds awfully familiar... why is it not acknowledging its extremely strong similarities to things you already know about?"

stylistically i prefer a clearer distinction so that i can set aside some analytical power and not read so hard when it's something that is SO similar to past literature that i have already formed an opinion about -- the way the chapter is written is so straightforwardly lacking in any citation??

i found it difficult to read the chapter 'striving play' because it felt like i was reading stuff that i had already read before more than once, and at minimum this is because it is him rehashing some of the same descriptions and arguments from 'agency as art'

2. okay i had previously made an unverified claim, so rewriting my second point. it's potentially less obviously serious than i thought.

in some cases nguyen does not sufficiently, for me, describe the relationship of present writing to past writing (his and others')

when i read this i find it difficult to engage with because i have to navigate through the haze of "i'm being told that i react this way, i see things this way, etc", detangle the language to understand it as *nguyen's position*, and only then become able to study and regard what is being said.

a specific example of this, pulled from pg 295

"All the high arts, the really respectable ones, seem to be the ones where a singular genius broadcasts their art . . to us lowly masses, and we just soak it up in relative passivity."

1. i noticed that nguyen uses a lot of this type of presumptive language that positions him and the reader in the same place. what i mean is sentences like "we feel this way." i've generally become not a fan of this but it's especially troublesome for me when the familiarity feels forced.

i'm still trying to figure out how to not let this stuff get in the way of actually examining a work but the big two things are as follows

omg haha don't mind me, i'm just a curmudgeon when it comes to this stuff. i will someday come to better understand my specific complaints!!!

i must say i have grabbed the book from the local library and it is Not For Me! i don't think i expected anything less but i have a better understanding of where nguyen's style doesn't gel with me now.

(it is SIGNIFICANT. i can hardly get through a chapter without getting super irritated! argh!!!!)

@beho.dev i was reading your blog and the fizzbuzz post sniped me so here's my one-line python solution (very much borrowing from your logic)

def fizzbuzz(v):return[v,"fizz","buzz","fizzbuzz"][[3,0,0,1,0,2,1,0,0,1,2,0,1,0,0,][v%15]]

at last, the bespoke blur is complete.

bsky.app/profile/droq...

a red pixel art "0" the smoothness is set to 1.0

a red pixel art "0" the smoothness is set to 0.0 (it is pretty similar, but different)

a red pixel art "0" the smoothness is set to -1.0 (look at this strange beast! i love it! it doesn't look as distinctive once you zoom out, though.)

a red pixel art "0". the smoothness is set to 5.0

it's not as strong as i know a blur can be, but that minor disappointment set aside to solve another day, i am very happy with the outcome. i have a blur which can be tuned to achieve some relatively distinct looks! including some unexpected ones.

finally, the blur has yielded to my will. here is me intentionally tuning it wrong

but also, you can have it!!! i just wanted my nice blur T____T and i will get it, mark my words

your stuff is literally the first thing that popped into my head when this occurred hahaha

like it is kind of cute but none of it is remotely what i wanted my math to do so i think i must just be doing random things to my code at this point

aahhhh???? i think i need to stop for the day

i don't know anymore but whatever it is, it is suffering

uhh excuse me what is happening

better, because at least it is actually blurred, but...

i had a working blur shader for my new bespoke blur, but i wanted to make it better, but i don't think it worked

what! apparently i got my copy of this book before release day? i pre-ordered it... i'm still only crawling through the early parts of the book but i'm really enjoying the breadth of real forms of play being discussed (see quoted bleet, peter describes some) & will have more to say eventually!!!

this was a time when it felt like games could go in any direction and Michael's games of the period embodied that, and collectively we were part of the group that felt like it was at the forefront of that... but ofc it ended up being a very short-lived feeling.

if you wanted to hear a very long discussion about the state of indie games circa 2013ish (and hear us talk about an extremely underrated Michael Brough game as well) look no further than our esteemed group on this episode

..(not that that's being discussed in this video necessarily, i just skipped to the end and immediately encountered a sponsored ad segment and was like, eh, okay) and the kind of pointless constant mythologizing-obfuscating discussions that ultimately go nowhere that i think you're gesturing at here

after so many years of this surely people would know a little more, but i don't think that's the case, most people are just chasing their tails

very game-play-coded! i feel like a conspiracy theorist when i ponder the similarity between 'the point of games is to be doing things and not the goals'..

twenty years of youtube video essays and not even the simplest questions settled to a satisfactory degree. they are taking you for fools.

to conclude my thought, my goal is mainly to detangle the idea that a work is solely responsible for the attention it receives. this leads to a great number of problems, not least of which is the actual situation cited and being discussed. competing for attention is what gambling and porn do.

--we prioritize "making profound works" above "making more people appreciate profound works".