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https://blacknerdproblems.com/gone-in-a-flash-musings-on-digital-impermanence/
“Since Adobe will no longer be supporting Flash Player after December 31, 2020 and Adobe will block Flash content from running in Flash Player beginning January 12, 2021, Adobe strongly recommends all users immediately uninstall Flash Player to help protect their systems.“
There is a generation of gamers who honed their skills on internet browsers. Many kids with mice and keyboards flocked to their preferred domain. Perhaps you were a frequenter of Addicting Games, Armor Games, or Newgrounds.
I, myself, spent most of my time on OneMoreLevel, always telling myself that I’d only needed to play well “one more level.” There were platforms and RPGs, sports sims and visual novels. There were licensed properties and original ideas and clones of those original ideas that were circulated in an attempt to capture those coveted clicks. There were empires founded on this bit of software and we are starting 2021 by watching them fall.
Of course some of the more popular games have been archived so to speak. Some have found homes in proper releases on Steam such as the zombie scif-fi RPG, Sonny.
Others have migrated over to consoles as is the case with N: The Way of the Ninja and The Fancy Pants Adventures. Some you can still download like Need from Madness and Radical Aces (although, those aren’t true Flash Games, instead being created with the 3dvia player, but their software is similarly dated). Concerted efforts from BlueMaxima saved more than 38,000 flash games before the software was retired. Only time will tell which ones were truly lost to time.
The (not exactly) old adage goes “once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever,” but the shuttering of Flash Player is not the first instance of digital impermanence. Gearbox’s Battleborn is also shutting down this month after it had been removed from stores in November 2019 after failing to escape from the large shadow cast by Overwatch.
Destiny 2 vaulted a nontrivial portion of its game just three months ago. Epic’s Paragon was deactivated in 2018 due to the company funneling more resources into its beloved battle royale, Fortnite. And Paragon fans are lucky that Epic was generous enough to release all of its assets.
When Toontown shutdown in 2013, some of its fans banded together to recreate an unlicensed, free-to-play version of the game. And this is to say nothing of the hundreds of multiplayer servers that have been laid to rest, refashioned and repurposed.
Video games are uniquely susceptible to just… not existing. Books can go out of print, film reels and pressed records can be destroyed, but video games exist largely in an ephemeral state. Zeroes and ones on a hard drive, files sizes that grow exponentially with the complexity of the game. It’s not a simple matter of copy/pasting. When you are playing a modern game, you’re playing a unique instance that some other players will never get to experience and, if they do, it’s still only an approximation that took an untold amount of resources and effort to get to happen. See the vanilla World of Warcraft servers. See a ROM hacker adding in a digital patch to simulate a hardware upgrade for the SNES.
It is an endeavor, and one that has no easy solution. Whether it’s the Library of Congress, the National Video Game Museum, the Strong Institute, or the Videogame Heritage Society, there are several organizations dedicated to preserving these interactive art forms, but will be unable to capture their kairos, their timeliness. Videos games are predicated on people playing them and if they aren’t played, they’re not really games.
Somewhere, there are a handful of PlayStation 4s with a copy of Kojima’s PT. There are PlayStation 3s and XBox 1s with copies of Destiny stuck in the pre-Rise of Iron crucible meta, with Touch of Malices that will not rotate because last last gen consoles couldn’t support it. There is a ROM of Pokemon Blue that thankfully has the ability to store more than one save, such that a young gamer does not have to fear their younger sibling overriding their level 99 Venosaur and Mewtwo (and I’m sure other treasured companions) with a fresh save. Technology has made it possible to archive *almost* everything, but it is still incumbent upon us to make the effort to document the games that we love, lest they disappear in a flash.
But I suppose that’s just part of the game we call life and we get to choose to keep playing.
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The post Gone in a Flash: Musings on Digital Impermanence appeared first on Black Nerd Problems.
“Since Adobe will no longer be supporting Flash Player after December 31, 2020 and Adobe will block Flash content from running in Flash Player beginning January 12, 2021, Adobe strongly recommends all users immediately uninstall Flash Player to help protect their systems.“
There is a generation of gamers who honed their skills on internet browsers. Many kids with mice and keyboards flocked to their preferred domain. Perhaps you were a frequenter of Addicting Games, Armor Games, or Newgrounds.
I, myself, spent most of my time on OneMoreLevel, always telling myself that I’d only needed to play well “one more level.” There were platforms and RPGs, sports sims and visual novels. There were licensed properties and original ideas and clones of those original ideas that were circulated in an attempt to capture those coveted clicks. There were empires founded on this bit of software and we are starting 2021 by watching them fall.
Of course some of the more popular games have been archived so to speak. Some have found homes in proper releases on Steam such as the zombie scif-fi RPG, Sonny.
Others have migrated over to consoles as is the case with N: The Way of the Ninja and The Fancy Pants Adventures. Some you can still download like Need from Madness and Radical Aces (although, those aren’t true Flash Games, instead being created with the 3dvia player, but their software is similarly dated). Concerted efforts from BlueMaxima saved more than 38,000 flash games before the software was retired. Only time will tell which ones were truly lost to time.
The (not exactly) old adage goes “once it’s on the internet, it’s there forever,” but the shuttering of Flash Player is not the first instance of digital impermanence. Gearbox’s Battleborn is also shutting down this month after it had been removed from stores in November 2019 after failing to escape from the large shadow cast by Overwatch.
Destiny 2 vaulted a nontrivial portion of its game just three months ago. Epic’s Paragon was deactivated in 2018 due to the company funneling more resources into its beloved battle royale, Fortnite. And Paragon fans are lucky that Epic was generous enough to release all of its assets.
When Toontown shutdown in 2013, some of its fans banded together to recreate an unlicensed, free-to-play version of the game. And this is to say nothing of the hundreds of multiplayer servers that have been laid to rest, refashioned and repurposed.
Video games are uniquely susceptible to just… not existing. Books can go out of print, film reels and pressed records can be destroyed, but video games exist largely in an ephemeral state. Zeroes and ones on a hard drive, files sizes that grow exponentially with the complexity of the game. It’s not a simple matter of copy/pasting. When you are playing a modern game, you’re playing a unique instance that some other players will never get to experience and, if they do, it’s still only an approximation that took an untold amount of resources and effort to get to happen. See the vanilla World of Warcraft servers. See a ROM hacker adding in a digital patch to simulate a hardware upgrade for the SNES.
It is an endeavor, and one that has no easy solution. Whether it’s the Library of Congress, the National Video Game Museum, the Strong Institute, or the Videogame Heritage Society, there are several organizations dedicated to preserving these interactive art forms, but will be unable to capture their kairos, their timeliness. Videos games are predicated on people playing them and if they aren’t played, they’re not really games.
Somewhere, there are a handful of PlayStation 4s with a copy of Kojima’s PT. There are PlayStation 3s and XBox 1s with copies of Destiny stuck in the pre-Rise of Iron crucible meta, with Touch of Malices that will not rotate because last last gen consoles couldn’t support it. There is a ROM of Pokemon Blue that thankfully has the ability to store more than one save, such that a young gamer does not have to fear their younger sibling overriding their level 99 Venosaur and Mewtwo (and I’m sure other treasured companions) with a fresh save. Technology has made it possible to archive *almost* everything, but it is still incumbent upon us to make the effort to document the games that we love, lest they disappear in a flash.
But I suppose that’s just part of the game we call life and we get to choose to keep playing.
Want to get Black Nerd Problems updates sent directly to you? Sign up here!
Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram!
The post Gone in a Flash: Musings on Digital Impermanence appeared first on Black Nerd Problems.
“Predictable” is one of the most damning words in film criticism. As a reviewer of films—and as a filmgoer in general—there’s nothing worse than when a movie goes exactly where you think it will without any nuance or fun along the way. Enjoying the ride is one thing; guessing correct so many times you should get a screenwriter’s credit is another. So that’s why movies like director Alister Grierson’s Bloody Hell are so welcome. At no point in the entire 95-minute runtime was I exactly sure what was going on. For better or worse, it absolutely keeps you guessing.
It’s hard to even tell from the trailer exactly what’s going on, and that too is to Bloody Hell‘s benefit. Is it an action-comedy? A gritty horror film? Is it a trippy John Dies at the End kind of experience? The answer is kind of all of the above and none of the above. “Indescribable” is also not really apt. But because we can’t really glean exactly what we’re watching, tropes-wise, we find ourselves just letting the story wash over us as we go from one hyper-violent set piece to another.
The story follows Rex (Ben O’Toole), a retired military guy of some sort who, following a robbery at a credit union, finds himself on trial for his actions in thwarting the assailants. Cut to eight years later. Rex is freshly out of prison and looking to get away from the paparazzi. At seemingly random, he chooses Finland as a destination and almost immediately a family of psychopathic Fins capture him, chain him up in a basement, and get him ready for dinner. Think of it as the Finnish Chain Saw Massacre.
But it’s not entirely bad for ol’ Rex. He has two people to talk to. One is Alia (Meg Fraser), the seemingly innocent and gorgeous young daughter of the family. Because of course. And the other is himself. Rex has long conversations with his inner self, his conscience, or whatever you want to call it. The upshot is, O’Toole does most scenes in the movie opposite himself, one of which is shirtless almost the whole time. It’s impressive, in every aspect.
The Horror Collective
Really there are two different main plots at work in Robert Benjamin’s script. One explores the “reality” versus the perception of Rex’s takedown of the robbers. It touches on, but never fully delves into, his clearly scarred psyche and his innate bloodlust. Just because he’s effectively “saving” people doesn’t immediately make him a hero.
This story weaves in and out with the survival horror plot of Rex chained up in the basement waiting for the Finns to do something to him and trying to make his escape. This plot is the much more pedestrian, at least for awhile, but it has some absurdly over the top horror stuff. There are a few twists I wouldn’t dream of spoiling because, like I said, not knowing what’s going on his half the fun. Maybe even more than half.
The Horror Collective
Ultimately while I do think Bloody Hell is fun for the popcorn gorehound entertainment it tried to be, I also can’t help feeling the character of Rex is kind of reprehensible. He shouldn’t be the hero of a movie. But maybe that’s the point. This guy definitely is the hero of this type of movie; since we get to know how his mind works, we realize he really isn’t all that heroic. It’s only down to O’Toole’s all-in performance that we like Rex at all, and it’s on his (immaculately shaped) shoulders Bloody Hell rests.
Very strange, quite enjoyable, and a nice little well-shot indie flick. Better than it should be, and definitely never predictable. Bloody Hell is now playing at drive-ins and on demand.
The Horror Collective
3.5/5
Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Twitter!
The post BLOODY HELL Is a Pretty Fun and Very Weird Horror Flick appeared first on Nerdist.