After 4too painstakingly tried to formulate answers to my questions he sent me this very interesting reading;
1. How did you get started in the Fallout community?
First, let me thank you, Mr. Scooper, for allowing me the time to clear away some of my routine
weekly duties, and immediate social "voluntary" obligations (helpin' kin folk).
I don't recall which FO fan forum was the first.
Was on line and moving through FO sites, at over 38 kbits/sec, while the buzz for FOT was being hummed to harmonic resonance .
4too's recalled first post?
Chris Taylor was fielding questions about FOT's first release bugs, (God Damn the "4 Horseman"!!1!) , and I ham fisted a primal scream sort of excrement.
Chris T. actually found a viable question, and to my post posting amazed embarrassment, answered it, sans the emotional implications.
Learned something about style there.
2. How would you describe your writing style?
Self indulgent.
Flash a copy of THE ELEMENTS OF STYLE before my muzzle and I'm teleported to 'flight or fight' hyperventilating hysterics.
Spelling was always a chore, therefore the dictionary and later spell check became often visited imaginary friends.
I believe it was a 5th grade detention thing to have us copy out complete word entries from the WEBSTER'S dictionary, complete with declensions and word origins. Deciphered the abbreviations and discovered the hidden tales of history, sort of like Briar Rabbit tossed into the brier patch... acquired a vocabulary out of context to any officious text.
So I rewrite to check the spellin', a short answer zinger becomes burdened with word and phrase changes, because this other text *sounds* better to my mind's ear, or connects to a bigger picture in my mind's eye.
No discipline.
Writing is easier when it's a form of play or an act of passion. Having fun, or pissed off ... guess I'm feeding in the emotional shadows, 'teh' dark side Luke.
I'll leave the immaculate ejaculate commentary and debate club chess finesse to those that can (or can't).
3. What is your native language?
'merikan.
No world english spoken here.
Blend of American regional dialects, and work ethics, harassed by a divergent and irrationally incongruous flurry of educations.
'Over educated' is a flippantly bull sh-t response to one's achievements and qualifications as liabilities.
Not to use the whipping stick of the sardonic as an excuse to bar your way to ... anywhere ...
If you want to be true to yourself, you are merely 'inappropriately specialized'.
And you move on ...
4. What are your thoughts on Blargh and his writing style?
Blargh is the heroic phantasmagoria projected in Plato's Mythic Cave.
As the shadows shimmer and dance, we attach meanings and desperate truths, culled from our lint lined pockets of fading memories.
Blargh is the master of his style. The direct imperative, the sly query, the intoxicating derision rolled succinctly into a pining koan.
I am a Blargh fan, I am.
5. You have been around the Fallout community for a long time but some may accuse you of being a gimmick or alternate account because your writing style is so different than what is expected. What are your thoughts on this matter?
No alt, and I have no alts.
Not a mimic, but surely a gimmick, or two.
Got this egotistical, square headed, policy to maintain and manage one 'persona'.
It's as simple as I can get, most times.
Have tried 'to be' 4too as long as web pages allow the tag, and am restrained by being responsible for my petulant vagaries and myopic gesticulations.
As Brother None is my witness, more difficult for me to turn "it" off once I start typing.
'Pity the fool', fenced in by my own style.
6. What did you think of FO3 and/or its DLC?
Here's a DAC exclusive!
I've assisted in installing 3 copies of FO3 and have yet to leave the Vault.
Once the hardware and OS were capable, no interest to drive it round the block.
Two installs were for the true target demographic, but more preoccupied with finishing WOW campaigns and are now rioting in Team Fortress.
My install? More like a software test for this Mac's Boot-camp. 20, 40, 60, hours? With what pay back? FO3 won't snake the roots out of my drain tiles.
When I saw all those thong clad babe mod's at the Nexus, almost ...
almost made an emotional attachment, but just grabbed a few jpg's for the screen saver and went back to flipping the tabs to NMA, DAC, and the Codex.
NMA, DAC, and the Codex closest thing I'll ever come to a MMO, this side of reality.
Outside of the FO content, don't have a lot of use for action RPG's, no matter how grand the sand box, or how irrationally exuberant the rotarian boosterism of hired scribblers.
Feel like, and we know that emotions are the one true selling hook in commerce, politics, and other anti social behaviors,
feel like ... I've played these shooters with stats before.
Care about the FO content. Yes. Care about a Bethesda game? No.
Don't care what I may be missing, this day. Maybe tomorrow. Nex' day ...
FO3 is the only Bethesda title I was willing to buy.
FO3 is not primarily a FO game; it's a Bethesda Soft-works game first. Oblivion With Guns. How could it be any other way?
So if I buy a game for it's FO content, and not that it's a Bethesda Soft-works game,
why would any one be surprised that FO3 rests - not played - on a virtual disk on this Mac?
How could it be any other way?
Why bother with DLC if the main event has no appeal?
But ...
Maybe, if this out of this world DLC is MARS SAGA or UFO revisited, and has hilarious 'asploding heads, and exciting breast physics in zero-g stringed space,
my emotive languor will pass.
Real important / entertaining --> F-cking 'n' F-ghting!!!!1!
Yeee-Haaw! ................. Ya'll go, ...
I'll catch up.
Maybe tomorrow.
Nex' day ...
7. If you were to have a debate with Blargh on a subject matter of your choosing, what would it be?
Can any one bracket Blargh into the restraint of debate?
You all may see a single chromatic laser of wit.
I see a broad spectrum of associations.
I see a rainbow.
Chase a rainbow, what a majestic Quixotic fantasy!
What pot o' prizes awaits at the nether end?
[Subliminal message: how to dance around a topic and not actually address the issue! Oily subterfuge for the win!]
8. Do you realize that the way you write is incredibly difficult to understand?
Guilty as charged. Want me to stay after and copy out word meanings from the dictionary?
Can try to rewrite, and rewrite, but there comes a point when I will not comprehend the diminishing clarity, until I walk away for it.
Why revisit after the zeitgeist has moved on?
Will try again, later.
9. If a new person were to enter the community what advice would you give them to help understand your posting style?
A lot of the "styling" is to have fun. (Hey I sound like a game dev!!!!1!)
Don't put any more effort into it then I might have, unless that's what turns you on... then the "aha!" is all yours!
I reckon that makes absolutist "meaning" a collateral event. Have a happy accident!
This timeline of cliche and innuendo that we all draw on, it stretches back for millennia,
close is good enough ...
move on, there's more circus to see;
close is good enough ...
it's all horse shoes, hand grenades, and ...
close is good enough ...
10. You often post on the Codex and NMA, what do you think of them compared to DAC? Do the people at the other forums seem to idolize you like DAC does?
[schmoozing]
The Codex, NMA, and DAC, three different planets.
Sure that some of the natural sibling rivalry, may not bolster a genteel goodness and a nubile niceness, still, the differences forge on, for progress in quality gaming.
The Codex covers a lot of the gaming entertainment industry.
Only know, if not care, about Bioware and the other usual suspects, because some one cares to talk trash at the Codex.
NMA at first glance appears business like and steady for a fan site. But I don't go far from the news or general topic forums, and may not recognize all the hidden nuances.
The Codex and NMA are, ... , under control, and I can see why some of the more "virulent / valiant forces of chaos"(tm) have a sanctuary at DAC.
DAC is all ambiance. Some of the regulars are seriously ... unreconstructed.
Still, I'm a fool for the Book Thread. Got some good leads on sci fi sites here.
Part of the 'shock and awe' is how f-cking bright ya'll can be.
Really appreciate the encouragement to keep tryin'. One of the reasons I wouldn't turn the Pooper down on this interview, wasn't the honorary I got recently at DAC, but,
the "Quest".
About the time welch and Brother None were encouraging me to keep writing, KEEP REWRITING , (and I guess a threat of bodily harm @ the Codex means some one sniffed at my jargon.),
haris and Mr. Snake were 'dancing' to Rosh. Roshambo was drumming out invectives 20 beats a line, ... , or better, ...
at some point Rosh stepped out and I stepped in, don't know why -- just did. Couldn't let haris have the field, yet, maybe later!
After ceremonially throwing the virtual furniture around a bit, haris and Mr, Snake suggested that if I just go talk to normal people, to learn how to effectively communicate ... life would be more ... whatever, well ... jus' mo' life!
I guess normal for them ... one liners from the hip ... in swedish (?)...
Didn't find anyone yet speaking swedish, or world english, so still out there ... *above and beyond* ... a questing!
Normal conversational english for me, more like an occupational hazard, more like Roshambo ... well 10 beats per line ... something any bopper could dance to ... any 'too or 'toon of a DAC personae ...
4too, still out there ... seeking a mirror to normal-acy ...
And,
the history happened here, (web side placard soon to be erected), right here, not just any illusion, but a Mighty Delusion OF GRANDEUR ... the Quest began, the quixotic quest for 4too LITERACY!
[/schmoozing]
11. Seriously, what the fuck man?
Right Mr. Scooper, I did act out a bit on question 10.
Won't happen any more ... let 11 be the quiet time ... all manic energy checked at the door ...
Since --> this is the last parthian shot, it's got that "all good" kind of aura. Oooo-yah, the zesty blue cleanness of a minty mouth wash!
If less megalomaniacal in the word smithing, and more coherent in stringing the beads of sweat into recognizable patterns of behavior,
I might get more of my eclectic dot connecting into game threads.
Here's my featured 'antidote' ...
On talk shows, this guy pushing his book about memory exercises.
Discussed 3 types of memory. Maybe I can style them this way:
One more reactive and sub conscious, one building on patterns and recognition, one juggling multiple memory vectors and reorganizing them on the fly.
All subject to analogy subjectiveness, all just shadows on Plato's Cave Wall: left brain - right brain, reptile spine vs. prefrontal ape, emotional teasing the pseudo analytic,
and all strangely applicable to the different styles of gaming genres.
What the f-ck, ... think about that.
What 'flavors' of memory you REALLY like and enhance, and which are like wasting good butter on bitter Brussels Sprouts?
Which game genres are metaphorically, toxically full of salt, sugar, and fat, and which are a tragic waste of guns akimbo and tits and ass?
It's all good when it's all fun, <---> that's what the f-ck.
4too
Thanks, 4too. |