The Minefield Weekly
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At this point I ceased updates to the Minefield in favor of a guest written--and theoretically easier to maintain--weekly "magazine" format which did not work out well at all. While the first issue kicks ass and has some great pieces in it, I never got enough submissions to keep this project going. In light of that fact that it has not decreased my time spent online and is actually more difficult to maintain, I killed the EMF Weekly on August 11th. The guest pieces will be added into my articles archive, but here, for the record's sake and for your enjoyment, is the EMF Weekly's short history.
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The Minefield Static
The page I made to keep the Minefield in a suspended format. Basically the standard EMF with a goodbye message and so forth.
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The Minefield Weekly, issue zero
Kind of a front page or editor's soapbox which I kept while putting together the first and second issues.
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The Minefield Weekly, issue one
A lot of good writing here. My thanks to all the people who helped me with this.
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21 July 1998
Pause.
A man makes a picture, a moving picture. Through light projected he can see himself up close.
A man captures color, a man likes to stare. He turns his money into light to look for her.
- Thank You and Goodnight -
This is not goodbye for the Minefield; don't worry.
I have ceased updates in order to devote the maximum time possible to my movie. Also, since this page has maintained one of the best reputations in Subspace for constant and usually daily updating, it is important to me that I place that on an official hiatus; the alternative would be the same page as before only with less content. Better to simply put the page on hold for now. I assure you that as soon as I have settled into a reasonable editing schedule, in the weeks following the completion of principle photography, this page will return to its form as a reliable source of information, opinion, and sword rattling.
I want to thank everyone who has contributed to this page's success during its first cycle--all of you who read it so often and make it satisfying to write and maintain, and those who have encouraged me or contributed material, but especially Cybrid and Omicron who really put it on the map. Also to those who have sent me pieces for the Minefield Weekly so that I can keep this place interesting while I am unable to write it myself.
Please visit the Minefield Weekly.
Sn Jy 1998.
Ns. Dy.™
Thump click clickclickclick thumpa thumpa beep beep clickbeep repeat.
- Trixter Responds -
This morning I asked Trixter about the allegations of threats made by him against WiZT...
No, there was no threats. That interview was not all my comments, and even the
ones I did were edited and twisted. I was speaking off the record completely, and
he posted it and edited it. I asked them to take it down.
I must apologize for my rude tone in the previous story, which gave all benefit of the doubt to WiZT and GreyCloak and was unfair to Trixter. It was poor form and I have only left it unedited because I don't want to seem as though I am trying to conceal the remarks. I will keep the interview up today because it is part of a news story, but it will go down tomorrow out of courtesy to Trixter and because I have not been threatened in any way. Mind you, I am not discounting WiZT's version of events, which may well be truthful.
- Ae! -
Here ends my yearly-or-so week long ramble and fawning session over Autechre in anticipation of their newest release. I have the new album, it is awesome, and I am happy. It is weird and perhaps over-intellectual, like a set of etudes for digital samplers. I am personally a little disappointed in it because I love Ae primarily for the atmospheres they create, and in the course of their increasingly experimental development they have lost a great deal of that atmosphere. Then again, the album is basically flawless. It tinkers and folds and mazes into itself like a psychotic's puzzle box, but at the same time it is funky and entertaining and kind of creepy. I can't say it's their best album, but I have to admit its near there on the list. It's probably not for beginners. Earlier works such as Amber and Incunabula are prettier and not nearly as neurotically constructed.
- The Infamous Trixter Interview -
As reported by GreyCloak on his scribblings page at Subspace Maxig Com, WiZT's recent interview with Trixter, in which Trixter first publicly fantasized about purchasing Subspace from VIE, was removed from Subspace.Net due to legal threats allegedly made by Trixter against WiZT. Way to go, Subspace.Net. Caving to pressure and censoring your own page before it has even officially opened is a great way to build a reputation for hard-edged journalism. ;) Then again, wouldn't we all have done the same thing?
I'll get to that in a minute.
This article was almost lost forever, actually. Articles referencing it mysteriously vanished from both Subspace Maxig Com and Subspace PCGaming Com. When I loaded the old url in hopes of retrieving the interview from my Netscape cache, instead of a bad url I found a sort of "retraction" page--WiZT's inevitable response to being threatened by a rich American who is probably twice his age. (No disrespect meant to WiZT.) An anonymous posting to the Trashboard had been reset by the time I looked there. WiZT, for his part, had accidentally deleted the interview from his own hard drive.
God bless my 100 meg NS cache directory and Windows 95's funky search utility. I managed to find the interview after all. The Minefield bends over for no man or god. Here it is.
- News.Txt Articles Page Is Up -
Cybrid has in almost no time at all pulled together a set of guest editorials for Subspace Warzone Com which ranks as the best this game has seen. I can't get my friends to be this prolific for me, yet Cyb has people from all over the map writing quality pieces for him. Most notable among these are Apollo 18's editorials. Not to suggest that Apollo's board posts have been useless or unthoughtful, but considering his reputation for abbrasive trash talk, rudeness, and not pulling one single punch ever since he was born, I am amazed at the compassion, insight, and restraint showing up in his writing. With all the hype and noise surrounding the recent openings of new pages, don't overlook these articles. All that work put into html design, funky graphics, etc, and here comes this little page full of text and contributes far more to the game in a much shorter span of time. The best thing to happen to Subspace since players started running War Zone.
Cybrid's Op-Ed Page
7/15/98
You're gonna walk on home. You're gonna walk alone. You're gonna see this through. Don't let them get to you.
- Since No One Can Take A Joke, Part VI -
I should clear up that my little barb against Subspace.PCGaming.Com and GreyCloak was in fact nothing more, and nothing less, than a barb. It's gearing up into a nice page and I have no quarrel with QA_Man. To quote Cybrid, "I was just a little curious as to how you can have a collaboration between the major SubSpace news pages without letting them know in the first place." I figured hey, QA doesn't consider my page major, so why not bite my thumb at him too. I was half-sure it was a mistake then. After finding out Cybrid hadn't been told either, I became convinced.
Either way, GreyCloak told a fib. Neener neener! Can you believe he got mad at me for saying that? GreyCloak, I love you man, but you can't have my integrity. ;)
I think I know what QA is up to. Consider that, in the course of announcing this all-site-spanning event without telling any of us about it, he has, in fact, created an all-site-spanning event. Either he's a damned genius or I'm sadly paranoid.
- Filmmaking Sucks -
My stupid movie fell apart again last night, this time because the camera has started making too much noise for us to record sound. So I stayed up late and read all the news pages like a good li'l miner, and drank lots of hot caffeineated beverages. You know what that means? It means I still don't feel any better, than it's 50% your fault.
- Autechre Update -
On rare occasion a very important album comes out in the UK on a Friday or Monday and we get it here by Tuesday. Which means I may well be getting my copy of the new Ae album before I next update. Cross ur fingers.
7/14/98
Behold ! The Minefield
Twilight fades through blistered avalon. The sky's cruel torch on aching autobahn. Into the uncertain divine we scream, into the last divide.
- Sheep Cloning Facility Reborn -
Just a harmless little test for my new Chaos Zone map. Hadar, you aint getting this one now, sorry man. >:) Add a jackpot game and you have some damned intense dogfighting, and as a born tunnel rat I can say I am pretty happy with the mazes and corridors.
As a result of the new game (and probably the simple fact that there hasn't been a real running style game at the VIE servers in quite a while), the server boomed and the zone hit a record population (at least a record during retail times) aftera long stretch of minimal usership. I figured what the hell, people like points--who cares what I think of em? ;) In the long standing tradition of Sheep Cloning Facility, the points are now very very nice. In the last of three several games I played in, the final jackpot amounted to 356,649 points. Of course, this was after over an hour of intense fighting and I think it was well earned. The other jackpots ranged from 30k to 140k.
The map is a bit unfinished at the moment--the tiling is especially sloppy--and the settings are somewhat screwed up from an earlier experiment. If anyone knows the command to upload a server.set file, please clue me in.
The SCF is now your official late night funhouse, and home to the last Jackpot RZ game. Enjoy, and please let me know if you have any ideas.
- SCF Vangels Meeting -
It was damned unofficial but we had a sort-of IRC meeting with about half of the Sheepdogs. They're being held in #wooly on irc.dal.net if anyone wants to make a note for next time. When will the next time be? That's a secret. :)
- Fix the Minefield! -
Sorry for the broken links. They are left over from when I uploaded everything to Maxgaming with Netscape but used an FTP program to send them back to WestNet. CuteFTP didn't change the links. Duh. :P It'll all be back in order soon.
7/12/98
More later. Promise!
If you forget my name you will go astray, like a killer whale trapped in a bay, the ocean miles away.
- GreyCloak is a fibber. -
The word from Subspace Maxig Com today...
QA Man from SubSpace.PCGaming.com has said they are gearing up something big. It will be involving all of the major SS news sites, something never done before. Look for it in the following weeks. [GreyCloak]
Funny, I heard nothing about that. :) I'd also like to point out that SubSpace.PCGaming.com is *not* a major news site. :P
- Gigakiller's Turf Map Rules All -
I've been dying to get back there and play for the better part of this afternoon, so I will write more about this later tonight. In the meantime forgive me for quoting myself, but there is little point in writing the same thing twice.
Chakotay just added it today. It is amazing. Hall fights as intense as C5 and
G19 are all over the place. Angled walls create chaotic space but the space
is just right and the bombs come flying through at just the right angle.
Somehow there are more dead ends than the other maps *and* better
opportunities for circling and flanking. A great deal of variety. Some of the
map is derivative of old structures, but always in a new context or with a
new twist. Exits into adjacent tunnels appear just at the moment you need
them. First day out and already blood is ALL over those walls. Sweet new
ideas, War Zone staples, and an excessive number of entrances that
somehow functions to make the fights more territorial. An homage to the
ol' Crossroads that far surpasses it.
This is just about the finest day Turf has ever known. It's like out of
nowhere Subspace is reborn. Have a look on the TC page and check the
game out tomorrow afternoon.
- dgus owns Subspace -
It's official, Trench Wars is the biggest zone in the game.I'd congratulate dgus on the victory, but since he apparently has no idea that I exist there is probably no need. :P
- SCF and TCE Move -
The home pages for the Sheep Cloning Facility and Turf Classic have moved from Warzone to Maxig. Since the move came with little or no warning, the good people of Warzone are offended, completely ignoring the fact that the admins of these two pages left because they were angry with Warzone.
Personally, after some consideration I now think the surprise and outrage are phony. Over twenty days ago I mentioned here that the page would be leaving Warzone because the html was edited by some or other member of the Warzone brass. Quite a bit more warning than Silent Dragon gave to Maxgaming before moving his Spiral to Warzone, no?
I think Subspace Warzone Com is angry that what they know should happen finally is happening--and we can likely expect more of it soon. The inevitable collapse of a Subspace site where too many people have lost interest in Subspace.
Watch next for quickly deleted forwarding pages, already promised..
- SCF is jumpin, by the way. -
Not the zone, but Silent is rebuilding the site nicely, and as of today we have a set of Vangels.
Silent Dragon
Super.Fly.
The Dread Wooly
Gommy
Dennis21
Ocean
FlippMode
- Zone News -
Better updates here later, but I've got to get this out of my system. The new map up in Turf Classic is a masterpiece, one of the most fun maps I have ever played in. TC was open past midnight tonight for the first time in months. Giga has given us an amazing piece of work, and it's prompting the coolest fights I've seen in a long time. Nonstop fighting for long spans of time. A full review of this map tomorrow, or soon at any rate. Chaos West is hanging in there, and the SCF vangels are rounding up some nice scenario ideas. We should be in business pretty soon.
- Another Mapfolio Already! -
Gommy took my advice and made his own mapfolio (his term, soon to be mine as well). Impressive stuff. More on this tomorrow as well, but have a look. Gommy also asked me to relink mine.
7/11/98
No update 4 U !
We're all held captive out from the sun--a sun that shines on only some. We the meek are all in one.
- news.txt now! -
Bobby D, formerly of SubArena fame, is writing League updates for Cybrid's page. The perfect man for the job in my opinion, judging from the readability of SubArena in its time. Also, Cybrid got printed in PCGamer's letters section. Read all about it.
- Turfy Stuff -
Chak raised some good points at the TCE page about my piece yesterday on the new Turf map. One additional point occurred to me, which I probably shouldn't mention since Chak and I are not in agreement about tunnel-swarms in Turf (because they KICK TOO MUCH ASS! ;) If all those entrances force people to pick their turf carefully, defensive freqs may not expand past a point where they can't cover all their entrances. Swarms may well dominate the remaining areas, and in fact may still hold an advantage over the turf-defenders. It will be fun to see what happens though. Translation: Screw voting and change the map already, man. :)
Oh yeah and....oops, I forgot to link to my Turf FAQ. Never assume other people have 175k bookmark files. ;) This should be version 1.0, by the way, but I am too lazy to change the number.
- Actually, I am not lazy. -
Finally shooting my movie again in earnest. The scenes are moving slowly and we're doing a lot of takes; we're probably going to vault way the hell over budget. Ugh. Still, the performances keep getting better and better. We spent three and a half months casting this sucker and the acting is sure as hell not going to be what one would expect from a student film. I'll probably start babbling about this stuff again soon. I'm also going to be really busy over the next few days, so you're going to get chickenshit updates like this one. Sorry! :)
- Go play in Chaos West -
Just an extra Bit-O-Pimpin™ for CZW, which is kicking ass with a (finally!) growing population, an awesome, Speed-style map by my fellow MMG member Mafia. It's centered around a creepy Pentagram design, with a fresh new J12-type safe zone war just southwest of there. 150 start bounty, a few nifty tunnels and duel-dromes. Go in and enjoy it before Chaos West goes back to its same old problems; the Battle Drone will be around forever, but this map is a rare and possibly passing treat.
If you do play in Chaos West, be sure and visit The Wormhole, the zone's official homepage. The best way for a zone to stay active is for its participants to take an interest in how it is run and keep up to date on news of that zone. No offense to the Chaos East vangels, but that zone has become a haven for the status quo. If you are a progressive player who digs map cycling and the occasional experiment in zone settings, be sure and visit the page (and especially the message board) from time to time.
In the interests of fairness, here is a link to the CZE page as well. For all my spew about West, the East vangels are keeping a tighter zone and making a more organized effort, and their zone continues to be the most frequented in the game.
7/10/98
BAA!
Don't believe what you hear, don't believe what you see; if you just close your eyes you can feel the enemy.
- Awesome New Turf Zone Map -
Chakotay, Vangel G'h0d of Turf Classic East, has just added a maps section to the TCE Homepage. Featured, as if out of nowhere (perhaps I haven't been well enough keeping up on things) is a brand new map by GiGaKiLLeR. It is very nice, and to accompany it is a nice, big, very specific review written by Chak.
I am a bit curious as to why GiGaKiLLeR alone is credited as author when Chakotay explains in his review that four people made the map. Is this a throwback to Happenstance's WZ map? The new Turf map is much more solid and consistent, but has that same scatteredness about it, little spaces of weird ill-fittingness, where it seems that you cross a line and all of a sudden you're in a different zone. I also think there may be too much in the way of homages, tributes, and the wearing of influence on the sleeve, as it were; offhand I can spot eight references. A bit of nostalgia here, or was the Crossroads map perhaps used as a template?
All that aesthetic jabber aside, this may well be the best Turf map yet made. It looks very promising. The only real problem I can see is that there are fourteen entrances to the base ring--more than Crossroads and General Rage put together, I belive. Say bye bye to locking off huge sections of base, but then again in a zone with twenty man frequencies this may be for the better. I think this map should be put up as soon as the Shark issue is resolved and any more scoring tweaks are finalized. It really deserves to be tried out and played on. Til then I will remain a General Rage fan, but I'm keeping a very open mind. :)
Someone remind me to update my Turf FAQ. And actually, while you're at it, someone remind Chakotay that there is a Turf FAQ and he might wish to link it on his page.. ;)
- My Groovy Map Portfolio -
A bit narcissitic perhaps, but I did put it together for a reason other than just to show off. Aside from that, it's something I've been wanting to do for a while. Aside from this page, mapping has been my primary involvement in Subspace, and as my collection of maps grows along with different drafts of my own work, I wanted this page as a way of keeping track of my levels, and more importantly as a personal record of my involvement in the game.
Since I am lately becoming too busy with my movie to spend much time on mapping, and since i'm not sure anymore of how friendly the remaining Subspace community is likely to be toward new work, I've sort of slowed down some of my mapping efforts. It gives me more time to just play the game. Thus there are a few incomplete maps here. The designs are more or less finished, but the playtesting and tiling will take a lot of work and hours that I won't be able to put in for the next several months.
I can think of several mapmakers I asmire--some of whom are retired and very much missing in action--who I wish had pages like this one for me to look through. I hope someone out there enjoys this page similarly, and more important I'd like to suggest that other mapmakers put together similar pages if the idea suits them.
my "super" ! MapExtrava-ganza™
- Reasons to Fear the Chaos West Vangels, Volume One -
<control^> UnGAH!
<control^> !
<control^> I AM GORPON! KING OF THE MUTANT SPACE BATS OF THE PLANET REGIS 9!
<control^> I WILL BE MEETING WITH NERPON, THE GRAND LORP INQUISITOR, KING OF THE ZETAN CLONE BEASTS
<control^> WE WILL DISCUSS THE FUTURE OF EBLANA
<Celest> Cool.
<BossGirl> ok
<BlackShad> wewt. We need some order around here.
<BlackShad> Even if it's kept by Zetan clone beasts.
<Celest> Who are you? Will something cool happen if I op you? =P
- New Autechre Album in Three Days -
If you are anywhere near a good record store, I recommend keeping your eyes peeled for this sucker. I'm betting it's going to be hands down the best album of 1998. Have a listen at the sound clips on the album page for it at the Warp Records site. You will need the RealAudio player to hear these. If you don't have a good record store nearby, you can always order the stuff directly from Warp. No I am not a pimp for the label, I just love them. :)
If anyone from the UK would like to risk an untested purchase, please contact me quick. We could work something out where you buy your copy on the 15th and if you hate it I'll buy it from you....provided that you make me some mp3s for me to listen to in the meantime. ;)
Most recommended: Tracks 2, 3, 7, 11.
7/8/98
We're all going to die.
Then someone will say what is lost can never be saved.
- The Cult of the Final Something? -
Whatever it's called, a lot of people responded. You'd never *guess* who the first two people were. ;) Aside from a few Apollo 18 types, mostly very positive stuff. Whenever the last-ever Subspace game happens, it's going to be pretty big! Meanwhile, it's looking like this is going to be an exercise in dividing the heads from the bowling balls and seeing who really cares versus who would rather be playing Quake 2 because VIE doesn't answer their ICQ floods.
No, I do not know what we're going to do.
BUT it may or may not have something to do with doing what Vangels are supposed to do anyway. Welcome new players, foster creativity and growth, all that good stuff. The CFC Pledge™ is as follows. (This is a beta version.)
I, (ur name here) promise to work with you people for the
furtherance of Subspace even once I start to hate all your guts.
Tomorrow, or possibly later today, I will put up some of the cooler (as well as lamer) things people sent me. I have no idea what this is going to amount to but at least it makes me feel a whole lot better. ;) Join the crusade! The Cult of the Final Call is now accepting recruits, recruiters, donations, and hured mercenaries. What have you done for your obsession lately?
- Chaos West Mops Up -
Today was the first good day for CZW since almost the first of the year. While I was there it peaked out at 109 players. While the settings, geared for a small arena, promoted some rather nasty behavior in a large one, the instant attaching and no greening meant fast action--perhaps too fast, but the J12 war is great :) and it's a good way to get used to a map. The J12-style spiral safe-zone base is actually located at J10 in this map, but people are referring to it as J12 anyway--a first, as far as I can recall. J10 is different, however, especially with the T20-style instant attaching. It may take the new award as the bloodiest fight in subspace. I saw people rack up hundreds of kills (and losses) in under an hour. When one freq is holding the base, it is almost impossible to invade.
Mafia's Chaos map is big and funky. Lots of junk floating around and indeed very chaotic. Short on tunnels for my tastes, but the open space fighting is sweet and you actually see a lot of action around the outside. There were a lot of complaints about vulching, but I personally think this may be just a matter of getting used to the map. You can't very easily detect or avoid a vulch if you aren't familiar with your surroundings.
It always amazes me how much more enlightened certain individuals must be than myself with so much less experience. here I am with maybe 150 to 200 hours experience in mapping, writing about maps, and playtesting maps, and yet I still need to actually fight in the various parts of a map in order to make a judgement about it. Compare to the deft holistic critiquing that led to such cogent statements as "this map sucks" and "the map sucks" after only a brief look at the alt-key display. Impressive indeed. If only we could clear up political and social issues this way! Oh wait, a lot of us still do, don't we....scratch that.
- All Hail the Sync Turret! -
That's right, you heard me. I enjoy having that thing around. The sucker's not all that hard to kill, he's friendlier than half the populace of the zones he inhabits, he gets negged a lot and never complains, and if my understanding is correct he has four copies of Subspace and a pretty nice connection. Unfair? Hell yeah! If God had wanted life to be fair, he wouldn't have invented people. (Or 19" monitors, heh.) It's an interesting twist, it's not ruining things any more than the good old fashioned turrets do, and it's cute. I think you people who hate the sync turret are bloody jealous.
It also bears mentioning that if ol' Sync has actually purchased four copies of the game and is arranging for his synch in hardware, as most of us suspect he is, VIE would be violating his rights and a customer by banning his play style from the servers. It should, however, perhaps be made an option to ban such turrets from player servers.
7/5/98
Happy Fifth of July!
We sleep in the mornings. We dream of a ship that sails away, a thousand miles away.
- No News? -
Nearly every page has been lamenting the lack of news in Subspaceland of late. The Minefield alone dares to ask the question: Why is there no news? Who is responsible for this lack of interesting stories or events? Gee, hmm, could it be us? :)
Think about it. Read back to the old news posts. How much of the news you see is about VIE and the people who work for it? Meanwhile, how much of the news came about because of the actions of forward-thinking, enthusiastic players from a vibrant and clever community? I remember a time when we didn't sit around waiting for things to happen. The players organized and debated and drew lines in the sand. I remember the first time I read the TTL and followed a link to the Blind Justice Jihad, and thought to myself, this is the coolest fucking game in the world.
Where is all that enthusiasm and dedication now?
Well let's see. There are four regularly updates Subspace pages, aside from the legions of pages whose authors spend days on the html, hire a "staff" then vanish off the face of the earth. This accounts for six or seven people. There are two fairly active Vangel pages, each with painfully low participation on the message boards. The Suggboard is in ruins; apparent victim to the defeatist philosophy that Subspace is in its final version and VIE will not listen to suggestions. Has it occurred to anyone that VIE may someday make another game? Has it occurred to anyone that other developers like suggestions too? How about the time-honored tradition of telling your friends an idea you have simply because it is an interesting idea? It's one thing to be inactive in a discussion and another thing entirely to discourage others from throwing in their own two cents.
I think a bit of it might be the nostalgia factor, and the fact of Subspace being an apparently shrinking community. Perhaps we all know each other too well for there to be any serious enmities or rivalries to speak of. Did Burst fail to produce a game with a true span of moral greys? Has good won out over evil by simple virtue of the evil players having too short an attention span and too low a creative drive to become seriously involved in this game?
Has anyone seen Mr. Savoy lately?
There are a few nice scenarios on the horizon. The 2xT3 servers are alive with new ideas. Now and then an interesting thread crops up on the TTL. Well, sort of. But just imagine what would happen if Cybrid, Omicron, Imago, and Famous Anus were all buried alive in a freak coal-mining accident tomorrow. This game would end that very same day.
For quite some time, to spite those who said this game was dying, I have maintained that I will be the last one out the door when it happens. I will call to have the phone and utilities shut off. I will turn off the light and nail boards over the door. That was kind of funny to joke about until I started envisioning it actually happening. What scares me is not the prospect of Subspace's demise but the idea that no one is really very upset about it. How many times have you seen the following statement, or something like it? "Subspace is dying. I've been playing a lot of StarCraft and Quake 2." I feel as though, without actually becoming much more dedicated to this game, I have nonetheless become more dedicated than just about everyone else. What has happened to all the people who in my newbie days impressed me with their obsessive love for the game? I am sure I am not alone in this respect. I would bet that those of you who consider yourself loyal to this game, who daily work to keep it fresh and moving, once felt quite unspectacular in this loyalty and dedication. I would bet that a year ago, or even six months ago, you felt surrounded by that sentiment. Today, if you still play this game and you retain that attitude, you are a marvel. Why is this?
- The Cult of the Final Call -
Or, um, something. I am thinking of starting a cult. There are people who do nothing but play Chess. The CEO of Nintendo of Japan plays no game other than Go. Isaac Asimov got up with the sun and typed until the sun set, practically every day of his life. John Gardner spent seventeen hours a day revising. I bet there are professional basketball players who don't play much baseball. Or attend every party to which they are invited, or see a lot of movies, or a number of other things.
Allow me the luxury of a bold, shocking, bloody damned obvious statement. Subspace is a better game than Chess. (It is also a better game than basketball.) I want to know if anyone else out there has given up a lot of things for this game; I want to know who is going to lock up with me when the Subspace heads off to the Great Emulator Page in the Sky. I want to hear from those few remaining among us who would draw blood over this game, and I want us to pool our ideas and do something more about the state of Subspace than wring our hands and wonder about Harmless and debate player control of the VIE zones. Completely apart from the specifics of zones and politics, I think the players can and should control the fate of this game. What I need to know is how many people are willing to put in the work and stick it out to the very end. Yes, there will be meetings. Yes, we will carry out secret assassinations of our enemies. All that good stuff. Mail me. For real this time; I mean it. Mail me, but only if you mean it. The very last people out the door. And spread the word, please.
7/4/98
Happy Fourth of July!
We knit a web to catch one tiny fly for our world without sound
- oops -
I almost forgot! Happy 4th of July. :)
- Return of the Templar Knights -
control informs me that this once-great squad of early version Chaos fame is gearing up for a reuinion and a return to glory. More on this later tonite when I have a chance to get the story straight.
- Incoming Scenario -
VectorBoy's impending Star Trek scenario is only a week away. Signups are still being accepted for the Federation side. Write to VB at ICQ://597238 for more information, or again, check back here tonite when I have time to mention more about it.
- A Kewl 4th Page -
Shockw@ve, a retired Space Police and recipient of the Minefield Award™ for Excellence in Quitting Subspace, has made a nifty 4th of July page. It's simple but a nice tribute, and I thought since I'm not doing much here I should link to it. Outside of Subspace, Shockw@ve goes by the name Ashen and keeps a regularly updated page of designs, logos, art, photography, etc. He is best known, of course, for creating the SCF's awesome Evil Sheep banner. :)
Go have a look at his page and poke around the site some. He even has a super-narcissistic page of all his CD covers somewhere. ;P
- I am not taking the day off! -
Well, maybe not. :) For all the work that was put into the founding and building of this country, I find it a bit weird to see so many pages announcing in advance that they are taking the day off. Sure, you take the day off from work to hang out with family or friends and party some, you take some time to watch fireworks, etc, and far be it from me to chastise anyone for not updating their pages. What I can't quite figure out is the whole "this page is closed in celebration of Independence Day" thing that some of the pro magazine and news pages are doing. I don't think it's wrong; just a little goofy.
Having said that much, yes, I know this is not a proper update, but I'm damned well going to write one today if there's any news worth mentioning and if I have time to mention it.
7/3/98
Spider and I sit watching the sky on a world without sound.
- Soul Reaver Information, Please -
(very very off-topic)
Tonight I went on a little Legacy of Kain kick, hunting around the web for information about Soul Reaver, the upcoming (supposed) sequel to Blood Omen. I'm a bit out of it lately, having devoted myself more or less to Subspace, but I can't help keeping a special place for Blood Omen, and the screenshots for Soul Reaver are looking very nice.
Anyway so I find out it's not authorized. Crystal Dynamics seems to have taken their payment of Silicon Knights' development costs on Blood Omen as meaning they now own the rights to the story and characters as well as the actual game developed for them, and are making the sequel in-house. As anyone who reads this page often can probably guess (wink) I am very angry to hear this.
Unfortunately, the newest stories on any of the gaming sites is about Silicon Knights filing for an injunction against Crystal Dynamics. I can find no news on whether or not they succeeded, nor any information on events since. If anyone can point me to a source for this, not to mention just a general good source or forum for Kain fans, please contact me.
7/2/98
News of the Day
Spider and I sit watching the sky on a world without sound.
- Extreme Games is back. -
After a hiatus almost too short to bother announcing, Extreme Games is back up on its old server, 2xT3. Wampit at Maxig reported Tuesday that the zone would be back shortly, and it did indeed return soon after. What was not mentioned is that EG is now sporting a new map--no big deal if you know how often EG changes its map (this is the 6th in my collection, how about you?)--but this is a great map. It may even live up to RX7's promise of being one of the best maps ever.
The down side is it's a patchwork map, pasted together from designs by Arctos, The Romulans, B8 Factor, T2-17, Gommy, VIE, and I think maybe Starseed. What sets it aside from other patchwork maps is a genuinely creative application of old structures into new bases. The old WZ castle is grafted onto a system of tunnels, and a mean dynamic has been added to the Keep. Half of an Armada base is stuck onto T2-17's tower. Arctos' famous double spiral is used as a juncture. Only B8 Factor's combs are left relatively untouched, and while I'm not sure I like this fact, that structure stands apart from the others in that it has never seen life in an active zone.
The center greening area is sort of sectioned off, allowing flaggers to avoid most of the bullshit that used to end up wasting your time after dying or on your way to a base. A nice amount of open space and sparse placement of structures, added to EG's weird radar settings, give a creepy sense of isolation and travel over long distances. Best of all, there are brand new structures incorporated into this map as well, many of them intelligently designed. My only criticisms of this map are that it is sloppily edited in places, with entrances placed a bit haphazardly and some of the structure grafting seemingly without motivation. Despite this, I am really impressed with this map. It is probably the first really respectable patchwork map. Props out to RX7 and Pent for it, and to EG in general for having the balls to finally put up a full size level when smaller designs seem increasingly to be the norm.
Go play in Extreme Games. :)
- How many shopping days til Christmas? -
Subspace.PCGaming.Com has scooped us all. Are these the same people who put out the Easter candy displays on the day after Valentines? :)
Someone want to break the news to QA Man? ;)
- Turf Bug Remains? -
According to Julius Caesar per his posts to the TCE Board, Chakotay's changing the Turf scoring from Territory-style to Periodic did nothing to stop the crashes. Whether the flag reward divider was actually deactivated is unclear. It may be that Turf flags don't refer to that setting, but indications seem to be that it should. Let's hope some solution is found and that the zone returns to life.
- Alpha Zone?. -
For some reason I've been playing in Alpha Zone recently. More surprisingly, I've been turretting there. I realized tonight that I never actually did that, so I figured what the hell, and got a turret frequency together. Weird. Anyway it just goes to show that there are always things to do in this game when you get bored or frustrated with something else. I'm wondering if I'll ever run out of reasons to play.
- Silence! -
Not much else going on. Shot a bit more for my movie and realized it will probably take until mid-September to really complete principle photography, plus at least half a year to cut together. I don't know if I can sit at one of those annoying little editing tables for that long. :/ We get our first dailies back today sometime. Wish me luck. :)
- Music! -
Check out these unbelievably yummy sound clips from the new Autechre album. Tracks 2, 3, 7, 10, and 11 are especially good. ;)
7/1/98
Happy July!
When I am king you will be first against the wall, with your opinion which is of no consequence at all.
- Ding dong, the Turf bug is dead. -
From the Turf Classic page today....heartening news, though I wish it had come about by way of other circumstances.
Tuesday 06/30/98
As you all have undoubtedly noticed einexile has flamed me on all the boards...
I don't like flames... I don't like them at all. But e does have a point.
These months have proven that it doesn't work as we all would have wanted
it to work. The scoring has been switched to Periodic reward.
I forgot about the word "flame". I suppose Subspace isn't accustomed to genuine article flame wars. My roots are in the indie music listservs--often some of the nastiest forums online, despite also usually being intelligent and informative. As one might guess, back when I was an active poster I had a set of fans on one hand and on the other hand a horde of people who wanted my head on a plate. I guess some of that shows up here every now and then, but I'm a bit more mellow now, especially in Subspace matters. I guess I do get pretty nasty from time to time. It is not ever for an arbitrary reason, however. I love this game and hate to see it failing. When I see it failing because of someone's coordinated efforts, I can become very angry.
Having said that much, I did pull my punches with Chakotay, and did write those message board posts as angry admonishments to a friend--one with whom I had discussed the situation privately on a number of occasions with no result. It's the Vangels' job to help the game, and while I admit that, yes, I was too nasty and such bile has been known to do more harm than good, I resent Chakotay's labeling of my posts as flames. The word implies an unnecessary and cheap attack, an attack based on petty details or a misrepresentation of some sort. Not only did I post those messages as responses to rude flames against VIE (and Blackie & BFrog specifically) in which Chakotay actually cursed them out for not taking better care of his zone, but my posts did, after all, change his mind. I frankly don't see how a person can be won over by an argument and still label it as a flame. Yes, my posts were blunt. In a way they were mean. I kind of wish I was a little better at that. But they were honest and to the point, and I maintain that they were necessary.
The question I now have on my mind, which perhaps should have been on my mind eariler, is will anyone want to play Turf after all this? I hope I haven't spoiled the fun for Chakotay or anyone else. If I have done so then I am genuinely sorry.
An added note. At the risk of nitpicking, I'd like to point out that we did not all want the team divider to work. While I'd never go so far as to wish it didn't work, I think team size division sucks in its own right. It is a narrow view of the conflicts between different kinds of teams, and ignores several important aspects of the game. Anyone who has organized a successful public flagging freq should know this.
- Woohoo! -
It's July, and you know what that means! That's right, I get to change my Kate Moss calendar!@#
Then again, there's my Alphonse Mucha calendar....a picture of Sarah Bernhardt with a double chin. Blah. Back to the title page we go for Mr. Mucha...
- Music -
The new Red Snapper single is out and it is awesome. Red Snapper are pretty unique in that they are essentially a three piece avant garde jazz band on the premiere electonica label. Warp put out that Boards of Canada album I was raving about the other day, as well as Broadcast, who are prominently featured on my "other" page. Aphex Twin, Autechre, Squarepusher, Plaid, Nightmares on Wax, LFO, and so on. And this cool little rocking weird jazz band. This is called Bogeyman. The single is just four different mixes, but all so different from one another that it makes for a satisfying listen all the way through.
Thinking about those old mailing lists and finallt getting back in touch with my fly friend *k-j* has got me in the mood to do a music page. It might just be a subset of this one, or a separate one. I was once fairly well-known (and yes, fairly well-disliked) for my music reviews and rants. First I need to see if anyone else is doing the sort of page I am thinking about. If you're interested in contributing anything please let me know.
