tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-81212724702883378012024-03-13T03:14:07.249-07:00ThejakeblogOfficial Site of writer, anthropologist, musician, games designer, and all-around slacker, Jacob Germain.Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.comBlogger170125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-59351669217044067362016-04-30T17:48:00.002-07:002016-08-07T13:13:46.744-07:00On Employment
A lot of games coming out around now are Open World style, a result of Grand Theft Auto V making a billion dollars or so. Open world designs mean that objectives can’t be narrowly focused into “get from one end of this level to the other” or “beat this opponent” but instead you’re given an objective and frequently you have a small set-piece inside the larger world in which to accomplish that Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-9854566533217534342016-03-26T15:45:00.001-07:002016-03-26T15:45:30.015-07:00On being an interloperAs part of my coursework in college as an undergrad I created a couple of ethnographies after doing participant observation in a couple of different communities in my life. I chose to focus on communities that I was already at least tangentially a part of rather than trying to integrate into a new community or two into my already somewhat busy social/personal life. This felt Ideal to me, as I Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-14252450005498807712016-03-13T03:26:00.000-07:002016-03-13T03:26:07.120-07:00What Did We Learn
My Grandma has this belief that we’re put here on this earth to live our lives the way they unfold and for our immortal spirits to learn something from the lives we lead. It could be something very big, it could be something very small, but regardless we’re here to learn and learn we will. My friend has the belief that we’re essentially the same spirits repeated again and again, and the two of Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-60357896279811250582015-07-23T19:14:00.001-07:002015-07-23T19:14:40.256-07:00Re: some mario maker early preview coverage
So I don’t normally do this because a) console wars are literally the dumbest possible conflict and b) gamers in generally tend to be aggressively wrong in a way matched only by hardened rightists so the folks who need to hear this probably won't, but this particular article irked me in just the right way that I want to respond to it.
To contextualize this discussion here I want to point out Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-10082007299900903102015-07-20T15:31:00.000-07:002015-07-20T15:47:45.011-07:00Six Totally Unexpected Reasons Reviewing Games is Harder Than You Think
I gotta stretch this out into more of a personal blog entry to cohere this into something that isn’t just a real facile aphorism. So, I’m reading Nathan Rabin’s latest year of flops on av club, since I guess the spinoff website thing didn’t work out and Nathan is back at the site that loves/hates him. Anyway it’s a review of So You Wanna Marry Harry, a singularly puerile (and those who know me Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-22755182757815667882015-06-14T12:33:00.000-07:002015-07-20T16:00:55.238-07:00End-of-History Illusion<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-36419480064824059072014-10-08T09:15:00.002-07:002014-10-08T09:16:38.736-07:00On Reading Art
There is a vast and inescapable gulf between creators and the folks who enjoy stuff that’s been created. This gulf is inevitable. Art is created to convey messages, from top to bottom. Even art that’s created for the sole purpose of “this thing is aesthetically appealing” is still conveying a message about what “aesthetically appealing” is. Plot that’s merely created as a device to move a Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-31607322434831710312014-09-29T10:59:00.000-07:002014-09-29T10:59:03.333-07:00On humans and hierarchies
There’s been this sort of interesting idea kicking around in my head that essentially the only judgments humans can make without needing a cultural reference to back it up is whether a thing is good or bad. Indeed whether a thing is good or bad is often what many descriptions boil down to. A critical review my expound on the myriad factors involved in a work, but ultimately these factors fall Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-59432090774966889612014-07-22T23:12:00.002-07:002014-07-30T06:47:47.451-07:00Skylanders: Swap Force
Three years after its initial iteration, Skylanders shows no sign of slowing down, cannabilizing entire store aisles with cartoon bits of plastic and innovation. The first real adaptation of NFC technology in video games has been a wild success, nailing a vulnerable target market (children) with consumer capitalist dream toys: little devices that a video game requires in order to function. A Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-50753199413213234552014-05-01T09:08:00.003-07:002014-05-01T09:08:42.061-07:00praxis
What am I afraid of? Why is it so hard for me to sit down and write?
I’m afraid that I don’t really have any worthwhile or new ideas and I’m afraid that what ideas I do have will inevitable come out wrong and be interpreted in weird, distorted ways. Not that any of this is new. I think the biggest and clearest part of this slump I can point to was stepping outside my comfort zone yet sticking Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-76224308932134694912014-02-27T22:00:00.001-08:002014-02-27T22:00:32.257-08:00
I only have one feeling: infinite and soul-crushing anxiety.
I was thinking earlier about this: I am honest because I cannot believe anyone around me
When I do believe; when I am so fooled; when I am vain
I cling to it like a drowning man to styrofoam, lost in the sea of maybe abandoned by the good ship s.s. jake
Even my dreams lie to me.
Especially my dreams. Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-51259034564626737382014-01-08T01:19:00.000-08:002014-01-08T01:19:15.171-08:00Post-Gay
Since the dominoes are falling or the jenga brick has been removed or satan has arrived on earth to damn us all or whatever and gay marriage (that is marriage between two people of the same sex, whose sexual activities are bizarre foreign and probably disgusting to all right-thinking heterosexuals) is becoming legalized and all kinds of movements are insisting on the right of homosexuals to liveCoyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-39343059463428357012013-11-23T19:15:00.003-08:002013-11-23T19:16:09.804-08:00Laziest Generation
The whole point of these missives, this writing exercise, those monographs is to share some kind of knowledge, some wisdom, some truth hard fought and hard won. You’re supposed to come away having a better appreciation for life and your place in it. The problem is, of course, that there needs something to be said before that writing can occur.
It’s 2:13 a.m. and I’m eating pepperjack and Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-70840457003935405952013-10-21T23:42:00.002-07:002013-10-22T00:03:24.462-07:00On obsession and desireIt’s eight and I’m at the bar and I’m feeling a little down and I’ve got a whiskey and diet and I’m thinking about him and where it went down and what I should have said
He’s still out there somewhere and probably not even thinking about me and I’m just sitting here and I should contact him. I don’t want to bother him, don’t want to risk making a worse impression than I already have
“I don’t Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-66706408496131458612013-10-19T14:28:00.000-07:002013-10-19T14:32:02.336-07:00Creative Content
Oh man a lot of stuff has happened lately, yet I haven’t written at all. I don’t even know what writing is any more. I’m just hitting buttons and this little counter on the bottom corner keeps going up. I’m already at 42! “Word” is the best game Microsoft has made since “solitaire.”
I keep reading these articles (I read all the articles) about millenials and the generation gap and junk like Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-82170085927776687712013-09-10T22:43:00.003-07:002013-09-10T22:44:29.437-07:00Look at banner, Michael!
Sometimes when I’m particularly bored or particularly procrastinating, I read about various proclamations of my personality. Partly it makes me feel good about myself (because pretty much all my personality profiles say that I’m smart and sexy and basically awesome, which I am, so that’s cool) and partly it helps me conceptualize myself from a perspective outside my own. I have a problem pretty Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-29036259691961186792013-08-26T02:22:00.002-07:002013-08-26T02:31:02.763-07:00I was asked to write this
A long time ago in the hoary old ages of time when I still shaved regularly and wore even stranger outfits and personally communicated with as few people as I could get away with (colloquially known as “the years I had to move my mid-tower from room to room searching for a wifi signal I could airsnort into”) I got involved in local politics. Mostly I did it out of some residual respect I had forCoyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-86003355535775628982013-08-16T10:27:00.002-07:002016-04-30T18:13:10.024-07:00Porn Review Special Report: Various Paraphilia
When I first decided to do these reviews, I only had one particular work in mind for a review. That work is the Unending Breast Expansion Add-venture, a collaborative choose-your-own-adventure style interactive erotic fiction document (whew) that debuted in 1998 as a paraphilia-themed version of other popular collaborative fiction projects. As the name would indicate, the primary paraphilia on Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-29710885943096957412013-07-31T05:43:00.001-07:002013-07-31T05:43:45.381-07:00User Generated ContentThe other evening I wrote a short twine game to try and decompress the emotional impact of spending any amount of time online. It's not particularly subtle. You can play it right from your browser here.Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-28665367749431720572013-07-15T22:54:00.001-07:002013-07-15T22:54:47.430-07:00How to do Things with Video Games review
A few weeks back I read and reviewed a book by Dylan Holmes called “A Mind Forever Voyaging,” which billed itself as a history of narrative storytelling in video games. The book has a particular political bent, which is legitimizing the study and cultural importance of video games as a whole. Ian Bogost here in his book “How to do Things with Video Games” has the same political bent, but the Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-91199836882045116832013-07-10T14:48:00.003-07:002013-08-16T10:34:43.490-07:00Rebelde
I’ve been on the bus for just over two solid days now. I have slept for a total of perhaps 4 hours, owing largely to my personal inability to sleep upright. Much of today has been punctuated by accidental microsleeps, closing my eyes and following my mind down some irrational track.
I traveled out of New Orleans on a bus headed for Shreveport, wide eyed and bushy tailed. The bus was crowded, Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-24179345048203298112013-06-29T14:41:00.001-07:002013-10-21T23:55:03.922-07:00Parents
My
dad once told me that the reason he quit facebook after his very brief
time using it was because he wasn’t a narcissist and didn’t think anyone
should care to hear about whatever random thing pops into his head or
whatever. This is sort of fitting with his generally reticent and
private approach to life and is not something I really on any level
understand. I know some people do Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-61983426033741344582013-06-21T14:50:00.004-07:002013-06-22T14:58:09.213-07:00View<!--[if gte mso 9]>
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Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-10306272024782501932013-06-19T12:29:00.000-07:002016-04-30T18:13:10.017-07:00Porn Review Special Report: Breast Expansion
One
of the operating assumptions of this series and of erotic materials in
general is that the female body is sex. The form of a woman is designed
to entice, the function of a woman is to arouse and ultimately climax
the other party, male or female. Breast expansion as a paraphilia is an
expression of this idea in terms of breast paraphilia. Since boobs are
one of the most popularly Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8121272470288337801.post-31179392096460580952013-06-03T19:15:00.001-07:002016-04-30T18:13:10.020-07:00Transfuture Allstars - A Porn Review
In
this day and age, old notions of gender and sexuality are challenged
daily by individuals across the country. Every day I can get up and go
outside and walk a few blocks and bump into at least half a dozen
proponents of queer desire. I live with a drag queen, an embodiment of
an often unspoken acknowledgement that gender is a performance; if not
necessarily a refutation of Coyolxauhquihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11916388464160934382noreply@blogger.com0