While We Wait: Writer's Block & Other Lame Excuses

[erez87]

NK's NES is just a never ending story, and there are so many never ending things a finite amount of people can keep up... (Apparently a single one).

 

[Shadowbound]

Then update rolls around and Shadowbound snarks about how I don't even know about Bavarians. Who gives a falk about Bavarians?

 

[Daftpanzer]

I consider myself an intellectual because I read Wikipedia articles for fun.

picture

+1 Like

 

[spryllino]

I suppose a mod needs time, inclination and skill. Many NESers have two of those (I think I have the inclination and not the other two), but there's no helping it, I suppose, if someone basically just hasn't got one of the three. Crezth said above that he hasn't got the ultimate inclination - doesn't derive fulfilment from it - which is all very well and admittedly disqualifies him, and others for the same reason.

This state of affairs seems potentially soluble to me by either of two mechanisms: firstly, leaving it to those who have all three, i.e. NK at the moment, but potentially others at other times, in which case we mustn't be surprised if good NESes aren't very frequent; or, secondly, individually working up the necessary skill, finding the necessary inclination, or making time, in which case we would find ourselves with successful NESes. Either way, there isn't much point in moaning about it; we know NESes where any one of time, inclination and skill are significantly lacking just flop, and if no-one's prepared to individually do anything about it (I confess I'm not, for instance), then we shouldn't be remotely surprised.

 

[Azale]

Yo symph mentioned that we think our hobby is too much work to hobby. Well, it is. It's too much effing work to update. I had all the time and cause in the world to update AToCT and I didn't because I hated it. It was a ton of reading where I constantly had to make myself do more reading and research, when what I really wanted to do was sulk about how hard my life is and play video games. Then update rolls around and Shadowbound snarks about how I don't even know about Bavarians. Who gives a falk about Bavarians? Apparently I'm supposed to. No wonder the whole enterprise failed.

Considering what people put up with back in the HALCYON DAYS which Luckymoose so correctly deconstructs, yo I think the problem is standards. They're too damn high. NK has spoiled you all with timely well-written updates that synthesize all that unreadable crap you spew at him into a coherent narrative. You want to do 2006 NESes? Easy as hell. Boot up MS paint and get geography-tracing. No matter what the time period, call every offensive a blitzkrieg and every stagnant war trench warfare. ArbiNES. It can be done.

Reason I don't mod is because it's too hard and not remotely rewarding.

yep x 1000 to all of this.

The only solution is to make your own timeline and tell people to shove it if they don't like your interpretation of a given event. At least then all you have is the writing workload and not the research & whinging too.

Hypothesis: elitist attitudes make it harder for new people to get involved = inevitable decline as attrition takes hold. Then the system either collapses completely or a new, younger elite is formed and takes over in a bloody coup. Human nature etc etc.

IOT is less active than NES


what we need is a real space nes to get all those new arrivals when Civ:BE comes out.

 

[Symphony D.]

As Wu-Tang Clan would say if they were Scottish, antimatter is nay somethin' ta feck with:

Spoiler :

8 grams takes a 61x61 accelerator about 8 hours to produce

Yeah, remote detonation, that's the ticket.

This is surely at the minimum safe distance!

It wasn't minimum safe distance.

Like at all.

Um.

Yeah.

e: on default behavior, they also destroy bedrock, so there's that too.

 

[Symphony D.]

Russian Air Force is still jonesin' after RC-135s after all this time.

 

[Thlayli]

Yo symph mentioned that we think our hobby is too much work to hobby. Well, it is. It's too much effing work to update. I had all the time and cause in the world to update AToCT and I didn't because I hated it. It was a ton of reading where I constantly had to make myself do more reading and research, when what I really wanted to do was sulk about how hard my life is and play video games. Then update rolls around and Shadowbound snarks about how I don't even know about Bavarians. Who gives a falk about Bavarians? Apparently I'm supposed to. No wonder the whole enterprise failed.

Considering what people put up with back in the HALCYON DAYS which Luckymoose so correctly deconstructs, yo I think the problem is standards. They're too damn high. NK has spoiled you all with timely well-written updates that synthesize all that unreadable crap you spew at him into a coherent narrative. You want to do 2006 NESes? Easy as hell. Boot up MS paint and get geography-tracing. No matter what the time period, call every offensive a blitzkrieg and every stagnant war trench warfare. ArbiNES. It can be done.

Reason I don't mod is because it's too hard and not remotely rewarding.

You need to mod something that is fun, not too difficult, and works for you.

IDK if you felt the same way about CNES, but you seemed to be enjoying yourself until the gaping maw of Kraz-Thlayli zero sum personality diva competition imploded the NES.

Not every NES is super srs history TL. Perrrrrsonally, I think most people (including myself) on this forum are smart and effin' lazy, and use every possible justification to avoid admitting the obvious. Our culture is built around instant gratification; we're not model makers, we're FPS players.

Yes, modding is hard work. But amazingly enough, almost all of the things in life that we derive lasting satisfaction from (mastering a profession, learning to play classical piano, writing a book) are really, really hard. If you aren't cut out for modding, you aren't cut out for most of the more challenging aspects of life, in which practice, precision, and integrating the ideas of others is important.

I don't say this to insult people; I think almost everyone is capable of being a mod. If you aren't having fun, you aren't modding right.

Don't just give up, mod better.

 

[Symphony D.]

I don't say this to insult people; I think almost everyone is capable of being a mod. If you aren't having fun, you aren't modding right.

Don't just give up, mod better.

It's almost like this discussion was already had and your position has retrogressed back to "anything is possible if you believe in the heart of the cards friendship gumption continuing to try to become good at things you hate instead of mastering things you actually enjoy!" in complete dereliction of all the points raised against that not six weeks ago.

If you aren't cut out for modding, you aren't cut out for most of the more challenging aspects of life, in which practice, precision, and integrating the ideas of others is important.

lol

 

[Luckymoose]

To say this: Everyone is capable of being a mod, not many are capable of being a good mod. Players do not want simply okay mods, so the mods become discouraged. To use your book analogy, I do believe anyone can write a book, but that doesn't mean said book will be good or liked. It isn't as simple as modding. There is no magic formula. You're either good enough or the playerbase rebels against you.

 

[North King]

On the plus side, that was a good discussion to reread.

 

[Luckymoose]

Yeah, and anyone can write a novel too! All we need to do is look at how many novels actually come out of NaNoWriMo and... oh.

A novel is just a length of words put one after another. Anyone can do that. The hard part, as I said above, is making it good. Anyone can mod, write a novel, or play piano, but that doesn't mean they'll be any good at it.

 

[North King]

Strictly speaking some people can't play piano, you ableist. >=(

 

[Luckymoose]

Strictly speaking some people can't play piano, you ableist. >=(

If you can move your body, you can play keys.

 

[North King]

And some people can't move their body. BECAUSE THEY'RE DEAD.

how you feel now, punk?

 

[Symphony D.]

A novel is just a length of words put one after another. Anyone can do that. The hard part, as I said above, is making it good. Anyone can mod, write a novel, or play piano, but that doesn't mean they'll be any good at it.

I would disagree only in so far as that putting the words on a page isn't enough for something to be considered a novel (it's necessary but not sufficient). 50,000 words vomited onto a page is a draft, a novel inherently has (lots of) editing and revision put onto it. Yeah, those drafts are novel-length, but they aren't novels, in the same way that repeating "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," with cute line arrangement 1,500 times will be novel-length, but not a novel.

This would be the "making it good," part, so we're not really disagreeing, but this is a thing that annoys me about people who go "Oh, you're a writer? I write too!" so I felt like sharing.

 

[Luckymoose]

This would be the "making it good," part, so we're not really disagreeing, but this is a thing that annoys me about people who go "Oh, you're a writer? I write too!" so I felt like sharing.

The people who claim to be writers often times do not write. I think this is the main gripe we all have with them. If you aren't writing something, whether a first draft or a final one, you are not a writer. A writer must write.

 

[Lord of Elves]

This reminds me of that one time I said "modding is easy, modding well is hard" and Crezth threatened to haul me before the Supreme Revolutionary Tribunal of #nes and have me disembowled. Suddenly it turns out I was right.

From the mouths of babes. Gift horse in the mouth. Two in the bush one in the hand. Don't throw stones when you live in a glass house. Don't get stoned, kids. Stay in school.

 

[Symphony D.]

To make art requires doublethink: you must simultaneously love and hate yourself, your work, and possibly everyone and everything else. You must simultaneously be a megalomaniacal and egotistical narcissist whom is graciously imposing, nay, gifting a vision of excellence to the (undeserving, unwashed, uncouth) masses of the world, and a self-doubting, self-critical, wrathful nemesis and destroyer of civilization, ready to burn down all works of both yourself and others. An imbalance of either of these things is disastrous. Too much of the former, and you'll only make at best pablum. Too much of the latter, and you'll make nothing at all.

The former might sell well in spite of its lack of artistic merit and can possibly be covered up through sufficient editing or outside oversight though, so always err toward the egomaniacal.

This reminds me of that one time I said "modding is easy, modding well is hard" and Crezth threatened to haul me before the Supreme Revolutionary Tribunal of #nes and have me disembowled. Suddenly it turns out I was right.

no log = stdh.txt

 

[Symphony D.]

It's intriguing to me that when a (brown, Muslim) man steals a bulldozer in Jerusalem and does some damage with it out of frustration with his circumstances, he's a terrorist.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem_bulldozer_attack
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Jerusalem_bulldozer_attack

When a (white, Christian) man steals a tank or turns a bulldozer into one in America and does some damage with it out of frustration with his circumstances, he's just a criminal.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawn_Nelson
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer

Curious.