Wertle's Journal

Books
It's easy to take for granted, but the library is pretty much the greatest thing ever.

I haven't just been focusing on games since moving to LA; there are plenty of books I'm plowing through. Living right next door to the library has inspired me to use it, it would seem. Here's what I've finished so far.

Moby Dick, which I'd never read before. I liked it a lot! Even the whaling sections! I think it has to do with my insanely fast pace at reading: it made all those informational chapters feel like pleasant asides, nothing that I had to plow through. As I mentioned in a status update before, it could just run in the family (my brother is a big Melville fan).

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I always got this and To Kill a Mockingbird mixed up, because they both had birds in the title. I enjoyed this read quite a bit as well, even though I foresaw the inevitable end. It was tough, but fascinating and well-contained.

Shardik. In spite of Watership Down being my favorite book ever, I realized I'd never read any of Richard Adams' other stuff. Shardik was a focused journey story, and had a lot of the same feel as Siddhartha to me. I think I prefer Adams' animal-POV stuff, but it was a good read nonetheless.

Next up on my plate are The Forever War and another Adams' book, Traveller

Fourth of July Fun and Feasts!
What a day of splendor! I spent the holiday with Josh, and we had a fantastic adventure of a day! Our primary goal was to defeat the grill and make something tasty, using the book that my mom lent us as a guide for proper grillin. We picked up some porterhouse steaks from Whole Foods and inevitably, as always happens when Josh and I go to Whole Foods, we indulged in purchasing way more tasty food than we'd originally planned.

I was pleased and surprised to see that the Whole Foods in Pasadena carries Garlic Expressions - my favorite salad dressing of all, and I introduced Josh to its majesty via an heirloom tomato & avocado salad, drizzled with the garlicky, vinegary goodness. DELICIOUS!

We also picked up fancy cheeses and breads and apple butter, which proved to be fine supplements to the steaks (which, I may add, were grilled to absolute perfection). Afterwards, we finished devouring the rest of the cherry-blueberry pie I baked yesterday.

In addition to the foody decadence, we played games (finishing Gears of War 2 finally, and starting through Half Life 2 Episode 2) and had not one, but TWO naps! It was the finest and laziest way to spend a holiday.

Huzzah!

Twilight Princess
Twilight Princess checked off my video game list! I finished tonight, and was extremely pleased with the game. I enjoyed it through and through, especially a lot of the items and mechanics that I wasn't used to, and the storylines were all great. I really loved the relationship between Midna and Link that grew throughout the entire game - it was beautifully nourished (and I even shed a few tears at the very end!)

Creating believable relationships in games, and making you really care about characters, is hard as all get-out, as we all know. Many times if a game tries very hard to make you feel a connection to a character, it feels forced, contrived, and induces eye rolling and scoffing (*coughcough*GearsOfWar*cough*). The Midna relationship, however, grew and changed and was believable, and I latched right onto it. I feel like just about everything in that game (from the story, to the animations, to the audio) served that character relationship, and it worked!

Also, Twilight Princess has some of the best end credits ever. When I finish a game, I want the end credits to wind down the experience - a nice ease out of the interest curve. Credits that give nods back to the story and show "what happened after" are wonderful and gratifying. I'm pretty sure these end credits were the most pleasing I'd experienced since Final Fantasy VI.

Well...7 games left! I'd better pick up the pace! :) I doubt I'll make it by the end of the summer, but I'll keep working at it.

Pedigree Dog Documentary
An interesting (and somewhat disturbing) documentary on the genetic problems with pedigree dogs, yoinked from Klandagi.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=44215931

Now, I know most people on the internet don't want to spend an hour watching a video, so I've highlighted a few interesting moments in the documentary. Scrub on! I do recommend watching the full thing, however. This is a BBC documentary, so focuses on British pedigree dogs and show dogs.

I find it particularly interesting during the part where they compare show breeds today to how the breed looked a hundred years ago (scrub to 6:40 to see).

One commenter notes how dog show judges have a huge impact on the direction the breed takes, since breeders will produce dogs to win shows.

At 16:30, the documentary points out that the Kennel Club had its roots in the Eugenics Movement. Captain Kirk would be outraged! Joking aside, though, wouldn't it be fascinating it we exercised the same attitude in human models as we do with show dogs, as far as selective breeding for desirable traits? I wonder what they would end up looking like after 50 years?

Someone draw a picture! I want to see a concept.

At 18:40, I discovered that 1 in 20 Rhodesian Ridgebacks is born without a ridge. Fascinating! Listen to the breeder talk right afterwards about what a shame it is that these new uppity vets won't put down a healthy puppy for its lack of ridge.

At 24:00, it talks about how pet insurance is more expensive for a pedigree dog than a mutt due to the health implications, which I find smirk-worthy.

32:00 shows another interesting comparison between the original and today's pug, and 40:40 compares the change in the basset hound.

43:50 reveals a conflict of explanation of the anatomical features of the bulldog between bulldog breeders and dog historians. The idea of unusual explanations to justify non-traditional traits as being traditional is something I run into a lot in the martial arts world, and so I can empathize with the frustration of the historian.

49:40 finishes up talking about an activist raising awareness on syringomyelia in King Charles Springer Spaniels (an issue frequented several times throughout the documentary), and the resistance offered up by breeders of the dog.

So there you go, I hope my highlights may have gotten a few more people to watch a bit of this. Comments?

Squee!
I am full of happy, you guys. A near-full month has flown by right under my nose, and I am completely at ease with the pace. I don't feel like I'm in a hurry for anything.

I love my job! The Insomniacs scooped me right back up into their pack, and I feel completely at home there. I love my team and I love the work that I'm doing, and I try every day to be grateful for it and for how lucky I am.

I also love the place that I live. There are so many flowers piled up outside my window, and every day hummingbirds zoom about and drink out of them. It smells wonderful! I was hesitant about choosing to live by myself out here at first, but now I'm very glad I did. Owning my space has inspired me to take responsibility for it, and I've made it into a place where I am happy to be. I took Joyce's suggestion and printed out several photos from my trip to the Phipps Conservatory, framed them, and hung them about my apartment.

The greatest thing about moving across the country and starting a new career is the opportunity it gives for creating good habits. It's like a clean slate for starting up routines.

I've been cooking regularly again, like I used to before grad school, and I have a little herb garden which I use just about every day.

I've started riding my bike to work every day, and I've been stretching every morning and every night. It's like I'm getting healthy again, or something!

Anyway, I'm trying to burn a solid memory of how I feel these days into my mind, so that when I run into hard times in the future, I can call it back up and smile.

Training
A week into work and already things are in full swing! I am extremely happy :)

Now that I am a Dr. Professional Game Designer, and now that I have some threads of consistency to schedule around, it's time to start training! That is, it's time to start catching up on games that I have been intending to play. As I started making a list and a plan, I realized that this is rather like having a workout schedule or an exercise program.

Dividing daily workouts between cardio, upper body strength, lower body strength...dividing daily game playing between the Wii, the PS3, the PS2, the PC...it's amusingly similar.

An issue to contend with is my budget: I'm in no place to start buying games, even used ones, so I'm starting with what I already have or what I can scrounge up for free or very cheap, via Insomniac's game library or Gamefly or whatever. Jake at work suggested that I could scrap by pretty well on demos and betas, and gave me a multiplayer beta voucher for Uncharted to get started (it rhymes, tee hee!).

So, here's my starting list of games to either beat or sample.

Wii
1) Twilight Princess - which, I realized the copy I have doesn't even belong to me, it's DC's! I borrowed it and never gave it back because I'm a TERRIBLE FRIEND

PS3
2) Ratchet and Clank: Quest for Booty - hooray for Insomniac freebies!
3) Assassin's Creed - I feel like I practically played through most of this when watching Joe last spring, and I would like to play the sequel when it comes out, so I need to catch up
4) Far Cry 2 - I saw so many talks about this game at GDC this year that I want to check it out and see what's what
4) Flower - I only got to play a tiny bit when we were playing it at Schell, so I went ahead and bought it

PS2
5) Fatal Frame - oh how you taunt me! This game is effing hard, but not in a discouraging way, in an "omg I must conquer you!" way. I'm gonna get myself a guide and play through and have enough film for the last two nights. SO THERE!
6) Ico - this gets referenced and brought up in game design discussion so much that I simply must play it for research.

PC
7) Half-Life 2 - I had a pretty good run playing through this game until I got myself stuck under a pipe because I wanted to see if I could fit under there. It happens. Anyway, research!

DS
8) Rhythm Heaven - because i almost beat it when I borrowed it from Carlos, and had a super fun time with it!

8 Games in one summer, can I do it?

Banana Tortilla
So I've been in my new apartment for a few days, but my stuff won't get here until tomorrow. Thus, being left with my cast iron skillet, my travel/camping spice kit, a banana and some corn tortillas, this delicious treat was created...

Ingredients:

1 banana
2 corn tortillas
cinnamon
honey
vegetable oil

1) Drizzle some oil on the cast iron skillet and heat it up, medium-high
2) Slice the banana and throw the pieces on the skillet; sprinkle pieces with cinnamon
3) After about 30 seconds, flip the banana slices and sprinkle cinnamon on the other side
4) Remove banana slices and divide between two corn tortillas. Drizzle with honey and fold the tortillas over
5) Heat the banana-filled tortilla on the skillet, about 15 seconds each side.

Enjoy!

As for other updates, I LOVE my apartment in Burbank. Love it! It is so beautiful, and the area is filled with fragrant flowers, and the view outside my sliding patio door is so pretty and placid. I've already set up an herb garden and printed out a few of my Phipp's photos to hang on the wall.

Once I get all my belongings in and set up, I will be keen on visitors for sure. I start work on Monday: excitement!

Phipps Conservatory
So I went to the Phipps Conservatory today to take some photos. I love my fancy Canon Rebel, but I'm notorious for leaving my camera behind when going on outings, and so I never have any new photos! It seems that if I want to take pictures with it, I have to plan a trip to do so. That's all the well, I'll get better at remembering eventually.

The Phipps is one of my favorite places in Pittsburgh - both the architecture and the overwhelming pleasantness of the botanical gardens. Plus, it has a whole room devoted entirely to orchids, my favorite flower!

You can see all the photos here, but below are a few of my favorite shots. Enjoy!

( Plants and flowers below! )

I took all these with a standard lens kit, though I often was craving a macro lens. I think I did just fine without one :)

Graduation
I have a Masters degree! Wooo! This morning when I woke up, I felt free and full of adventure. I felt like a different person, which did not happen at my high school or undergrad college graduations. It was mysterious!

First off, an update about my grandfather. He was able to get his oxygen intake down and return home, where he is apparently doing well considering the circumstances. Hooray!

When my family came in for graduation on Saturday, we went to Claddagh for dinner. On a Saturday night of graduation weekend, it was unsurprisingly packed, and we had a long wait for our table. Later, they informed us that the wait would be longer, because the kitchen was so backlogged on orders that they weren't taking any new ones until they caught up. They said they could seat us and we could order drinks, but that it'd still be 45 minutes or so until we could order food. We said that was fine.

When the waiter brought us our drinks, he also brought a couple packages of oyster crackers for us, which was very thoughtful. While we were snacking on them, my brother and I theorized that oyster crackers might be tasty with malt vinegar. So we started pouring, very carefully, single drops of malt vinegar on single oyster crackers, then eating them with delight (it was very tasty afterall!)

Well, I think the waiter saw us doing this, and assumed that we were either starving or crazy, because he showed up a few minutes later with the good news that he'd talked to the chef and was going to be able to take our food orders just then. Bwahaha!

The graduation ceremony on Sunday was really nice. Delicious, delicious food! Photos of me looking all masterful here. Afterwards, in true nerd fashion, I took my family to see Star Trek, and everyone enjoyed it. Wins all around!

Speaking of wins, my parents totally surprised me by getting me a PS3 as a graduation gift! I was completely caught offguard! Hooray! Now I can actually play the games that Insomniac gave me! Oh, that too...I know I jabbered about it on facebook and twitter, and most people know about it, but I can't remember if I blogged about it on LJ. I have a job! I'm going to be returning to Insomniac as an Associate Designer. I'MA MAKE GAMES FOR A LIVING!

WOooooooo! Spring Break!

Mountain Dew Commercial?
Does anyone remember, like, a billion Derbies ago, there was that Mountain Dew commercial with Pat Day in it? It started off just with shadows making you think it was some hard core basketball player drinking the mountain dew, then the gate bells sounded and it revealed that it was actually a jockey standing on a bench. He jumped down and said something snarky.

It was hilaaaaaaaaarious! Unfortunately, my google-fu fails me in attempting to dig it up. Anyone?

Home and Back Again
Whew, what a week! Those of you who read my twitter know that last Monday I dropped everything and drove home to Louisville, as my grandfather was in the hospital. He has pulmonary fibrosis, which is basically irreversible scarring of the lungs, and as such cannot so much as sit up in bed without a critical drop in his oxygen levels.

Thus began a typical week of having a loved one with a terminal condition in the hospital, which means I did a lot of dish-washing, laundry, litter-box-cleaning, and brought lunch to my family at the hospital almost every day. Basically, I tried to do everything I could to keep my parents sane. My mom said that just being there helped loads, which I believed, as my extended family converged on the hospital every day throughout the day to be there in support of my grandparents.

My grandfather was in a very bad way on Monday night when I got in, but stabilized as the week went on. He's doing a lot better now, as far as being able to talk with people and such, but still has no oxygen reserve. The goal at the end of the week was to work with the respiratory therapists to get his oxygen intake down to 10 liters (he was on 15, which is too high for him to be able to go home, which is what he wants) and Hospice is involved to try and make things as comfortable as possible. The condition is terminal, but that could mean days, weeks, months...no one really knows at this point, but my grandfather seems to have no intention of going anywhere but home right now :)

The rest of my family is hanging in there, but very tired, especially since any sort of family crisis seems to squeeze out all reserves of drama or family-craziness into the open. I've been a sounding board to the frustrations of family members as much as anything else. It all helps.

So, I want to thank the ballers, especially Scott and Maria, for taking care of me this week while I was taking care of my family. It really meant a lot to me, and really helped me deal with the situation. I love you guys!! <3 <3 <3

Student Loan Stuff
Alright, internet, it's advice time! After consultation with Tracy on money matters, I have decided to consolidate most of my student loans. But, of course, this is going to be much trickier than it was with my undergraduate loans.

You see, every big bank and its brother has suspended their student loan consolidation plans as of last July, so finding a lender is much more of a pain these days. AES, the service through which I have my federal loans, has a listing of consolidation lenders, but there are all small, local Pennsylvania banks. If I were to go with a small bank lender, I'd rather do it with someplace local to where I'll be out in California.

Another option I've been investigating is the US Department of Education's Direct Consolidation Loan, which FinAid and Fastweb point to in light of the banks' suspension of consolidation programs. I am eligible to consolidate all my federal loans in this program, and I would get a decent interest rate, and right now it's my strongest lead.

But, I wanted to double check with you, internet, to see if anyone has heard more about this program? I've searched for reviews or potential horror stories (I don't want to get myself into something akin to Sallie Mae) but haven't found any. If anyone has stories or experiences with the Direct Consolidation Loans, I'd love to hear of them!

Don Quixote
After seeing this particular xkcd (which I can strongly relate to) I realized that, while I know the story of Don Quixote through parodies and pop culture, I've never actually read it. So I picked up from the library and gave it a try.

At first, I was very amused at the silliness of the language, and the fact that the antics were just as ridiculous as portrayed in any parody. But the depth of the story never really changed. There was a shallowness and redundancy to the plot that made it feel less like reading a book and more like watching TV - in particular, like watching a painfully mediocre sitcom.

Occasionally there would be long pages of what was obviously social commentary and satire on some topic from the time it was written, and before long I would skip entire chapters. It's kind of like when you watch a really dated movie that has pop culture references, you think "oh, that's commentary on this thing that happened," and shrug and move on.

Don Quixote is very straight forward, and pretty flat. There's really no change in any of the characters, and the plot devices and antics never really change, either.

When I found that the incident with the windmills happens in the very beginning of the book, and is pretty unimportant to the story as a whole, I was puzzled. But after reading on, I figured it was because very few people probably read much further than that :)

So, Don Quixote, I gave you a solid attempt! It just wasn't working out. Sorry!

Batman Dream
I had a fascinatingly epic dream! For LJ people who hate reading about dreams, a cut. For everyone else, tough luck!

( In which Lisa befriends the Joker )

San Francisco wrap-up
Ugh, I have been sick like a dog all week with post-convention funk. I think I'm finally killing it, though.

So, GDC was fun times for sure, but several of us stayed an extra day over the weekend to hang out around San Francisco. Andy, Edmundo and I stayed with M.E. We got up the next morning and headed for Chinatown to meet Carlos, Carren, and Carren's sister. The goal was dim sum, but no no, not just ANY dim sum.

You see, when the crew went on their ETC West Coast trip two years ago, they went to a specific dim sum place while in San Francisco. They were all determined to find the same place again, but had no idea what the name of the restaurant was, and nothing but fragmented memories about where exactly it was located.

Between looking up dim sum places and seeing if they looked familiar on Google Street View, looking at photos from their West Coast Trip to see if any pictures contained street signs in the background, and trying to combine their memories ("I remember it was at the crest of a hill!" "I think we were parallel to the Transamerica Tower!" and no less than a dozen "THIS LOOKS FAMILIAR!"), we walked up and down nearly every block in all of Chinatown and STILL didn't find the place.

I suggested that perhaps it were a magical place, and you could only find it if you'd never been there before. All the same, I wasn't about to go wandering around by myself to test the theory.

Nevertheless, there is no shortage of good dim sum in Chinatown in San Francisco, so we still had a DELICIOUS lunch!

The other big highlight of the day was going to see the Exploratorium. I had heard many sing the praises of this science museum, and was anxious to check it out for myself. The songs of praise are true! It is, by far, the best science museum I have ever been to. All of the exhibits are 95% interaction and only 5% text (The Louisville Science Center's newest installations could learn from this place for sure) and the interactions were significant and engaging (not just "press this button").

Of course we didn't see it all, and I really wanted to check out the Touchdome, but it was sold out for the day. This is fine, for it will give me an excuse to go back to San Francisco at some point so I can finishing exploring the museum. HEY COLIN!! Can I come visit you sometime so we can go to the Exploratorium? :D

Anyway, it was lovely time spent in San Francisco. (it was actually sunny for the whole week! Not a cloud in the sky! MADNESS!!)

GDC Friday
Today, the conference caught up to me, and it was somewhat lazy. With the exception of getting up at the ungodly hour of 8:00am to go to a Schell Games breakfast, I spent the morning in full nappage. After we checked out of the hotel, I took my napping to the little park area behind the Metreon, where I was lulled to sleep by the water feature.

For lunch I had 2 banana-strawberry-nutella crepes from the fancy food court, which perhaps wasn't the wisest decision I've made, and resumed my lazy day at the bean bag lounge in the conference center. I happened to run into Olivier there, and eventually Drew showed up, and then some Schell Games people, and so on (the more people in a cluster, the more magnetic it is, I guess).

Several of us went to the afternoon talk about level design in Far Cry 2, and how it supports varying player types and allows for player expression. It was certainly an interesting lecture, and drew some fascinating analogies that I'm not sure I agree with, but were interesting nonetheless. More delicious food for thought.

The Schell Games crew bid the fancy food court a final farewell, and now I'm chilling with Andy and Edmundo, waiting for M.E. Chung to come and fetch us and bring us to her abode.

Overall, I had a fantastic GDC! I got to see so many people again, and the talks I did see were very good. A worthwhile experience for sure!

GDC Thursday
Goodness, today was a very busy day! I'll be friendly and cut it for my LJ list.

( Talks, Adventures, Schmoozing, and the Like... )

GDC Wednesday Night
I'm chilling out in my hotel room wearing an outrageous zebra-print bathrobe, for it seems that the hotel provides tacky animal-print bathrobes for all its guests. Classy!

I spent the afternoon schmoozing about the expo floors. The amount of booths on the floor was somewhat dismal, and the career floor was packed, but I suppose that isn't surprising given the times. There was a lot of me introducing people to other people, and a lot of randomly bumping into folks, and other such socialization.

The evening was a restful one - Tracy, Chris and I ordered in food and hung about the hotel room. Afterwards, I joined a pack of ETCers and headed to the ETC Gathering, picking up Drew along the way. The party was loud and crowded in a small space, and I was proud of myself for lasting a good 15 minutes in there. I am, as always, terribly apt to be drained by large and loud social gatherings.

Drew and I then headed over to the top floor lounge at the Marriott to meet up with a bunch of people from Project Horseshoe. Much like the gathering on my first night in San Francisco, this social setting was MUCH more to my taste. We didn't sit and chat for long before someone busted out the card games - Family Business taking the forefront.

Family Business is a fun little card game in and of itself, but the true joy in the game is from the gimmick where all the players have to speak like mobsters. This, of course, amplifies hilarity in every action, and I was happy to observe the rise and fall of the city mobs, particularly the vicious rivalry between Olivier and Brenda (I suspect that feud may last for generations on end!)

Tomorrow I'm planning on hitting up the Valve and Blizzard talks, and hopefully catching up with Steph and Colin if I am lucky.

GDC Wednesday Morning
After a whirlwind of excitement (by which I mean a 5 hour delay in Dallas), I finally arrived in San Francisco last night to be bombarded with social greetings. We're staying at the Hotel Palomar, which is multitudes better than they sketchy place we stayed last year (sans purple track lighting and a palm tree painted on the wall, though) and much much closer to the convention center.

Andy and I met up with Drew and some of the Insomniacs and there was much greeting and hugging. Amusingly, Insomniac and Schell Games seems to have booked the same hotel. Before long, Reagan joined us, having "heard my laugh" from God knows how far across the floor. I'm flattered that my laughter is a beacon, but occasionally embarrassed by how loud it apparently is!

There was chattering and drinking and people came and went and I gave out many hugs. Jesse stopped by, and Schell Games Austin showed up, and then the ETCers started filing in. It was much fun! These are the sorts of social encounters that I truly enjoy, rather than exhausting myself at the IGDA party.

This morning I hit up Clint Hocking's lecture on Fault Tolerance, which was about Intentionality and Improvisation in the design of Far Cry 2. There, Drew and I found and greeted Olivier, and subsequently threw things at Brenda Brathwaite a few rows in front of us (she brandished threateningly and there was much giggling from our row).

The talk itself was very interesting! I thought that looking at gameplay patterns in a cycle of composition/planning phases and execution phases was a pretty insightful way of analyzing how a player interacts with the game, and one I hadn't thought of before. While I think his use of the word "Improvisation" was misleading, the ideas behind it were sound and fuel for much thought. Plus, after chatting with Brenda Harger afterwards, we agreed that having the phrase "Improvisation" more accessible in this industry was a good thing, even if it was not being used accurately. Having it get exposure may lead people to investigate, and that's always good!

After the talk, Drew and I went and grabbed lunch with a friend of his from Infinity Ward whose name slips me. The fancy food court in the shopping center is just as delicious as I remember it! Paninis for the win!

As I expected, I was exhausted after lunch, and in need of a nap. I think I'm pacing myself much better than last year, now that I have an idea of how GDC is gonna roll. Looking forward to social gatherings tonight! Stay tuned for ADVENTURE!

Brainz!
I noticed a weird thing that my brain did the other day...

I was at the animal shelter, and went into one of the cat colony rooms to work on cat socialization (read: petting and snuggling). The cat colony rooms are setup to be like a living room of sorts: a couch, coffee table, some tables, and an abundance of cat trees and toys and hidey holes. This is where they keep cats who enjoy being around other cats.

Anyway, as I sat down to join one of the cats lounging on the couch, I noticed my brain processing information in a particular way, and I found it rather interesting.

When I looked at the cat, I realized "that cat has three legs." But, I noticed that it took me until I sat down beside him for several moments before I'd registered *which* of the three legs he was missing.

I find this kind of bizarre. It wasn't as though I thought "there is something different about that cat" and then after a bit of observation noticed he was missing a leg. No, my brain processed the fact of his three-leggedness all in one go, but it took extra time to notice the specific of which leg was missing. I recall that I even spent several moments looking at his hind legs to find the missing leg before seeing that it was one of his forelegs.

Is this not a strange ability? Maybe it is similar to reading - how I tend to process text in big chunks at a time before actually seeing their individual components.

Or maybe I just think too much.

As an aside, the three-legged cat was very friendly and snuggly and seemed perfectly at home with only having three legs.

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