The greatest stories & why - Games #01

Demon's Souls & Dark Souls 1:
The souls series thrive on interpretation, leaving just enough for the imagination to want more but keeping out some of the bigger details. Another absolutely integral part of this is the environments which tell a story all by themselves. Together with vauge direction they form a very potent narrative. Another driving force is that every part of the game seems to have a heavy connection to a theme, invoking so much more character from the different areas.

Deus Ex 1:
Deus Ex is built around the premise of factions always vying for control. Completing enough objectives for any faction will eventually lead you to the end scenario. The key component they employ to make this fun and engaging is the ability to switch sides often (once per map?). This is supported by a strong personal objective that plays into the bigger picture seamlessly and brilliantly.

The Elderscrolls III - Morrowind:
Morrowinds greatness stem from it's complexity. While it's an easy base to follow: A prisoner is sent to Morrowind for unknown reasons but to do the bidding of the Blades (Agents of the King). But it grows in complexity while you get more familliar with the world. The story slowly unfolds seamlessly integrated with more or less optional guild quests. Before you are done not only will you have struggled through a religious narrative but also a political one. Between the cities, tribes & political parties there's a wide differentce in culture, laws and customs. Spice things up with an alien world with age old legends & an overarching plotline every so slightly coming together with every TESIII game where each game leads Tamriel towards becoming more and more unstable in it's state of existance.

The Legend of Zelda - Ocarina of time:
Through the journey they foreshadow events and make phenomenal use of pacing. This is done through hitting certain checkpoints. Often times these are in themselves incredibly important with their own subplot. Like Saria becoming a Sage or Kakariko burning down prompting you to action. What really makes it tick is the games great use of symbolism and numbers. It really feels like a genuine legend. It has it's own identity with a rich world of unique and wonderful races and colorful characters. But perhaps most important of all is it's potential for taking dark turns. There's no lack of sad stories, dark & terrifying moments that stand as excellent contrast to the adventure.

The Longest Journey:
What makes TLJ special and unique is not only in it's execution and presentation as an adventure game. But it's how the pacing is phenomenal, how the characters are memorable, likable. But also how the world somehow seemingly tells you everything you need to know but still keeps the bigger mysteries intact. It has humour and it has grace. It moves through the narrative in a natural way. This makes it incredibly easy to loose yourself in the world so masterfully crafted. Every detail of the designs have been carefully and meticulously overseered, and this is something you don't just see on the screen. You see it in your mind, you feel it in your heart. You hear it echoing down the crevice of your soul.

End word:
I aim to make this a series of sorts. Analysing what I think made a specific game/movie/other type of medias story/narrative/lore great. Note that this is my opinion and is subject to change and you as I am entitled to my own opinion. On a final note I'd like to know your greatest stories and why. Leave a comment, let's get some talk going!

Signed, Mireneye

Feeling the magic

It was a night of triumphs in three parts. One part was the unfettered joy of being connected to all of you again. Another is the joy of knowing I've reached rock bottom. With nothing to loose, there is only one way forward. The third triumph is not quite so easy to explain. It is equally part of both but neither come close.

The third triumph is one belonging to the thought of a child. If you close your eyes you may feel it linger in the youngest crevice of your soul. It's the imagination of watching magic unfold for the first time, a phenomenon you can't explain. It is the triump belonging to hope that grows from purity of emotion. So pure, perfect and undeniably outside our grasp. If not for our fondest memories, and our greatest archivements.

Some people live entire lives without ever realizing such things. I've been happy to have experienced it many a times, one may call me lucky.

Never the less the last triump never stays for long. It's a flash, a feeling to fair to hold on to. And why would you? It's fragile and may break at the slightest touch, may crash and crumble upon a glance to long. Leaving you with an empty memory; Not more than another event in an otherwise ordinary and boring life. This triump is only great, because others are not.

Everyone who knows me, know that I have always believed that I'm here to do great things. Call it hubris if you want. But I never bothered to explain but to a handful of what great things I meant. Maybe I didn't know? maybe I still don't know.

But I know this.

The light is meant for everyone, It is a resource in abundance.
It's the damdest thing,

Waking up realizing that today is the day I change the world.

So when I say I'm here to do great things. I'm not doing them for me. I love feeling empowered, I love feeling that I can entertain. I love sharing. But that is also where it stops.

Where I stop... YOU begin.

Without you, everything is finite. Ambition without purpose.

But together we create, express and live magically. Infinitely.

Live for the triumphs, dare to challenge yourself. Inspire the mirror and reflection will pay aplenty.

It was a night of triumphs in three parts. As the third fades, its's brethren show me the way to my next stop, on this grand stage.

Signed, Mireneye

The beutiful thing about lingering emptiness

I'm sure you also have had that tv-show, movie, book, manga or perhaps game where you reach the end and all you obsess about for days on end is how you are left feeling 'empty'.

Some of it is because they leave us without any real closure. Some of it is because we became so attacthed to it that we have a hard time letting go.

As a stage performer, writer and game designer this is a property I've always loved but very rarely thought about. I very rarely reflected over what lies at the core of making something truly settle in the minds of people.

That feeling of not being able to wait for the next episode.

The void of a season brake.

A book with many loose ends.

Or even a song you have stuck on repeat because, damnit one playthrough is not just enough. Give me the hour long version.

And while to many it's excruciating it is a true testament to the impact these things can have on our daily lives.

The moments of emptiness is defining us.

There is simple elegance. It's not just time invested, it's mind & heart invested. And it is that simple elegance that I want to employ in my life moving forward.

Signed, Mireneye

THANK YOU! CONTENT CREATORS!

As I'm sitting down tonight to watch some youtube videos, listen to some pay your own price albums from sources around the internet, while eating away at cheap yet superb ice cream I can't help but marvel at how much we have at our disposal today for so little.

I could go on and let this post focus on the negative aspect, of always wanting more but no..

Tonight is for being thankful, tonight is for saying "Thank you everyone who's ever created anything that I've ever enjoyed".

You inspire, create and share. You touch and let others tag along on your journey. You've shared a part of your life.

My deepest most profound thanks.
Signed, Mireneye

Life altering changes ahead!

There's a grand polarity in my character. While one side favors logic, the other favors chaos. Further more, one favors adventure and the other favors security.

Maybe humans are kind of like that, we are like a set of complex scales, our character is defined by how we weigh the different values in our own mind.

Some claim characteristics can be influenced greatly by environment. Perhaps then it isn't so odd that I have had a sense of security that I've dearly preserved. I've had a steady job with a steady income, I've had a close connection to my beloved mother. But all that comes at a pretty high price. I've had to conform more and more every year to society. I've had to bend myself to their rules instead of my own. I've had to sit in meetings listening to sheep, being herded into a comfortable and profitable system for society.

And I can't take it. And no I don't need a doctor to tell me I'm burnt out. Of FUCKING course I am. I'm surprised so many endure this bullshit.

I've talked before about carving my own path. It's meaning has mostly applied to situations that change how you think on a day to day basis.  Today let's talk about carving a path that will change things on a much greater scale.

Some might call me crazy for making a philosophical debacle about something as simple as moving. Let them. We all have different values on scales to consider.

I have to value how much I will miss my mother and my father. How much I will miss my friends, the stars on my sky. How much I will miss the weekly thursday practice or simply seeing familliar faces when I ride the local buss.

I'm moving from the far north of Sweden to almost the edge of the map to the south. To help my brother build his and his fiancés house while I live there (for "free") and focus on turning my artistry into a line of work. This means LOADS of free time for my own projects and it unlocks much easier access to the world. This is an option that my character just can't deny or turn away from. It HAS to be explored. It calls my name.

I fear but a handful of things. I fear what will become of my dear mother, and what will become of my matchup with a local magician. I fear things I have worked hard to build will simply dissapear, like tears in rain.

And so I've asked myself over and over what I value highest. Taking a step forward into the unknown or find comfort in the security I've become a part of. The answer would be simple if I knew I was the only one affected by it. Alas those simple days when all I cared about was myself are long gone. At some point I've realized that a warm heart to touch people is the vessel through which they touch you.

To my friends and family for warming my heart. For bringing me courage to pursue my sense of destiny. I love you, deep and dear. You are eternally with me.

Signed, Mireneye

The human machine

What are the differances between us and machines? Where most AI's if they would "break" would result in a complete mess because of the steady base it is built upon, a human when it "breaks" mentally it can go any which way but all of them are things that A, He can develop and learn from. B, He can be broken down and changed drastically from or C, He can completely push away, ignore and seal away with the rest of the memories.

All of these are based on the human need for self preservation. Does that mean that the difference between us and machines are the "self"?

But then what is the "self" I touched on this subject many times before. The essential idea I've come too are twofold.

1, The self is the amount of experience and memories accumulated to this exact point in time.
2. The self is a mirror of everything around you.

The difference of the two are simply the point of view. In one we assume "we" amount experience, "we" accumelate memories. Which is a part of the solution.

The second doesn't need us. It creates us from everything around us.

Both of these are flawed without each other. 1, needs 2 to recieve input. 2 needs 1 to act on the input it gives, or it bares no significance.

Biologically our basis is to act upon input. It's how we adapt, how we learn and how we evolve. That is if you go by the Darwinistic world view of evolution. If not, It's not hard to argue that even if evolution is not a part of this then we still adhere to a biological basis of input - review and action.

The difference in how we work in comparison to machines seem to be how we break mainly. Like I mentioned above.

You can easily draw comparisons like: Machines and Humans both needs power. True, but it's significant to think about HOW these systems work on a lower conceptual level. Humans recieve energy more or less in tandem with nature. We translate sunlight, food, etc.

In some ways humans are almost badly programmed machines. We have high level understanding of "Oh I'm feeling sick" but we don't know why. While a machine could likely by todays standard always track what is wrong.

It could be in this area, the mist of meta-knowledge created by very high level interpretations of the mind and it's memories and experiences that the "self" is actually created.

And as long as machines don't share the same neural mess which both makes humans hard to break completely (except on the biological level) but rather logical machines without fuzzy error handling that sometimes even defy logic I think it becomes clear.

How machines act is not a result of their own memories or experiences at the moment and so, high level fuzzy interpretations are not really possible, not in the conventional human sense if we don't change something fundemental in how machines work.

-Mireneye

Philosophy of passion

Spinning brings us closer to ourselves. The practice of control of the human body has always been something sought by by people through dance, martial arts, circus, acrobatics.

But how does the prop actually change anything? An extra limb, something external to learn how to control perhaps? I believe one of the most important aspects it adds is a clever feedback system.

But then is it the prop that gives us something or is it us, observing our movement with it?
No it's an exchange. An exchange between us and something inanimate.

And so it doesn't only bring us closer to ourselves, it also brings us closer to everything around us.
Understanding the world perhaps not only for what it is physically or mathematically, but what it feels like. What it looks like.

Along with our passion for the art, sparks a passion for the world. And we learn to understand others through that same passion.