One Hit Wonders of the 90s (Part 26)

Hello, dear reader. I have a favour to ask you. The original post begins after all of the asterisks, if you want to skip this.

Now that the One Hit Wonders of the 90s series is over, I'm not going to be doing my weekly revisiting of all these posts (I had to do that to add the new post to the bottom). Thus, I won't be able to catch any broken picture links or deleted videos any more. Yet I want these posts to be as good as possible.

Please, if you happen upon one of these posts, or if you take a walk through a whole bunch of them, let me know if you find anything that doesn't work. You can leave a comment, or you can send me a message using that handy "Contact Me" page linked above.

Also, feel free to let me know what you think of the post or any of the videos!

Thank you.

**************************

As I sit here staring out of the window, contemplating my place in the universe (and avoiding actually doing any writing, except that I'm writing this right now, but if I'm writing this right now then I'm not just sitting here staring, which means....which means I have a headache), a myriad of thoughts run through my head all at once, like a bunch of cars hitting an intersection at the same time because there are no stop lights. Crashing and burning in my mind, disappearing in a puff of smoke almost before I can wrap my head around them. Is this what life is reduced to? Can I aspire to more? Maybe help out with this economic crisis somehow? Or bring about world peace? (Nah, not the last one...I don't look good in a Miss America tiara, though that dress on the other hand...). Maybe just making sure that I leave the world a better place than it was when I found it?

And can any of that measure up to doing a weekly one-hit wonder post?

I think not.

So I shall continue! The fan out there who was beginning to worry can rest assured. I am never going away.

Not without a restraining order, anyway.

It's time for this week's one-hit wonder post! Where I look at a series of one-hit wonder songs that were popular in the 90s and generally make fun of them. Or make fun of me. Or, usually, both. And you get to play videos for hours on end! It's been gratifying to see some visitors recently find one of these posts and spend the next hour or so going through all of them. Really does make these seem worthwhile.

You should really stop enabling that part of me, you know. I may have to put on my happy face.

And you know you wouldn't want that.

As usual, you can find the list I'm taking these from here. But you know you don't want to go look. In fact, you're getting verrrrrrry sleepy.

Hey, wake up!!! You've got some videos to watch.

Here we go!

1) Jars of Clay: "Flood" (#37)



(can I just say how much I love Vevo on Youtube? Thank you, I will)

Obviously this was filmed in Vancouver.

Hmmm...40 days of rain, eh? Where have I heard that before? I'm completely drawing a blank. Maybe if I get up on my two lemurs and ride into that really big ship, it might come to me.

This isn't really a bad song, of course. Lately, we haven't really been getting any *bad* songs on this list (much to my regret, as that makes this much harder!). It's got a pretty good beat and some nice imagery in the video.

Jars of Clay has had a lot of success on Christian radio, and a couple of cross-over tracks, though this is the only one to hit the regular Top 40.

It's good to find your niche, you know? Like I've found my niche among the monstrously unfunny bloggers who are trying desperately to be funny.

I've made a lot of friends here.

2) Tracy Bonham: "Mother Mother" (#32)



No sooner do I say that, then we get a bad one!!! How ironic is that? And how totally unplanned! (and I'm serious about that).

I'm not sure which is worse: her singing to the plinking of her guitar or the rocking out that she sinks into. Or maybe it's that wonderful scream right in the middle of the song? My ears hurt after that one.

The words are kind of fun, with a woman trying to reassure her mother that she's a completely sane and normal person, living life to the fullest.

But in reality, she's Tracy Bonham.

3) Delinquent Habits: "Tres Delinquentes" (#35)



Hispanic rappers!!!! I have to say, I'm still not impressed. The beginning of the video has a good message about Hispanic-American citizens getting out to vote (though for some reason I doubt I would like who they're encouraging people to vote for). I have to say I like the music itself...the Mariachi music, anyway. I could do without the basic beat of the song, though.

It's making my rat hyperventilate.

4) Adam Clayton & Larry Mullen: "Theme from Mission Impossible" (#7)



I've always liked this theme, and this is an interesting rendition of it (wow, has it been 14 years since the first MI movie came out?). I love this arrangement! I think I'm going to get them to do my theme song. For the blog post where I rip off my rubber mask (that looks like it hurts so much) and reveal that I'm actually Stephen King slumming as a hack blogger.

5) Robert Miles: "Children" (#21)



Wow, what an awesome song! If you like electronica, anyway. I can see why this was Miles' only Top 40 hit, though. The masses don't really go in for instrumentals like this too often, so the fact that this one even caught on is surprising in itself.

I've always wondered about instrumental songs like this, though. How the hell do they come up with the names for them? How do you listen to this song and say "Aha! Children!!" I guess sometimes it's a mood thing, but often I'm just left wondering.

Doesn't mean I don't like the music. Electronica like this is among my favourites. But the mind does boggle. (And my mind can't afford to boggle, as it's messed up enough as it is).

6) Crucial Conflict: "Hay" (#18)



Oh no! Another rap invasion! (I think I'm using up my stash of exclamation marks with this post, actually).

This song is crap, and that's all there is.

So let's talk about the weather instead! Are you enjoying the rain? I know I am. We really need it, as it hasn't rained in a couple of weeks at least.

Is the song over? No? Hmmmm. What do you think of Lindsay Lohan's latest troubles?

Ah, hell. Let's just cut this shit short now...

7) Los del Rio: "Macarena" (#1)



I'm sorry. I truly am. If I wasn't a completist, I wouldn't have included this one. This song is insidious, evil, and all of those other bad-sounding words that I can't think of because my brain has shut down. If I have to go through it, then so do you.

Hey, what do you mean you can just stop reading and listening? That's not in the contract!!!! You think I'm doing this for my health?

And on that low note, we wrap up this week's installment of the one-hit wonders of the 90s. I think we all need a palette-cleanser right about now, don't you?

I know I just want something different.



Then the SWAT team showed up!



One-Hit Wonders of the 90s
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10
Part 11
Part 12
Part 13
Part 14
Part 15
Part 16
Part 17
Part 18
Part 19
Part 20
Part 21
Part 22
Part 23
Part 24
Part 25
Part 26
Part 27
Part 28
Part 29
Part 30
Part 31
Part 32
Part 33
Part 34
Part 35
Part 36
Part 37
Part 38
Part 39
Part 40

The podcast has been posted

Followers of this blog (and my Facebook) know that we've been working on a podcast at my office.

The results have finally been posted on our blog, and you can go listen to it here. I'd love your feedback, but please be kind. This is the first time we've done this.

The subject matter is Education and Educational Technology, so I will admit it's a bit dry for some people. We did try to add a bit of personality to it, but I admit that we're a bit stiff too. That will get better as time goes on, I'm sure.

But I'm posting it here for a couple of reasons:

1) I'm proud of it, even though it's very obvious this is our first time (and I don't mean that just because we *say* it is on the podcast).

2) Some of you have expressed interest in listening to it, no matter what the subject matter. For those masochists among you, I encourage you to go take a listen.

I'm just glad to have gotten it out of my system, and maybe when we start up again in the Fall, we'll be a lot more comfortable doing it. I noticed that the energy level in our voices kind of flagged as each segment went on. That's something we're definitely going to work on.

Let me know what you think!

And who knows?  Maybe I'll inflict a personal podcast/vlog on you some day, too.

Alan Wake & the Signal, a dual review (Can you hear me now?)

Alan Wake is a psychological horror game for the Xbox 360, and The Signal is the first additional downloadable episode for it.


So what's my verdict?  I didn't find it as awesome as some people have, but I thought it was a very good game with a great story, and a couple of major problems that marred my enjoyment of the game a bit. The first DLC episode is fun too, but again with a problem.

First, the good news.  The story is as excellent as advertised, aided by Wake's narration of it.  You are author Alan Wake.  Suffering from writer's block, you and your wife Alice head to a sleepy forest town in Washington named Bright Falls, only to find an unspeakable darkness there.  Your wife disappears and you wake up in a car that's crashed on a mountain road.  With the help of your agent and the local sheriff, you must face off against an FBI agent who thinks you're the devil as well as darkness-possessed individuals who will stop at nothing to kill you.  What's the evil secret of Bright Falls?  The story is told like a TV story, with individual episodes that begin with a "last time on Alan Wake" introduction, which is actually kind of fun.




Yes, Wake is a whiny git at times, and I really got tired of Alice (and she doesn't really appear that much to begin with), but the narration has the effect of bringing the player into the story, something that can be difficult to do in a 3rd person game like this.  Not only is the story atmospheric (even playing in daylight, the darkness of this game can be scary at times), but the interesting concept of having to collect scattered manuscript pages from a novel that Wake doesn't remember writing just brings you deeper into it.  I won't go into spoilers, but these pages are important to the story, though thankfully collecting all of them isn't.  It's the *concept* of these pages that's important.  Even better is the fact that the timeline on the pages you find doesn't follow the game you're playing.  You may find a page that describes something you've already done, and then next find a page that describes something that hasn't happened yet.  Talk about adding to the tension!

The less said about collecting the thermoses, though, the better.  That must be one huge and heavy coat Wake's wearing by the end of the game.  100 thermoses???

Anyway, the graphics are lush and evocative, really bringing home the small town Washington setting, as well as the creepy woods in which you find yourself wandering around. The character models are great too (Alice wandering around in her underwear is a particular highlight *wink wink*).  Everything moves with a fluidity that is a joy to play around with.

You are under constant assault from the Taken, human beings who have been corrupted by the Darkness that is causing all of Wake's problems.  This is where the game gets a bit tedious, as the combat mechanics are cumbersome.  The Taken can only be harmed when a light is shone on them (good thing you almost always have a handy flashlight!). You can shine your light on them and then blow them away with one of the various guns that are available.  You can keep them at bay by lighting a flare, which can save your rear end sometimes if your health is getting too low.  Flare guns and flashbangs can take out groups of Taken at once, and can come in very handy.  However, the mechanics of shooting aren't very good.  You pull the Left Trigger to focus your light and then the right trigger to shoot.  Aiming can be difficult this way, and God forbid you just want to shoot without wasting your flashlight batteries.  If the Taken are illuminated by a flare, why would you want to focus your flashlight on them too?  Or maybe you want to shoot that explosive canister to really light them up? Aiming without using your flashlight, especially when you're in a hurry, is very difficult. One could say that this reflects the fact that Wake isn't that great with weapons.  But it's still not that fun to play.

Of course, you can also just run from safe spot to safe spot, where the light from street lamps and other light poles (some of them in *really* odd places) shine down, giving you safe haven. I can tell you that, when playing a video game, I've never broken a sweat out of nervousness and adrenaline like I did during Alan Wake and some of his forest encounters. I loved that exhilarated feeling I got when I just made it to a lamp post with a couple of Taken on my tail because I was out of bullets. The fact that a couple of times I had forgotten I had a flare gun is beside the point.

So the game is fun, except that the combat can be tedious.  What's the other major failure?  I hate to keep harping on it, but it's those damned thermoses.  I know, I know.  You can just ignore them the first time you play through the game.  But even if I wanted to do that (I generally don't replay games), just the fact that they're there and so prominent (without even trying that hard, I found 92 out of 100) just brings me out of the story.  A lot of the time, it's just when I was starting to lose myself in it again.  Those thermoses just yanked me out of it.  Pairing these with the manuscript pages that you find as well, pages that are actually part of the story and *add* to the immersion, those thermoses stick out like a sore thumb.

Still, I wouldn't let that detract you from getting this game.  It's an excellent game, an extremely well-told story, and a well-caffeinated hero.  How can you go wrong?

Now, how about the first DLC episode, the Signal?

Let me talk about the ending of the original game, because that actually feeds into this.  Don't worry, no spoilers here.

I really didn't like how the first game ended, but I could have lived with it.  It would be easy to chalk up the ending as one of those "ambiguous" ones that you can just go on and talk about for a while.  Something good happens, a sacrifice is made, and while the ending may leave things hanging a bit, you can just figure that the sacrifice was made and that's the end of it.

This episode, though, ends on a total cliffhanger, even going so far as to say "to be continued" at the end.  Thankfully, I got it for free because I bought Alan Wake new, but in a way it's almost as deceptive as a crack dealer who gives you that one free hit, knowing you're going to be hooked.  If you bought the game used and thus would have to pay the 560 MS points for The Signal, you might decide not to do it.  You'd have your ambiguous ending to the story, and that would be that.  But getting the episode free?  Now I have to get the second episode, or I'll never know what happened (ok, yes, I can read about it online, but still...).  Thankfully, it sounds like there are only going to be two DLC episodes for the game, so it's not *that* bad.  But it still miffed me a bit.  It doesn't help that The Signal does not answer a *single* question that was left hanging from the original game.

However, the episode is just as imaginative, if not more so, as the original game.  You are in a product of your own mind, and a concept that's introduced at the end of the original game is carried all the way through the episode, where just the concept of "guns" and "batteries" and "memory" are hazy figments, hovering on the borders of your comprehension, until you shed a light on them (is that ambiguous enough if you haven't finished the game yet, but still understandable to those who have?).  There's a large field where this is taken to the extreme, where you can potentially get through without facing any enemies, but if you have a wayward flashlight, you're screwed.  Other set pieces are equally imaginative, like a field of flickering lamp posts, with safe havens appearing and disappearing like crazy.

The one major problem (except for the ending, of course) is that the game is almost all combat.  While it's *interesting* combat, as mentioned above, the combat hasn't improved at all from the original game.  Thus, you find yourself dying in annoying fashion way too many times.

And don't get me started on why you're searching for alarm clocks.  This time, I didn't bother unless I just happened upon one.  The stand-up cardboard cut-outs were fun, though, and another interesting take on the mindscape that you're playing in.  What is it with Remedy forcing you to look for things, with half of them being an awesome idea and half of them being extremely cheesy?


Finally, the product placement in The Signal is even worse than in the original game.  Yeah, in the original game, you have your Verizon phone and Energizer batteries billboards, as well as a couple other shoutouts to Verizon, but I have to say I didn't really notice them too much other than the billboards.


However, in The Signal, your cell phone drops at your feet from out of the misty darkness, in perfect working order, landing with the Verizon logo facing straight up and the camera holding the shot for a moment.  Then, the guy behind the signal you're following actually says "Can you hear me?  Can you hear me now?"  I thought my brain would explode at that point.

Anyway, if you enjoyed the original game, The Signal is fun.  I'm not sure if I would have sprung for it if it hadn't been free, but having played it, I can say it was good.  It's pretty short, but not unbearably so.
On to episode 2!  Whenever they decide to put it out.

Book Review - Fortress Rabaul

As the steady trickle of my review posting continues, my review for Bruce Gamble's Fortress Rabaul is up on Curled Up with a Good Book. This is a great history of an ongoing battle during World War II that isn't really discussed much, except in passing. Through my many long years of reading books about World War II, Rabaul has often been mentioned in books on the Pacific War with Japan. But it's always been mentioned as a stumbling block in the United States' island-hopping campaign from Guadalcanal up to the Japanese Mainland. I've never really read a book on the struggle to put the Japanese fortress out of commission.

This is that book.

From the review:

"Fortress Rabaul by Bruce Gamble is an extensive history of one of the main Japanese Pacific strong points during World War II. For every plan they made, the Americans had to take Rabaul into account, like a little sliver that constantly calls attention to itself until it’s removed (if the sliver were actually so fortified that it could destroy any tweezers you tried to use to remove it). If the Australians knew what Rabaul would become for the Japanese, would they have let it go so easily? As strapped as they were at the beginning of the war, they might have. Gamble considers all of this in an excellent overview of the war in the Southwest Pacific."

If you're into World War II at all, especially the war in the Pacific Theater, you should get this book.

It's not without fault (as you'll see in the review), but it's definitely high up there on the list.

Thoughts on the review are always welcome as well.

(Many thanks to Zenith Press for providing the book, though this had no impact on my review of it)

Video game music that makes you shiver

Music has always been a vital part of the gaming experience, from the "bleeps" and "bloops" of the old arcade games to the midi soundtracks of the original console generations, to the sweeping orchestral scores of today.  Much of it is iconic, at least to the point where you recognize the game as soon as you hear it (sometimes I still can't get the most addicting song from Dr. Mario out of my head).

The other day, I was happy that I was catching up on the Game Informer news page, because I discovered this gem: Air Dates for Video Games Live on PBS. After checking out the link for scheduled air times, I discovered that in Washington it was going to be on last night.  I quickly set the recording for the HD version of it.  KCTS in Seattle (and probably all of the other PBS stations as well) are using it as part of their annual pledge drive.  For those of you who don't know, Video Games Live takes video game music and has it played by a large orchestra as well as a choir and other performers.  Images from the video games are projected on a huge screen at the back of the stage, perfectly timed to go with the music being played.

When we started watching it last night, I just sat enthralled.  Creator and video game composer Tommy Tallarico has created something truly brilliant.  My hats off to him.  Watching some of my favourite music (as well as a lot of music I've never heard before but which was riveting all the same) being performed live on stage by an actual orchestra is something almost epic.



Yet I found myself disappointed, too.

Why is that?

The show itself was awesome.  But I wanted more.  I wanted a 90-minute special that was actually a 90-minute special.  Not a 75-minute special with three pledge drive breaks in it to pad it out to 90.  Granted, the PBS guy was interviewing Tallarico in studio, so they were still talking about the concert and its genesis.  I don't know how other PBS stations did it, since apparently Tallarico was live in studio (either that, or they taped it and added the images of "operators standing by to take your call" afterward).  But I want my 90 minutes!!!!!

Secondly, I could have done without hearing the same thing said multiple times all in the span of a few minutes.  Tallarico kept emphasizing how cool it was that KIDS ARE ACTUALLY ASKING THEIR PARENTS TO TAKE THEM TO A SYMPHONY!  And that is a cool thing, but I didn't need to hear it four times in 10 minutes.  Tallarico said it multiple times while he was being interviewed, one time being moments before they went back to the PBS special and he said it on the special itself.  My eyes were beginning to roll so hard they almost fell out of their sockets. Yes, we get it, Tommy!  It's very cool that kids are wanting to go to a symphony for this.  Can we please move on?



I don't want to de-value that point, though.  It does look like a wonderful symphonic experience that kids and their parents (and even grandparents) can enjoy together.  Everybody seemed to be having a blast (though I guess they wouldn't be broadcasting it if they weren't, would they?). It was very cool to see the kid get up on stage and play Guitar Hero to Aerosmith's Sweet Emotion" and watching his friends and family as he was doing it.  Everybody was getting into it, and I can only imagine what was going through the kid's head as he was doing it.  "Don't screw up, don't screw up, don't screw up..."

A lot of great music is included in the special.  There's a Mario Piano medley, an ode to old video games, Halo, a couple of wonderful World of Warcraft pieces, Castlevania, an utterly gorgeous presentation of music from Civilization IV, and so much more.

But yet I was left wanting more.  I guess you have to buy a ticket for that.

The video also has a couple of horrible editing spots, though I don't know if that's because of the cuts back to the pledge drive or not.  There's no sense that the concert is winding down, but suddenly everybody's taking a bow?  And performers are out there taking a bow that we haven't seen?

Colour me annoyed.

Still, the special is a wonderful taste of the show itself.  It definitely makes you want to go see the show yourself, in person.  I missed my chance when it came to Vancouver back in May.

In that sense, I guess the video has done its job.

One Hit Wonders of the 90s (Part 25)

Hello, dear reader. I have a favour to ask you. The original post begins after all of the asterisks, if you want to skip this.

Now that the One Hit Wonders of the 90s series is over, I'm not going to be doing my weekly revisiting of all these posts (I had to do that to add the new post to the bottom). Thus, I won't be able to catch any broken picture links or deleted videos any more. Yet I want these posts to be as good as possible.

Please, if you happen upon one of these posts, or if you take a walk through a whole bunch of them, let me know if you find anything that doesn't work. You can leave a comment, or you can send me a message using that handy "Contact Me" page linked above.

Also, feel free to let me know what you think of the post or any of the videos!

Thank you.

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Yes, I know I'm late. But I can explain. See, I was getting ready to do my weekly one-hit wonders post, but I decided to go outside and investigate this really large semi-truck trailer that was sitting outside of our building. So I hopped on my trusty Segway to check it out!

Little did I know that whoever parked this in the lot outside had hired an Amazon army as their security! When they caught me, I tried to get away, but it just didn't happen.

I think they released security footage of it.



You can hear the security chief narrating the whole thing. Sounds like a real hard-ass, doesn't he? "Don't grab him!" I'm sure he would rather they just shot me instead.

And sadly, once I was in their custody, I had a hard time breaking out. Thankfully, they didn't confiscate all of my stuff, and I was able to don my handy disguise...

Reach my alternate transportation...

And get away. Sadly, the Segway was trampled in the initial scuffle.

That makes me sad.

But I am happy that I am still able to bring you some one-hit wonder goodness! As usual, you can find the list of songs here.

Here we go!

1) Nonchalant: "5 O'Clock" (#24)



Some anti-gang rap to start off with, and it's quite the powerful one. Unlike most rap songs, I actually sat through this one in its entirety, and it's quite powerful. As the song goes on, you know how the video's going to end, but it's still affecting when it does happen. I do kind of a disconnect with Nonchalant playing both the sister and singing as well. So you get the images of her dancing around rapping alongside the ones of her cradling her brother. I think it might have been more effective if they had actually cast somebody else as the sister.

Hah! Look at me, trying to be a serious music/video critic. I'm lucky I didn't poke my eye out as I was typing all that stuff.

2) Spacehog: "In the Meantime" (#32)



What a bunch of weird-looking people! The song itself isn't too bad, but it looks like they're playing in the basement of the local middle school. Hey, don't throw that hourglass! That's a priceless heirloom!!!

I knew I should never have let them borrow my stuff.

We're starting to see more and more of these more modern rock-sounding songs make the one-hit wonder list. Lots of major guitar work, that sort of thing. Makes a nice change from rap, doesn't it?

Though obviously they still haven't learned how to dress.

3) Tina Arena: "Chains" (#38)



Tina, what did those clothes ever do to you??? And that lamp? I hope that's his apartment and not yours.

I don't get it. She's hot, has a marvelous voice, but Arena never really caught on in the States, with this being her only minor hit there. Maybe people were confused by announcements like "Arena appearing at Rogers Arena?" I don't know. She was a sensation in her native Australia, though, and she has had some moderate success down there even recently.

I guess she just decided working the American market wasn't worth the time?

Or maybe she didn't want reactions like this one.

Yeah, that can suck.

4) BoDeans: "Closer to Free" (#16)



Was this song only popular because of the TV show "Party of Five?" Maybe. (No, this song was not in the movie Spirit B; that's just a fan video)

Yet another song that's pretty good but nothing to write home about. It's got a great beat, which is good. Decent words. It's actually a "feel-good" song, but for some reason, it just doesn't move me. Maybe it's because I hated that show.

Yeah, that could be it. What a bunch of whiners.

5) The Lost Boyz: "Renee" (#33)



Another movie song! We now have TV and movies represented.

Another sad story of love on the streets. I much prefer this kind of rap to any other kind (though the "fun" rap of Will Smith and the like is even better to my untrained ear).

Not really much to make fun of on this one, so I'll just move on to the next one...

6) Jann Arden: "Insensitive" (#12)



Ah, the song that introduced me to this Canadian songstress! She's a huge Canadian star, but this is the only song that charted in the States. Much to the States' detriment. She is a great singer who I love listening to and I've gobbled up her other songs since I've moved up here. I wish I knew why she didn't make it bigger in the States, but it's very possible that she just chose not to.

She's a national treasure, though. She's even got her own show starting on CBC radio this month.

For my American friends, here's a bonus track from Arden.



7) Dog's Eye View: "Everything Falls Apart" (#14)



This is kind of a fun song (which is kind of funny, considering it's about everything falling apart, but there you go). It is a very silly video, though. The guy acts like he's had about 20 cups of coffee.

Still, It's an enjoyable listen, though I can think of a few people who will disagree with me.

So there you have it! We're half-way done with 1996, and we're still going strong! Twenty-five of these things in a row? Who would have thought when I started this that it would still be racking up the hits?

Now, it's later than it normally is, so I have to head off to work.



You know, I really should have paid attention on my first day of training.



One-Hit Wonders of the 90s
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9
Part 10
Part 11
Part 12
Part 13
Part 14
Part 15
Part 16
Part 17
Part 18
Part 19
Part 20
Part 21
Part 22
Part 23
Part 24
Part 25
Part 26
Part 27
Part 28
Part 29
Part 30
Part 31
Part 32
Part 33
Part 34
Part 35
Part 36
Part 37
Part 38
Part 39
Part 40

Blogs that change direction - the best?

Sometimes when I sit down to write a blog post, it comes out totally different than I intended it to be. I may start out just wanting to talk about a certain game, or a certain app, or a certain thing I've been doing, and it metastasizes into something either much more profound or, sometimes, something much less coherent (though thankfully, that doesn't happen often).

Most of the time, those end up being some of my best posts, or at least the ones that get the most response, and it's totally unintentional! Maybe it's that stream of consciousness thing sharpened to a fine point.  Maybe one of these times, when I'm facing a bout of "what should I post about today?" lethargy, I should just sit down and start writing and publish that!  It would probably be better than some of the stuff that's posted on here.

Anyway, there is a reason this topic occurred to me today.

A couple of weeks ago, on my Game Informer blog, I reacted to the news that the Xbox 360 video game Alan Wake had only sold 150,000 copies so far, pretty much a dud as far as video games sales go. I had been warring with myself since the game came out earlier in the year regarding whether I would buy it or not. I don't shy away from buying video games; if I want the game, I'll go out and buy it. But for some reason, whenever I was in Gamestop looking to buy "a game" but without a specific title in mind, I thought about Alan Wake and then decided I wouldn't get it this time. I did think I would get it eventually, but something just kept telling me "not now."

(Alan Wake is a suspense/horror game where an author goes with his wife to a sleepy Washington town. He wakes up in his mangled car, his wife nowhere to be found, and dark creatures haunting the forest. It's actually a pretty good game)

When I read the sales news, I decided to write a post about why I hadn't bought the game. Titled simply "Why I Didn't Buy Alan Wake", I just thought I would figure out a couple of basic reasons why I hadn't bought the game and then tell people about it.

However, as the post went on, it became an examination of how we purchase things like video games (and it could stretch to movies, music, pretty much anything like that).

"Unless it's a game we've been greatly anticipating, I think we all have these internal scales that we weigh our game purchases on. Do I spend my limited money and time on this game or that game? Often, we can't really say why we chose one game over another game. We just weigh them on the scales and one of them wins out. Asked afterward why you picked that game, you very well might not be able to tell them. "It just sounded funner," you could say."

With all that background, let's get to the point of this ("YAY! The point!" - The Peanut Gallery). What started out as a simple blog laying out a couple of reasons had grown into a greater post about how we make purchases in general. This got noticed by the Game Informer editor who does the weekly "Blog Herding" post (a post where she collects what she considers the best blogs of the week, both from GI editors as well as users). My post made the July 16th edition.

One of the commenters actually gave me kudos when responding to somebody who was complaining about how the editor made her choices:

"Take for example Hists' post about why he didn't get Alan Wake. What makes that a unique and thought provoking item is that he took a common thought, rethought it, and equated it to something the audience can relate to in terms they'll equally agree or disagree with. It's not a manifesto of what someone should or shouldn't do, but offers perhaps an alternative take on how people can think of things."

I don't say this to toot my own horn (though it's a nice side benefit!) but just to ask a question.

Do you find some of your best posts starting out like this? Something really simple, basic and consumable enough that you figure people will read it and then dispose of it without really thinking about it? And then it becomes something much, much bigger? And better?

(And congratulations to those of you who are able to answer that question because you've waded through all of the nonsense above. I salute you.)