Played a game of Ticket to Ride tonight. Lost by 5 points to my beautiful bride. Thought I was going to win too having the longest path.
Nintendo Games and Tegotae
Stephen Totilo, over at Kotaku, interviewed Shigeru Miyamoto last month at E3. He asked Miyamoto why Nintendo games feel different. Love the insightful response:
Miyamoto: So you know programming is all about numbers. The challenge is getting this kind of feeling into numbers. So there’s a lot of back and forth between the programmer and myself and the director. We really go in deep about how to create this feeling. We do a lot of back and forth.
Bill Trinen: It actually goes back to the way they designed the original Super Mario Bros., where when they tested it, originally, there was no Mario and there was no person. It was just a block. And you would press the button and see the block move. There’s actually a word in Japanese that describes what you’re talking about–the feeling–which there is no word for in English. In Japanese it’s called tegotae..
Joe and the God who helps
Joe, over at Theology Gaming, writes about Dark Souls and community. You can read more here.
There’s a life lesson in here somewhere. How many times in my own life have I set out with unwavering determination to accomplish a thing, armed only with my own knowledge and experience? More frequently than not those experiences serve to remind me that I don’t know as much as I thought I did. It’s certainly not that I think I know it all; I just think I know enough.
Congrats to Game Store Prophets for 5 Years!
Wanted to take a moment and congratulate Mike Perna and the Game Store Prophets Crew for 5 years of podcasting excellence. I love the work that Mike does. Not just talking about the concept of a boardgame ministry but actually putting action behind those words. Congrats, Mike!
July 22, 2011 – the first episode of Game Store Prophets went live. We had no idea what we were starting. We were a couple of geeks who happened to have served in ministry positions who thought there’d be something in the idea of bringing those two sides of our lives together into one place. Five years after tackling the oliphant in the room, GSP is just part of the work that we do as part of the larger work of InnRoads Ministries. We’ve seen new hosts, had a number of wonderful guests, and connected with people across the world. – Read More Here
How Wyatt and I got past a sleeping Snorlax
A giant Snorlax blocked the Route 7 bridge. Wyatt wasn’t sure what to do.
He searched for other routes to take. Distracted himself by catching the odd Pokémon. Yet, the Snorlax slept on.
What Wyatt didn’t know is that the game had given him a context clue. The mystical Poké Flute would solve everything. The sleeping Snorlax’s reign of terror was about to end.
Wyatt came to me frustrated. So we pulled up a walkthrough and figured out where he was in Pokémon X. Sitting on my lap, the boy and I discovered that we needed to backtrack to the Parfum Palace. The owner was missing a Furfrou, which happened to be lost in a maze out back. After finding the Furfrou, we were lent the Poké Flute of power.
We dashed back to Route 7, some ninja dude jammed out, and the Snorlax woke up. The Pokémon journey was saved!
What I love about sharing Pokémon with Wyatt is that it is a series he can play on his own. When he comes to a place where he needs help, we can sit down, engage, and devise a way forward. Together.
(As a side note: All my random Pokémon knowledge is finally being put to use. Super funny when I know what the evolved form of whatever-it-is is.)
JohnnyBGamer 