A Genuine Three-Parter, Written Yesterday

Part One: My Damned Car

My car quit working again tonight. It hasn't been working, really, but I've been able to fix it in odd ways (tricking it into thinking it was crushing a baby, resetting the system, having disillusioned Best Buy employees lift it for me, etc.). It just plain stopped for me tonight. If I see Corwin (our resident Handyman -- the one who calls me Tony Stark), I'll have him lift it for me before I go to Plano. Otherwise, I'm going sans wheelchair.

This is really cramping my style. I wanted to make an omelet tonight. I wanted to go get eggs, ham, mushrooms, milk, and cheese. This isn't too much for me to want, right? But no. I can't get my goddamn chair in the car, so I can't get my goddamn ass in Central Market.

Well, I could, but...Christ, it's complicated. Something about a fear of being trampled or stared at or being sighed at by people who move faster than I. Something like that.

I'll call the place in Mesquite tomorrow morning to see if they could fit me in this weekend. It won't affect my plans to see Step Brothers and The Dark Knight (again). Breakfast burritos tomorrow night. I'm definitely, definitely excited about that.


Part Two: My Review of the First Four Hours of Final Fantasy IV (DS)

For someone who has never finished the original 2D FF masterwork (it is, indeed, better than VI), I feel a little silly making such a big deal about the 3D remake. I played enough to know what the developers have improved upon and what they haven't.

I can remember the days before Final Fantasy XII, when FF games received more or less zero attention when it came to translating the Japanese originals into well-written English versions. FFXII was brilliant in terms of the vocabulary (save for their unreal pronunciation of "Marquis") used and the somewhat old-school, whimsical syntax changes. I loved it. It pleased me greatly to find that FFIV is similarly translated. Of course, the original translation was pretty piss poor (though the infamous "Spoony Bard" line is still gloriously intact) -- so I'm quite happy to see the remake lovingly cared for in the writing department.

The voice acting is a different story. It's not bad in the grand scheme of things, but it is slightly worse than FFX. That isn't great. The casting of Cecil is odd, too. His voice actor sounds like Tidus in serious mode. That isn't great. They nailed Kain, in my opinion. He sounds more or less like Maximus from Gladiator. Can't go wrong there. All in all, voice acting does not a great game make, so any gripes I have with that are somewhat irrelevant to my overall enjoyment of the game.

On the technical side of things, the graphics are very clean. Better than the remake of FFIII. Much better in a subtle way. The textures are cleaner around the edges. The animation in general is smoother. Good spell effects.

In the artistic arena, however, the graphics puzzle me. The DS, of course, is better for smaller character models, to be sure. However, the characters (more like FFVIII than FFIX) are almost universally dark, troubled, and mature. The "big head" aesthetic doesn't fit the characters whatsoever. It's easy to see why they opted for the caricatured look for the system, but I wish they had put more thought into proportioning the characters so they don't look like dwarves. I think they could've kept the small models without making them look like Timmy.

The battle system needs a faster default pace and more customization with the "auto-battle" system -- a great idea on paper, by the way. I'm not expecting an FFXII gambit system, but certainly more options than one would be great. I don't want my characters always attacking automatically if they're down to 10HP. Just doesn't make sense when I want to level, which seems to be the reason they put the feature in the game in the first place.

It's nice and difficult, though. They pumped the brakes a little on that front from the original, but it's still refreshingly tough.

They left the story untouched, for the most part. No big changes that I can see. They use an in-game engine for most of the cutscenes, which is fine by me. I stopped being blown away by FMV circa 2001, though i did enjoy the opening cinematic. With FF stories growing more complicated (not necessarily more complex, though), it does seem weird that they didn't insert transitional scenes between the gaps of gameplay and "big" scenes to make it feel a little more modern. You update the graphics, you update the gameplay, you update the sound, but you don't update the way the story is told? It feels a little behind the curve.

I'm enjoying the game, but it does beg the question: when is Square going to get around to remaking FFVII? I still can't get over the fact that some designers took the time to make a fucking tech demo, but they all had the gall to say that there were no plans to remake the game. If it's dated gameplay they're worried about, just use FFXII's example. I'd be 100% fine with that. Just get it done.

And that was my terrible review of FFIV. You didn't ask for it. You got it, though.


Part Three: State of the Heather Union

Why, oh why, John, would you be writing about Heather on this fine evening? I've seen her three times over the past seven days or so, twice yesterday. Things are fine from my end. They have been for years. Things have been great for me in general for the past few years.

Actually, I'll do the self-indulgent thing and explain the situation to my only ignorant (to this situation, silly) reader. Ah'em Priya. In case you care.

Maybe you don't.

THAT'S WHY IT'S SELF-INDULGENT!

Anyway, Heather is this girl I dated the summer between high school and college. She was my very first girlfriend. Isn't that cute? Things didn't work out for various, irrelevant reasons.

I wanted things to keep going, but did everything I could to be weird, uncomfortable, and passive-aggressive for about six months. I did a lot to potentially sabotage any friendship we had decided we wanted to have. We've been going in circles since then. I'm fine, she's weird. She's weird, I'm fine. There was a long time where we were both fine. That all kind of changed when Lauren and I got serious. Like "engaged" serious.

Things have just been a little strained. Maybe that's not even the right word. They're just uncertain. I mean, I'm fine. I have no problems with much of anything anymore. It's funny what impending marriage does to your overall view of life. I'm a pretty carefree, happy guy. Heather seems a little less so. Maybe that's just me being hyper-observant.

Maybe if the roles were reversed and Heather was getting married while I was on my eighth or ninth girlfriend since our breakup, I'd feel a little off, too.

I've decided I won't go into specifics, but during the time we spent together this past week, it's clear to me (I think) she's a little weirded out by all of this. I don't know if that's "me-specific" or specific to the idea of getting married in general. Specific in general. Jesus, John. Anyway, I kind of get why she was so resentful of me when I was all weird and shit after the breakup.

Perspective.

Eh, I grow more cautious the more I write. I'm not even that upset about any of this and none of it's really confirmed anyway.

Just a hunch I got.



"L.E.S. Artistes"
Santogold