Talking About Stuff #2

It is pretty darn funny how things can change so suddenly in a week. In my last Talking About Stuff post, I talked about wanting to do Gamer Streams on a routine basis, because they are fun and I think more people like me should be making our voices heard in the gaming world. Then Twitch Dot TV said hey man, we're going to feed your work to our AI mulching machine. But don't worry! You can totally "turn it off." Now, do I think I'm a big enough deal that me fiddling with my audio while randomly loading up Playstation games in what appears to an ADHD-riddled haze (but is actually me being terrified that a viewer could potentially be bored for even a second) is going to become the bedrock for some fascist tech idiot's pie in the sky idea that doesn't make any sense? No, of course not. But do I want to cosign my name to a company that would do something like that, and do so in such an underhanded way? No. So that's the end of my run on Twitch, again. That certainly fucked up some plans I had.

Maybe I could try streaming games one of those "fan" sites like Fansly or something.

Speaking of AI, I had also made mention of enacting a new self-imposed policy of only ever writing about old games (and independent stuff). One of my stated reasons for it was because I hate this increasing proliferation of generative AI and the right-wing bull shit that accompanies it. This was just a coping mechanism. Here's the thing: that shit has existed in retro gaming scenes for some time now. But the other thing is: that shit was easier to ignore for a while. Some dickhead on YouTube making tired jokes about SJWs or attack helicopters and using MidJourney to render himself as a guy wearing a Legend of Zelda shirt but not having the wherewithal to generate himself to look like Link is not the voice of an entire scene. That guy is too busy complaining about games and jumping at his own shadow just in case it's woke to actually play any. He's not playing the PSO Anniversary Event, he's not on Fightcade playing Vampire Savior, he's not checking out an RPG series he missed out on as a kid. All it takes is a social media block or not clicking a link for The Propeller Beanie Gamer to not waste my time with his inane and racist as fuck ramblings on the fall of western civilization. And all it takes is doing the same for every meaningless 13 HIDDEN GEMS ON THE GIZMONDO with the same AI generated thumbnail that could possibly look like a scene from Dragon Quest if you squint, lower your desktop resolution, look away from your monitor, and imagine playing a Dragon Quest game. It is background radiation.

The problem is when that shit invades my territory. Assholes with all the boundary issues of your typical rapist dripping their particular brand of slime over everything you love. Seemingly every week, there is yet another machine translated patch for a Sega Saturn game I've been wanting to check out ever since I was a kid reading GameFan. Another vibe-coded "recomp" of a game that has been easily emulated for twenty years. Fucking Nintendo 64 and Game Boy clones made out of recycled bombing drones, and a horde of ball lickers that will happily buy one; shout out to Game Sack doing their part to ensure that I remain the number one games personality in the state of Denver simply by default. In any case, that shit is frustrating. Like, I retreated into this niche hobby hole to get away from all of that because it delivered the finishing blow to the continued suffering of modern games! Just go back to arguing about mood lighting in Halo or whatever the fuck I have to see 100 screenshots about against my will.

I don't know if I have any real point to add to all of that other than: Fuck AI, and fuck everyone who likes it. And also fuck neo-nazis who have to rub their grubby racist hands all over cool shit. Luckily, there are still a lot of good people out there, some of whom are on this site's "links" page.

Star Ocean is a series that I never really got into for no particular reason; other RPGs caught my attention at the time. I recently saw some footage of Star Ocean: Blue Sphere on the Game Boy Color and was blown away by how fucking good it looked. It has to be the best looking game on the GBC. That sprite work is amazing, with the detail and use of color for the background, and basic yet very legible characters. I also tried out the PSP remake of the first Star Ocean, just to see if there was some story context for me to get. Doesn't seem to be a whole lot. Seems to be a game more about its systems than its narrative, which, as someone who just finished playing Final Fantasy V, I don't have a problem with. Anyways, Blue Sphere is cool and I want to play more of it.

This is Baby Rapper. He can rap about anything. He knows his numbers and his ABC's. He can do the Hokey Pokey and the Monkey, too, because there's no dance that he can't do. Baby Rapper has taken over my life ever since I was introduced to him a week ago. A CGI baby that looks like the protagonist of a bootleg arcade game from South Korea (the kind with tons of stolen artwork from Famitsu covers) lip synching to Beatles covers while dancing over a background of Beatles TV appearances and Max Fleischer cartoons. My one opinion that can get me cancelled is that I fucking love the Beatles, and hearing these middling takes on timeless songs does hurt me quite a bit, but I can deal with it because I am transfixed by this baby. This...Baby Rapper...

It's a tape that's meant to be enjoyed by everyone, according to the back of the VHS case. Older people will like it because they can sing along to old Beatles hits. Younger people will like it because of the cartoons, and I guess this fucked up baby. But boy, there are some interesting song choices for a young audience. "Paperback Writer," "Hey Jude," "Let It Be," "Yesterday." A dear friend of mine joked that "Happiness Is A Warm Gun" was going to be on the tape, while I made the much safer but still out there guess of John Lennon's "Mother."

As far as I can tell, there were no further episodes of the Baby Rapper saga. That is a shame. Would there have been more Beatles hits? Would there have been a different band getting the spotlight? Would Baby Rapper do an actual rap? We will never know...