Day: August 30, 2012

“No one’s ever asked to see my birth certificate. They know that this is the place that we were born and raised.” Said Mitt Romney to thunderous applause. At that moment I was reminded of another fine line. This one spoken by Senator Amadala in the Star Wars series. “So this is how liberty dies. With thunderous applause.”

We have struggled with the racist history of America for a very long time. Yet now, in a world where we have a racially mixed president, we are supposed to believe that racism is dead, and worse, we are expected to accept that election as proof of the end of racial divisiveness to the extent that any time you mention race you are immediately accused of ‘pulling the race card‘. In other words, we are being made to feel bad about bringing attention to racism, that when we notice it the notice is our own bigotry as minorities bubbling to the surface, or worse a ploy by the socialist Democratic party to draw black people to the polls.

Racism will not vanish until we discover another other to focus our unity upon. The structural functionalist in me believes that the other is necessary. Unless we have an outside group to rally against we will not rally together. This is a fact of human nature. We form community based on shared interests. As those interests become broader, we maintain community based on fear.

Right now the fear factor being used is this idea of racial backlash. We have a shrinking majority that is losing power. That group is both aging and splintering within its own ranks. Now they are saying that we can’t mention it when we feel abused less we become the bad guy. This prescriptive treatment is being shopped to women as well as they are told exactly what to do and say about their bodies. In fact, a political official was censured for saying the word vagina on the floor.

Where do we go from here? When you are told not to react you must react. You must shout and fight and flaunt your individuality less you be silenced for good.

I woke up yesterday $60 short. The money was promised long ago to a western sports game franchise called EA Sports. The money went to the Madden football game. I’ve been buying the game since the early 90’s, and year after year the game impresses. This year I failed to be impressed. What I wanted out of Madden 13 and what I received were so tragically far apart that I may be close to the point where I step away from the franchise forever.

Video Games and textbooks share a common financial strategy. They rely on the ability to release new versions of the product in order to maintain the profitability of the line. The difference is that Video Games need to offer something relevantly new–beyond the new players–in order to avoid players sticking with the old version. Madden impresses every other year. Apparently it takes that long to roll out a significant upgrade in complete form.  I’ve accepted that, and as such muddled through Madden 12 with all the glee of a kid about to get a visit from Santa in a few months. Santa came yesterday and dropped off that coal.

Gameplay isn’t the problem. I can see improvements there in locomotion and play reading. No, the problem is the all inclusive franchise/coaching mode. To start, you cannot move players up from the NCAA game in career mode. I spent weeks prepping a kid from High School to Heisman only to realize belatedly that my career stopped there. Weak sauce.

This is the big problem I have so far. This game was always a continuation of the college game as it is in real life. Now there is no importing of draft classes nor career continuation. Madden effectively tore out the connectivity that really made the game fun in replay. Sure, we can pull in random drafts built from the floor up by madden folk, but that isn’t what I asked for. I wanted a chance to construct my own thing, to live out that dream i failed at in real life. This didn’t go down the way it had and or the way I wanted.