Of Little Girls and....Ponycorns?

Have you ever wanted to make a video game? I did once, long ago before my dreams were crushed by the harsh reality of the real world. This little girl though, Cassie Creighton, fulfilled her dreams with the help of her father at TOjam, Toronto's independent gaming convention. Here's the Re-Blog...

5-Year-Old Girl Makes Video Game
by Ryan Creighton

As planned, i took my five-year-old daughter Cassie to TOJam, the three-day Toronto independent game jam, to make a game with me. And here it is:

Play Sissy's Magical Ponycorn Adventure

Cassie drew all the pictures, wrote all the titles, and recorded the voice of the main character. She also came up with the NPCs (including Mr. Turtle, the Mean Tiger, and the villainous Lemon), and designed some of the puzzles (including the one where you [SPOILER ALERT] have to read a sign to justify your need for a coconut to throw at the Lemon).

Cassie and Ryan [photo by Brendan Lynch]

Send Cassie to College?

i used Mochimedia's ad service to inject ads into the game, which is fitting, because Mochi was a TOJam sponsor this year. i threw ads in there with the hope that the game might drum up a little bit of cash, which i will put toward the education fund that Cassie's grandma started for her. Wouldn't it be cool if Cassie's game paid for college? (Sadly, it won't happen. See the Pimp My Game series for more reasons why.) For kicks, i added a PayPal Donate button beneath the game.

With your help, maybe we can send her to get some etiquette training? [Photo by Paul Hillier]

Alert Child Services

Dragging your kid to a weekend-long game jam, eh? Before you call Children's Aid on me, please understand that i didn't actually keep Cassie captive at TOJam all weekend long. She came in with me at 9:30 Saturday morning, and was the most excited i've ever seen her. We'd been preparing her for MONTHS so that she'd be emotionally ready for TOJam. After the organizers expressed concern that my rotten kid would be running around the place pestering people and making noise (an entirely likely scenario, if you're familiar with my insane children and my lousy parenting style), i spent every evening coaching Cassie.

Me: Remember, you're the first little girl who's ever made a game at TOJam. And everyone's worried you're going to run around screaming and making noise and wrecking things.

Cassie: (shocked face) No i won't!

Me: *i* know you won't. (totally lying here - i was as nervous about it as anyone) But you have to prove to everyone that little girls can make video games too. If you're very well behaved, then next year if another little girl wants to come and make a game, the TOJam people will say "the little girl who made a game last year was SO wonderful, we'd LOVE to see more little girls making games."

Cassie: i'll be have. i will!

Cassandra, "being have" [Photo by Paul Hillier]

Yes, Cassandra, There Is a Game Jam

The morning of TOJam was like Christmas for her. i'm not kidding. In the days leading up to the event, she told everyone she knew that she was going to TOJam. Naturally, they had no idea what she was talking about, but the strangers in the elevator and in the grocery store smiled and nodded politely all the same. By the end of the day on Saturday, Cassie had spent 10 hours at TOJam, and was begging me to let her stay overnight. She had put in about 6 hours of actual colouring work, and sunk at least another hour into voice acting later that evening at home, where it was quieter. i tucked her into bed and returned to TOJam late Saturday evening, and then pulled an all-nighter scanning her crayon drawings and integrating them with the game logic using UGAGS (the Untold Graphic Adventure Game System).

[Photo by Paul Hillier]

Family Jam

Sunday morning after church, the whole family joined me at TOJam with a bunch of instruments in tow. My wife Cheryl and the two little girls sat together on the carpet down a quiet hallway. Cassie grabbed the harmonica, i took the drum, Cheryl took the ukulele, and little Isabel used the thumb harp and the Happy Apple. We recorded some music tracks together. The one that made it into the game intro is just Cassie and Izzy playing together. It was really nice to have everyone involved like that. Here's the family track that didn't quite make the cut:

[VISIT THE UNTOLD ENTERTAINMENT BLOG TO EXPERIENCE THE CACOPHONY (because i don't know how to embed it on Gamaustra)]

Sunday evening, the family regrouped at TOJam. The game, while still unfinished, was set up in a hallway where Cassie excitedly ran up to any interested passers-by, snatched the mouse out of their hands, and said "I MADE THIS! LEMMIE SHOW YOU HOW TO PLAY!"

i think it was a really valuable life lesson for Cassie to see that all her hard work and effort went into making a product that brought smiles to the faces of her players. The next step is to brave the hairy Playbook process to get it on the device so that Cassie can bring it to school for Show & Tell.

[Photo by Paul Hillier]

Correcting History

i really hope you enjoy Sissy's Magical Ponycorn Adventure. In all of this, our goal as parents is to give our kids the kind of childhood we would KILL to have had. i can't imagine how different my life would have been if i had made a real working video game with my father at age 5. In fact, i can't imagine how different my life would have been if he hadn't left when i was eight months old.

But no matter. Some day, the ponycorns will get him.

Original article HERE

PLAY THE GAME!!

Just Because

I'm starting this new segment for when I find things and I'm too damned lazy to say anything in depth about them. Its like Tumblr, only it takes up more bandwidth. You may get more later, you may not. I'm the boss. Cheers!

-Mithy

Found this on Dorkly. I think its prudent...

In Other Alarming News...

I'm not sure if you as readers know this about me, but I am not a huge fan of bees. Which makes this blog and it's title, somewhat ironic. Its not just bees I don't like, mind you, its butterflies, mosquito eaters, moths, and pretty much anything with wings and more than two legs. This being said, I think it prudent to mention that I try hard not to smash or otherwise pulverize said insects mostly because I am compassionate to their cause. And respectful. Very respectful. Bees in particular, are amazing. There are nearly 20,000 known species of bees in the world and they help regulate our eco system by pollinating the plants that make up a majority of our environment. Did I mention honey? I'm fairly certain my honey intake is about 2 Tablespoons a day, which, when i comes down to it, is an addiction. As much as we do not like, perhaps fear that horrible buzzing noise and their stingers, we cannot live without bees.

Sadly, from 1972-2006 there was a rapid decline in feral bees, mostly due to environmental issues like pollution and climate change. In 2010 a virus called invertebrate iridescent virus or IIV6, and the fungus Nosema Caranae was reported to have killed off a wide number of colonies. Today, the species seems to be dwindling. From a personal case point, I was walking home one day from work and I counted 4-5 little bee corpses littering the sidewalk. This was both alarming and disconcerting.

This leads me to the point of this blog, which happens to be this article I found on InHabitat dot com, written by Lori Zimmer, Originally found here. I will provide you with the reblog...

It's Official- Cell Phones are Killing Bees

"Scientists may have found the cause of the world’s sudden dwindling population of bees– and cell phones may be to blame. Research conducted in Lausanne, Switzerland has shown that the signal from cell phones not only confuses bees, but also may lead to their death. Over 83 experiments have yielded the same results. With virtually most of the population of the United States (and the rest of the world) owning cell phones, the impact has been greatly noticeable.

Led by researcher Daniel Favre, the alarming study found that bees reacted significantly to cell phones that were placed near or in hives in call-making mode. The bees sensed the signals transmitted when the phones rang, and emitted heavy buzzing noise during the calls. The calls act as an instinctive warning to leave the hive, but the frequency confuses the bees, causing them to fly erratically. The study found that the bees’ buzzing noise increases ten times when a cell phone is ringing or making a call – aka when signals are being transmitted, but remained normal when not in use.

The signals cause the bees to become lost and disoriented. The impact has already been felt the world over, as the population of bees in the U.S. and the U.K. has decreased by almost half in the last thirty years – which coincides with the popularization and acceptance of cell phones as a personal device. Studies as far back as 2008 have found that bees are repelled by cell phone signals.

Bees are an integral and necessary part of our agricultural and ecological systems, producing honey, and more importantly pollinating our crops. As it is unlikely that the world will learn to forgo the convenience of cell phones, it is unclear how much they will contribute to the decline of bees, and their impact on the environment."

Quite a conundrum. We need our cell phones, yes? But at what cost? I'm going to leave this up for you to consider and decide. I wonder how similar to ridding ourselves of harmful fuel emissions would be to restricting our cell phone usage? Its all a matter of innovation, thinks I. Just some food for thought.

Accompanied by a song...

"Hey - I hear what you're saying
Hey - I hear what he's saying
If you're after getting the honey - hey
Then you don't go killing all the bees"

The Great (meaning big) Muppet Inquisitorial

So, I'm watching some of the Muppet Movie in anticipation of the movie thats going to come out next thanksgiving, and I'm saying all the lines and singing along, and then I wonder suddenly: I wonder what the largest muppet ever built was.

I want to warn you that, short of writing to Brian Henson myself, this is not an easy question. I think of all the big giant muppets and the list is fairly substantial and I'm only naming a few, without proper specs, I am, in fact, only speculating. But here some of the larger ones stand: Sweetums, Big Bird, Jabba the Hutt, The Skeksis from the Dark Chrystal, The Vogons from H2G2, Bear in the Big Blue House, ... and easily the most impressive and what has been declared as the biggest muppet, multiple times, The Ghost of Christmas Present in A Muppet Christmas Carol. All of these however, are completely lost to the one I have declared unofficially and personally to be the winner of this little research contest with myself. Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you:

"Humongous"

Built in 1986 for the production of Labyrinth, Humongous remains, in my eyes, the most impressive Muppet to date. he's 15 feet tall, he's got a big ax, and he will be preventing you and Ludo from entering the Goblin City. It doesn't even matter if he's operated by a teeny tiny little man, He can stand alone. It doesn't look like a muppet, It doesn't sound like a muppet, nor does it move like a muppet, but darlings, it is a muppet. I can't say it like the pro's can:


Quotes:

JIM HENSON: "It seemed like right late in the story what we wanted was for our heroes to come up against some huge obstacle, something worse than anything they'd encountered so
far. And we came up with the idea of building the largest puppet we'd ever built."

GEORGE GIBBS (special effects supervisor): "Jim asked us about last January. He said, 'Boys, I¹d like a fifteen-foot high giant.' We said, 'Oh yeah. Very interesting.' Lots of people had tried to make fifteen-foot giants that walk and throw their arms around. They hadn't been very successful. So it was a challenge, really. So, we decided how we were going to make it and we went ahead and made all the mechanics and everything work wonderfully. When the body was produced in fiberglass, it just wouldn't work, because the fiberglass wouldn¹t flex. Fortunately for us, we had our foam expert. And he developed a foam for us with skin, skin that would flex without looking rubbery. We made the foam look like steel armor."


JIM HENSON: "He weighs . . . I don't know how much. Lots. With all the rig and all the hydrolics, the thing has to be several tons. And so this was the largest, most complicated thing we'd ever built. We didn't have very long to build it, probably two to three months."

GEORGE GIBBS: "One man could operate the whole thing. In the old days, we'd have probably had five or six guys all at different levers, working hydrolics. But one man operates the whole of Humongous all by himself, makes him walk forward, makes his body spin 'round, makes him bow down, makes his arms swing the ax. And it's all done with hydrolics. Every move his arm makes, the arms of Humongous make exactly the same move."

JIM HENSON: "When George first showed me Humongous in action, it was really an amazing thing, to just stand there and have this large thing walk toward you. It's one of the most awesome sights in the world."

See it for Yourself



There it is, from the mouths of the maker's themselves and your eyes only. This thing is huge. And for a thing with only one line, its a miraculous feet to have built him in the first place. That is why, today, in honor of the belated anniversary of Jim's death, I celebrate Humongous and his big ol' giant robotic self.

In Which Mithy Blogs About a Book in An Effort To Read It

Readers,

If you know me, which many of you do and many of you do not, you are aware that I am an insatiable bookworm. As I was perusing my Google reader as I am notorious for doing at inopportune moments, and moments of boredom alike, I happened upon the blog Geek with Curves that I have been proudly following for many months now. In that days particular blog, the esteemed Amy Ratcliffe provided us with a review of Catherynne M. Valente’s The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making. In fact, I believe Amy, if I may be so bold as to refer to her on a first name basis, reffered to the book as "Gobsmacking" her, which, in my general opinion, means its worth reading.

This book, having been whopping newspapers, magazines and blogs all over the internet for the last week or so, has been causing quite a stir in the geeky circles I run in. I have not read it, but am highly anticipating the experience. The people who brag about it say it smacks of Alice and Oz but in an inspiring and truly original way. The book, which Valente originally provided in full online, is now the number 8 new york times bestseller. On a side note, I did a little cyber- snooping into Valente's background and found that I liked what I saw. Not only is Valente cute as a friggin' button, but she's witty and charming with her blogs and writings, a trait I hope carries over into this book. Oddly enough, I've been meaning to read her book Palimpsest, which has been on hold in my library queue for the last... um... year. I should probably just purchase it if I really want to read it before I'm 50.

But I digress. In the end, while I cannot provide you with a full review as of yet, I want to give you a heads up about this book in an effort to both read it myself and inspire you to do the same. There are very few original stories out there and I am hoping this piece lives up to the expectations I have of it.

Cheers and happy potential reading,
Mithy

Extra Goodies...

A book trailer of... this book. I find these odd. They are like commercials for the written word...


Linkies... mmmm....

Catherynne M. Valente
The books page, complete with a free preview. If you get clicky, perhaps you shall learn what I have about the author and her other works...

Amazon!
Who doesn't like Amazon... this link specifically, because if you click it, if transports you to the book!