Finny and Zach talk Nintendo and Donald Trump this week but not before a nice serenade by Finny. What business does a Dark Souls Amiibo have to exist? Why are video games to blame for mass shootings? The important questions get answered this week all while Finny battles a cold and Zach drinks water out of a Coke Zero bottle.
Be sure to follow us on Twitter @RyanFinfrock and @notZachRogers.
Let’s vibe to vibe a second…
Will Smith’s song “Switch” was the first rap song that I really enjoyed listening to and then I went down a rabbit hole of listening to nothing but rap music for the next few years… thanks to Will Smith and “Lost and Found.” I used to freestyle rap a lot and write “raps.” Yeah.. I was a lost cause.”Switch” is still a good song, it turns out… even though it is over 10 years old now. Yes… 10 years old.
HEYYYYY! Turn it over and switch!
But I’m not going to be talking about Will Smith or rap music tonight… so sorry about getting your hopes up about “white boy writing about rap music.” I’m going to be talking about a different kind of switch… of the Nintendo variety.
Yes, I’m sure you’ve heard something about this console whether is be positive or negative. Let me give you my take on this console and what I think of video games as an art form. Yes… I believe video games are an art form and the second-best form of storytelling next to reading a book.
The Nintendo Switch is the latest console to come from Nintendo and comes after the very unsuccessful WiiU. You don’t know what WiiU is or never heard of it? Don’t worry… you aren’t alone in that category. Nintendo has an interesting hook with this new console and it is the reason why it has the “Switch” branding: it functions both and a home console you hook up to your TV and as a handheld that you can play on the go (much like an Gameboy or Nintendo 3DS.) People should be head over heels over this thing, right? A Nintendo console where you can play Mario and Zelda games on the good with much better graphics?? Sign me up! Well… not so fast.. people are not so head over heels on this console… at least not yet.
The Switch retails for $299.99. Not a bad price for a console if we get down to brass tax. The problem that many people have is that… well… there isn’t much to play on this console on Day 1. You have the new Zelda game, which looks pretty damn impressive, a gimmicky motion-control party game thing called 1,2, Switch! where one of the games has you milking a cow. I kid you not… one of the games actually has you milking a cow.
Needless to say… that game doesn’t look all that great.. but that Zelda game! Holy crap! Look at this trailer!
Yes… you can play that game on WiiU.. but who has one of those or wants to play it on something like that? LEMME PLAY MY ZELDA ON THE GO!
Other than that… there’s no big releases on day 1 of the Switch.. which people are upset about… and it’s a good reason why. There are many other reasons why people are upset.. but I won’t bore you with all of those details. There are other games coming out throughout the year that are pretty damn promising. Splatoon 2 and Super Mario Odyssey will be big hits for the Switch.
Yes… Mario is in New Donk City. NEW DONK CITY! I feel like Jay-Z and Alicia Keys should rewrite Emprie State of Mind for New Donk City. Now you’re in NEW DOOOONNNKKK.
Anyway.. if you were thinking about getting a Switch on day 1, you are pretty much out of luck. Preorders are reportedly sold out everywhere which is not shocking with a company like Nintendo… remember the fiasco with the NES Classic?
People love playing Nintendo consoles because it reminds them of their childhoods. If adults have children, it’s a way to connect with their children and give them a glimpse at what their childhood was like while giving their child a great experience. That’s a main reason why people love buying Nintendo products.
Me? I love playing Nintendo games. Zelda has been on my radar for years, Splatoon 2 will be something I sink many hours into.. and having something where I can play those games on the go… sign me up!
So I preordered one and have it paid off.
I got a pretty good deal on it. Gamestop had a deal where I could get $75 extra dollars of trade-in credit when I traded in my WiiU… so I got $195 in credit for my WiiU… add the games I had with that and I bought a Switch for around $20. I’ll take that deal any day of the week.
Since I’m on the topic of video games, I thought this would be the perfect time to rant about something that I am pretty passionate about: games as an art form. This is a more contentious debate than you may think. A simple Google search will render thousands of arguments for and against games as an art form and most of them are pretty fascinating reads.
Video games are something that I believe can be a very powerful art form… when done correctly. For example, my all-time favorite game is called “Bioshock.” It takes place in a dystopian underwater world called Rapture. Many of the themes are taken from Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged.” Through the game, you experience what lead to the downfall of this once great utopia and witness the degradation of the human condition and the corruption of power. It’s a game is only as powerful as it is because you are there through the eyes of the protagonist. You are partaking in the events that are affecting the future (or lack thereof) of Rapture. It’s something that you can only experience through a video game. Art always conveys some kind of story.. so video games have to fit into this category.
Of course, not all games are great at the art. In fact.. some are terrible and shouldn’t be considered games at all. I feel that way about a lot of paintings too…
The United States Supreme Court is also in my corner on this one. Back in 2011, the Supreme Court ruled on Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association and ruled that video games are protected speech and should be treated as other forms of media. California was trying to pass a law to prohibit the sale of mature video games to anyone under the age of 18. This, as history shows, faced many legal challenges which led to this decision by the Supreme Court. I could continue on this subject because the history around this case is fascinating.
Video games are pretty cool. I enjoy coming home from work and unwinding with an hour of a good game followed by a good book. Not only is a good art form.. but it can bring a group of friends together and relax and shoot each other in the face… and what is more relaxing than that? That’s right… not much.
I’m kind of all over the place on this topic… but I felt like it was a different thing to talk about other than the political crap I’ve been talking about recently. There will be much more to talk about in relation to that… Inauguration Day is on Friday. I REPEAT: Inauguration Day is on Friday.
I want to try and do more in-depth pieces (like digging into the Supreme Court case I mentioned) but time seems to never be on my side. So I’m going to see what happens. Ive been writing a lot more and I love it… but it takes up a ton of time when I already didn’t have a lot of free time to begin with. So I’ll be back Wednesday talking about who knows what… so until then, give me a follow on Twitter @RyanFinfrock. Let me know if you liked this change of pace and different topic. I know it was nice, for me, to talk about something different for a change.
TURN AROUND NOW! Switch!
Boy, when I decided to go to a Monday-Wednesday-Friday format for posts, I thought there would be days where it would be pretty damn hard to find news stories. So far… it couldn’t be easier to find stories to talk about. However, the main topic today is something that really made my blood boil… so let’s just dive into it.
Buzzfeed took the world by storm last night when it decided to publish an over 30-page dossier of scurrilous allegations against Donald Trump. This story has grabbed my attention mainly because of the ethics surrounding the situation.
These allegations are unverified. So to many, this is grounds for not publishing any information regarding the dossier. Buzzfeed decided to publish it anyway. A funny thing happened after Buzzfeed published: other journalists came out and said they have had the same information but didn’t publish because they could not verify the information. So why did Buzzfeed think it did the right thing? Well, here is Ben Smith’s letter to staff after the story was published:
“Publishing this dossier reflects how we see the job of reporters in 2017.” Buzzfeed is trying to set the stage for journalism after its pretty crappy 2016. However, this precedent sets journalism up for failure. Publishing without verification is nothing short of irresponsible and is what led to the ‘fake news’ phenomena that we currently see. Buzzfeed is saying “hey, we’ll publish whatever, you decide if you believe it or not.” Buzzfeed’s readership consists of a lot of demographics… but I’m assuming the bulk of their readership are young, impressionable minds. What does this precedent do to them? Their education may not be where it needs to be to make that informed decision after they read an unverified document on Buzzfeed. There should be reasonable expectation that information published on a site like Buzzfeed be true. If this is the new lifestyle for Buzzfeed, it has become a terrible source for news (they had been getting on my better side, recently) and given other media outlets a bad name by association in a time where trust in media is already at an all-time low and journalists need to find ways to earn back the trust of the public.
Buzzfeed lost any credibility it had gained in the past few months from me (and many others from what I’ve seen.) It’s crazy to see someone make that kind of managerial decision that affected so much.
Anyway… let’s talk about the ramifications of this in today’s press conference with the President-elect!
Before we get into the dumpster fire, let’s talk about President Obama’s farewell speech last night. I was never the biggest fan of President Obama. I disagreed with him on a number of issues but I respected him as a leader. It’s also undeniable that he is a fantastic public speaker. Both of these characteristics shined brightly last night. He spoke of unity and wishing the best of luck to the next administration. It was a hopeful speech.. although his audience may not have seen it that way.. they chanted “4 more years” because they really don’t want to have Donald Trump as their next President. He also spoke very highly of his wife, Michelle, which made some people I know tear up a little bit (I’m not one to cry over political speeches.. so it didn’t do much for me.) No matter what you may have thought of the last 8 years, there are certain aspects of Barack that you cannot deny are admirable and will be missed in the next few days.
The official “Hamilton” Youtube page posted this video after Obama’s speech… which seemed fitting. I liked it because it was a new Hamilton performance that I hadn’t seen yet.
Now… let’s contrast that with President-elect Trump’s first press conference in 167 days…
It’s hard to talk about this without really diving into the politics of all of this and starting partisan arguments… but that press conference was one of the worst things I have ever watched when it comes to politics… which is saying something because I’ve watched more of the Cabinet confirmation hearings than I care to admit.
Anyway… where do I begin with this speech? Do I start with Sean Spicer coming on stage and calling out Buzzfeed (Trump called the outlet a ‘failing pile of garbage’) and CNN for being fake news? Do I start with Trump’s lack of good public speaking skills? (“We have much hacking going on” is a sentence he said.) Or do I start with his back-and-forth with a CNN reporter when the reporter wanted to respond to the allegations that Trump brought before CNN?
As you might have guessed, most of the questions focused around the Buzzfeed report and Russia. The reporters present really wanted to get to the bottom of Russia and get some real answers about it. However, this lead to multipart questions that sometimes had 4,5 parts to them. Note to reporters: STOP DOING THIS! This only gives Trump an out to forget one of your questions and just focus on one of them and then go off on a talking point tangent.
There are many other topics that Trump needs to be questioned on… but thanks to the recent news cycle… all anyone wanted to know about was Russia.. and Trump wanted to slam “fake news” outlets.
I also found it funny that Trump said he liked the outlets that didn’t publish anything about the dossier. “Hey! I like you when you don’t write anything negative about me!”
On a different beat, Trump called out the intelligence committee right off the top of his speech and brought into question if it were an inside job… which is very dangerous rhetoric… but again… so is this:
Finally, I wonder how Trump plans on doing so much in the first couple of weeks in office. He plans on repealing and replacing Obamacare and naming a nominee to the Supreme Court within the first couple of weeks. I really doubt his knowledge on how long things like these that take. Not only that, he refused to give specifics on what he’d replace Obamacare with or who he is looking at for a Supreme Court nominee.
Also, to clear things up, there is a clear distinction between what CNN did compared to Buzzfeed. CNN reported that Obama and Trump were briefed by the intelligence committee about the dossier. Buzzfeed published the dossier without verifying its legitimacy. You cannot say what CNN did is comparable to what Buzzfeed did. If anything… Buzzfeed took what CNN said as enough evidence to go ahead and publish the document.
I could go on and on about last night’s and today’s events.. but I’d probably get myself into trouble if I continued. So I’ll wrap it up here.
Tomorrow will be an interesting day.. and not because of politics. Nintendo will be holding a conference to talk about its new console, the Switch. I’ll be covering that conference for Brashgames.com. So be sure to check that out late tomorrow night. I’ll also post more personal reaction here (time permitting) on the whole event. It may turn into my whole Friday post if I don’t have the time after all of that work. It’ll all be fun nonetheless and a nice change of pace from the crap that happened the past two days.
Let me know what you liked, didn’t like or what you’d like to see. Be sure to follow me on Twitter @RyanFinfrock.
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