Whatever Happened to Xbox One App Achievements?!

Think back to the original reveal of the Xbox One. Many of you will remember some of the more negative aspects of that E3 presentation, and many of those promised features ended up being cut or rethought due to backlash. But there was one thing I remember about that day that I still thought was a good promise.

Microsoft promised to make achievements even better. I loved achievements then and now, so I was excited to see what that promise meant. As we know now, you can dissolve that promise into two easy categories. One was that all Xbox One games would have a base gamerscore of 1000, there would be no 200 gamerscore games just because they were arcade-only or the like. As of right now, the only way to have an Xbox One game with 200 gamerscore is if you're playing a backwards compatible Xbox 360 title.

The second was that apps would now have achievements as well.

And I really loved that idea.

After I finally bought my Xbox One in the later end of 2014, I found that the thing was a well-rounded home entertainment system. I don't mean like the Nintendo Entertainment System, I'm not so old timer or huge Nintendo fan who thinks "Entertainment System" is synonymous with "Video Game Console", I mean the things you usually call an entertainment system. Playing DVDs, streaming videos, and playing games all-in-one; and the focus was on making that feel more fluid and connected than ever before. It's funny how I was complaining about Microsoft talking about sports and video so much at that now infamous E3 conference, because now I see they were just trying to tell gamers that this time they wanted to focus on everything it did instead of just making it a games console that happens to play movies.

They also decided to have you earn achievements for doing so, and to me, this added an incentive to do so. Apps are free, the only payments are if the app is for a service you are paying for such as Netflix, so you could simply earn more achievements in things you probably would have downloaded anyway just to see what they were like or if you wanted the most out of the service you would be paying for even if you didn't download the free app. One of my favorite things was going on my Xbox account and looking at my App Achievements alongside my regular ones.

Sure, they offered no gamerscore, but they made me feel like I was actually doing something besides watching a YouTube video. Some of the Achievements were even in-depth, such as watching a combined total of a set amount of hours for a specific type of video. Let's also not forget that Xbox One Achievements are full-size pictures, and you can use them as background images if you want. I'll be honest, that is something I actually did with a few of my YouTube Achievements

And I'm legitimately happy to admit that just a day or so ago, I used my Xbox One to upload a YouTube video, and now have every single YouTube Achievement. I am not joking:

But a little over a year ago, I could no longer see those Achievements with my other Achievements on my online account. If I looked at my Achievements on my Xbox One itself, they weren't listed there either. The only way to see App Achievements was by doing the method you see above in the picture.

Related to that, recently I tried the free trail for Amazon Prime. I downloaded the app, and checked the Achievement list. I did a few things to pop an Achievement, but one never popped. As if they know the Achievements exist, but they no longer register when the correct action is done. That or I got an error, and by checking online and reading people's comments on Xbox forums, apparently either is just as likely.

And related to that, I am now paying for the streaming service VRV. It has no App Achievements, and from personal experience to before I had VRV, Crunchyroll has no Xbox App Achievements either.

App Achievements didn't catch on all that well, and you know, and if I look back I guess I can understand not everyone wanting them. I do slightly understand not programming any new ones in, however, I really wish I had the option to look at all of my achievements at once, including ones from Apps. I loved these, and I know I'm not alone from above stated forums. I know some hated them, so I think it would be cool to just have the option not to see or earn them if someone doesn't want them. Some people wanting to hate them should not completely override the people who really liked them, a compromise should be possible.

If you did hate them though, allow me to just ask you a few questions. Just to see something, and to get a full view of what you think:

- Do you sometimes look at your friends Achievement lists and go "Ugh, they really played Doritos Crash Course?" or maybe "Ugh, they really played Frozen Free Fall Snowball Fight?" Or any other free game you think they only played for the achievements?

- Do you think it's weird and/or stupid that mobile games on Windows Phones also have achievements?

- Do you think it's weird and/or stupid that Solitaire on Windows computers now also has Achievements?

- Have you ever played a game you thought was "just okay" but decided to get all of the achievements anyway? The same counts for PlayStation trophies.

If you have a problem with every single one of these questions and the App Achievements, I do have to ask what Achievements ever did to you. I mean, they're just fake rewards for video game players, let people have their fun if they're not hurting anyone. If you don't like them, fine, that's your business, I'm just asking if it's necessary to have a problem with every single thing I mentioned, and if so, if it's that big a thing to have a problem with.

If you don't like App Achievements, but at least a few of those questions were completely okay with you, let me know. It'd be interesting to hear your reasons. I do mean that. I am fine with all of the above questions, and I do find it interesting to hear other sides of the argument. Differences make us as a species more interesting after all, despite what the more close-minded may claim.

Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to download the Xbox Video App and see if the Achievements still work for it.

(And I may as well share the video I uploaded for the Achievement. Funny story, I also got an Achievement worth actual gamerscore because it's from SUPER HOT, and saving footage in that game gives you an Achievement.)

The Women's March Has Restored My Faith In Protests

Several months ago I wrote my first political post, calmly and rationally discussing my disgust at the election turn outs, and my opinions of the extremism from both sides which I truly believe was one of the more important reasons why this all happened.

I also in that post discussed how peaceful protests have been going downhill, with people now attacking random civilians or police men who would have been on the side of the protesters, or just breaking public or private property. (Although to be a hypocrite I did hear about the neo-Nazi who was punched on inauguration day by a protester and I plan on watching said video sometime because that is something I fully agree with and am happy happened)

I won't bother copy and pasting my older statements, especially since as far as I know, I am in fact say the wrong thing after all. Getting political is hard when it comes to not stirring anything up. All I need to say is that today, there were was a Woman's March. In fact, there were several.

On every single continent. Yes, including Antarctica.

And everything the protesters is, was what I have been waiting for.

There were no arrests. No reports of broken property. No rough housing. Everyone simply came together, and peacefully stating everything that is going wrong. The worst thing that could be said is the vulgarity of some of the signs, which in this day and age means nothing.

And they came in droves. In total, all together, millions. One of the marches counted a total of around 750,000. That is impressive, and it is more impressive how well everyone behaved considering the last few years. This is how you protest, and any protest after this that doesn't follow suite has learned nothing.

The following years will be terrifying, horrible, disgusting. However, if the powers that be have to contend with the kind of protests I saw today, then they are in for a world they will not like either.

A quick history lesson. Fascism always started bad for the citizens, but it ended very bad for the fascists themselves.

So let's share some moments from Twitter about this amazing part of the world's history.

This next one will simply be a link to The Atlantic, which sums up photos from around the world. https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2017/01/photos-of-the-womens-marches-around-the-world/514049/

You don't need me to tell you this, but keep marching. This is the right thing to do, and those against it are learning they are far more powerless than they think.

Can A Bad Adaptation Be A Good Movie?

Way back in high school I remember a class mate of mine (who's name and appearance I have long since completely forgotten) once told me, and I believe a few others who were also in the room at the same time, about her opinion on a movie she had seen. Apparently, she originally really liked the movie, may have even loved it if I'm remembering correctly. Then she said that after she read the book, she hated the movie because of how different it was from the source material. This statement immediately bothered me, outright confused me. For the life of me, I didn't see why something being different from it's source material should mean that it is automatically bad. It didn't bother her when she didn't know what the books were like, but suddenly, knowing it differed from it's source material meant that it must be bad.

Needless to say I don't agree with this mindset. The point of this post is not to simply shake my fist in the air and proclaim that I believe adaptations are allowed to take liberties. What I would like to do instead is discuss just how common this really is, and how people don't really have as much of a problem with this as many say they do. Let's be real, we have all heard the same thing or similar to my example from a high school girl. Some of us may have even said it ourselves. I'm not going to point out your hypocrisy or try to change your opinion, I just want to talk about how many things we love are actually adaptations that differ slightly or heavily, some of them you may not even know are adaptations in the first place.

Also this is now the point where I tell you the movie she was talking about was one of the Percy Jackson movies. I don't know which one, I never saw any of them or read the books. I waited until now to mention it by name as I'm aware the movies were not well-received, my point would have been made muddy if I used a widely-considered bad movie as my starting point, so I waited until now. For the record, this is how you stretch the truth effectively. I never withheld anything from you, I just waited for the time it would be best to mention. Consider that if you ever run for political positions. It is much better than lying. It beats having the piss takin' outta you, if you get what I mean.

Now to get back on topic. Perhaps you noticed the picture I used above? The picture was taken by myself, and those are in fact all pieces of media with their adaptations above them. I did the traditional book to movie, then video game to manga, comic book to video game, and book to comic book. I thought it would be interesting to do as many fields as I could, and I really do think it's best to do adaptations not as many people are aware of. I could take all day telling you that Disney films are okay and it doesn't matter if they are too accurate or not. That doesn't help my point, as even the person with the hardest stigma against my point tends to let Disney slide by. Perhaps this is because they mostly do fairy tales, but just as a reminder they also did adaptations of full novels, such as Tarzan of the Apes, The Hunchback of Notro Dame, Pinocchio The Tale Of A Puppet, and Bambi: A Life In The Woods. 

Speaking of, if you work at a book store and you have in stock a copy of Bambi: A Life in the Woods, do not put it in the kids section. It's a young adult novel that's very dark and realistic for it's setting. If it has that subtitle, it's the original story and it's not meant for children. I've seen it in that section and it worried me about some innocent child reading it and being horrified. It's also one of my favorite books.

Let's start with the first two in the picture; the novel Nothing Lasts Forever and it's adaptation Die Hard. Nothing Lasts Forever was apparently popular enough when it was published to warrant a film, despite being obscure now. The book itself is also a sequel to the novel The Detective, which also got a movie, that is not connected to Die Hard at all. Die Hard is an action classic, and it's overshadowed the novel so much, that my copy literally tells you on the cover that it's the book Die Hard is based on. The back cover barely talks about the book, most of the positive things are about the film instead. I felt this was perfect to start out with, as this is more common than you think. Hellraiser, The Wizard of Oz, the aforementioned Bambi, many movies get so well-known that many do not realize they are an adaptation. For some, they only learn when they decide to read that fact in the credits, or when they go to a bookstore or library and find a copy like mine that proudly states the fact.

Now, as for the book, it's very similar but has some very notable differences. It is worth a read if you so feel, but I won't shed tears saying the movie is much better. There may be things that make the original book worth reading, but one is vastly superior, and I understand not bothering with the other if you don't care enough. If you feel you only have time in your life for one of them, and you've already watched Die Hard, you don't need to feel like you've lost something. They took some of the better parts of the novel, and ironed out what didn't work. This is something that some may argue is not too accurate of an adaptation, but that I would argue makes for a great adaptation. You have to truly understand your source material to be able to say "This isn't good" or "This is good for the book but it wouldn't work for a movie". We've entered an era where filmmakers try to be more faithful to the source than ever before. It's worked out for them for now, but I'm waiting for the day when film goers start asking for the adaptations to have more differences like they used to, and I'm very positive this will happen.

Now for video game to manga. The Kingdom Hearts games are beloved by fans like myself. The first game has a storyline that is still considered wonderful to this day, and even with later installments getting far too complicated, we still do our best to understand them. The manga takes the basic plot and turns it into a complete farce, and I'm not the first one to say that. I can understand this being a turn-off for many people. Taking a game series that they love so much, and basically making fun of it. Well, personally, the first game is one of my all-time favorite games, and I adore the manga adaptation. There's a very strong "so bad it's good" vibe that I get from it, and I don't think I could have it any other way. Case in point, the one I chose for the picture is the manga for Chain of Memories, which takes itself more seriously and tones down the wacky jokes and atmosphere without getting rid of them. It makes the quality better, and means I do not lose the moments that I loved from the original manga productions. It cuts out more of the plot than the last one, the only Disney world left is Agrabah from Aladdin, meaning it keeps itself self-contained arguably better than the game did.

I can still play the games until I die, and they will remain unique experiences that cannot be replicated. In a way, I think that is what the manga is going for. Doing it's own thing because it knows it would just be an inferior copy if it tried being a regular copy. What this manga series is, is a comedy to the point that it may as well be a parody of the games, and I appreciate and love it for that.

Now for the third. What I love about Sam & Max is that no matter what version you are currently enjoying, it has the same characters in completely different situations. There was an original comic strip series, many video games, and a cartoon aimed towards children. By this point, it is a franchise, and every iteration is a cult-classic. If you like one, you will like the other as well, for similar and different reasons. I think that's something to remember. When you become a franchise, many of your installments are in fact adaptations. They should be held in regard to the other installments, but they are still products that need to be judged on their own for what they are. If you don't know Sam & Max, I have no problem saying you can start anywhere. If you do try, and you like what you got, then I say you may as well keep going even if it seems like a big leap.

And the last was  Lost on a Mountain in Maine and it's very recent comic book adaptation Lost Trail. I read the original book in middle school, and a few years ago I came across the comic I did not know existed at the time. I purchased the comic, reread the book, and then read the comic. I think both are quite good, and are on equal playing field with each other. If you don't know the story, it's the real-life story of Donn Fendler, who as a boy became lost from his family on Mount Katahdin. In Maine it is considered a classic that we read in schools, so I'll forgive if you have never heard the story. For us it's a personal thing, Maine is very big on fellow Mainers. The book was written by someone who simply wrote down what Donn told him, and the comic came decades later, with Fendler still having a part in the process, although admittedly I don't know how much. The book is a great read because you are just reading a child retell a harrowing experience that had happened recently. The comic is a great read because Fendler himself admitted that he remembered more about the event when age let it stew in the back of his mind.

I don't just recommend either, I recommend both. I think they compliment each other. They are great alone, but if you read the original first and immediately follow it up with the comic, you have a winning combination.

So all in all, I have talked about adaptations that overshadow the original, adaptations that decide to just do their own thing and damn the consequences, the power of franchising, and an adaptation that fills in some of the blanks the original couldn't.

All of them, to me, are just as valid.

Maybe it is nice to know exactly what you are getting into. Honestly, I could sit here and argue the fact that sometimes a good adaptation leads to a bad product. All I ask for in an adaptation is one thing, and I think it is best we all consider following this.

The only thing I ask from an adaptation, is that it is good. I don't care if it's faithful, I don't care if it's ridiculous, I don't care if it has almost nothing in common with the original. I just want a product that I end up enjoying. I think that is all I need to ask.

So, yeah. A good movie can come out of a bad adaptation. Or a good manga, or video game, book, or comic book. It's happened before, and it will happen again. Whether it's a slight variation or a completely different take. Anything enjoyable can be taken as it's own product.

Is The Commercialization Of Christmas Really A Bad Thing?

Before I start with the content of this post, I would like to point out for those who did not know, that this year all three of the winter religious holidays happened at roughly the same time. The first day of Hanukkah was the exact same day as Christmas Eve, and the first day of Kwanzaa was the day after Christmas, or Boxing Day as some call it. Kwanzaa and Hanukkah also both end on January 1st this year. Kwanzaa is always from the 26th of December though the first of January, but Hanukkah does not have an exact date every year, and I think it is nice how that all turned out. In a way, it's almost as if all three holidays put aside their differences and came together this year. Something we more of in the future, and less of the kind of people who are still mad other holidays have a right to exist.

To get on with the actual content of this post, for years people have complained about how Christmas time has gotten more commercial and the important aspects of the holidays are being slowly removed. Now, I'm not going to waste my time talking about the religious zealots who would be complaining about their precious holiday going away even if nothing was happening at all. This is not a post about the anti-PC crowd that are thin-skinned in their hypocrisy and their misplaced anger, as I said above, that is not this kind of post. What I will be discussing is the actual commercial aspects that have found their way into one of the biggest holidays of the year, and debating how good or bad of a thing that is.

Should this post be read by someone somewhere how has never heard of the holiday known as Christmas, the basic idea is split into two ways. For the religious side, it is the birth date given to Jesus Christ, whom the Christians consider to have been the true son of God, and you celebrate his birth by buying presents and giving them out on this day to your loved ones. On the commercial side, the gift giving is made the important part, and you see many stores both local and corporate reminding you to go out and buy all of your friends and loved ones something very nice for them to show them how much you care. Christmas cards also exist, but for years I have personally felt like they are going out of style. They are always cheesy, corporate, and the mail service gets most of it's business through packages so I have a feeling Christmas cards are not doing them the business it used to. More power to you if you still have a Christmas card list and mail them out, but cards aren’t my thing and I’d rather buy my loved ones something nice, but then again I keep my list of close personal friends very short so maybe I’d like cards more if I knew thousands of people.

On both sides of this, there is also a fellow named Santa Claus who magically rides on a sleigh every Christmas Eve, who brings presents to all the good little girls and boys, and depending on your country of origin, he either brings lumps of coal to the naughty children, or he has his magical monster friend the Krampus come and kidnap them. There are other slight variations of the Santa mythos, such as some countries have the children leave out their shoes and some hang stockings on a wall, but it is the same magical figure flying around the world giving gifts. Supposedly the religious types don't like Santa, for the sake of "keep the Christ in Christmas", but this is something I have literally only heard on TV.

I won't pretend I'm in a super-duper religious state, but it is religious enough that I would have heard people say this if these kind of people exist. Mostly it seems they are okay with Santa Claus, as it means they too celebrate Christmas, if they are the kind of person who wishes everyone believe the same things they do as well. Honestly, the biggest complaint I hear about the figure is that many adults have begun to question if it is alright to let your child believe he exists, the argument being that you are feeding them a lie for many years knowing the bubble will have to be burst at some point down the line. It's an interesting argument, but I've already brought up enough topics for today.

Personally, I love Christmas and I celebrate it every year. I'm religious enough, and I do like taking one day out of the year just to make sure we're all happy and doing well. In my worst years, the entirety of December leading up to the holiday would be my favorite month. I like the feeling of joy and good will, and even if I'm aware of some of the worst aspects, I still do love this time. (For an example, those people who ring bells outside of the mall for charity money don't always give to who they say they do, and some are completely homophobic in their cause. Don't let that ruin your spirit, but do feel free to let that be a lesson in researching where you put your money).

Growing up I did also have a few Christmas books we read aloud for the season. I believe one was religious in nature and the other was just a book about American Christmas, straight-up called Christmas in America. Forgive me for not knowing more, even though we do pull those books out every year to stand up and look at, we haven't read them in over a decade because my mother was the only person who thought they were interesting. My Christmas experience is truly no more religious nor commercial in nature than anyone else's, so I think I can add an easy argument here.

Now for the religious aspect, this is still a religious holiday to many and there is nothing wrong with that. No one is truly trying to take that away from you, and chances are the majority of the people who celebrate the religious version already know that, and tune out the fanatics just as much as the rest of the world. The loud and angry ones are never the majority that they think they are, after all. Personally, while having aspects of religion in me, I don't do much for the religious version because I am just happy to buy things for the people I care about, and I really love the atmosphere and the feeling. My family however does have their own traditions, and all-in-all, that is kind of how religious holidays work, with the people who celebrate it exactly how they think they should celebrate this time. Everyone does it differently, and it all means the same to them, as that is the point of religious holidays. To reaffirm your belief in God, yourself, the people around you, the whole world and all the people in it.

And so the question is if the commercialization aspect does in fact ruin all of the above.

In all fairness of course I understand having your feathers ruffled at the idea of trivializing a special time. That, in the end, is part of the process of commercializing something. Capitalizing on something with the intention of not just making a profit, but of trying to make a dollar out of as many people as you possibly can. This is not a niche market where they hope the crowd opens up, this is something where they plan on striking everyone's hearts and wallets at the same time.

We are talking giant inflatable Santas that are both on display and available for purchase, we are talking licensed Disney characters in Christmas clothes to place on your lawn, even made-for-TV movies about the holiday that are produced on a nickel and sold for ten or twenty dollars per DVD.

And I'll be real, I don't have a problem with this.

Businesses are businesses, they suck the money out of everything. We are talking about the very people who have invented holidays simply to grab our hard earned cash, we do not need to be surprised that they are trying to do so with the holidays they didn't invent as well. Personally, I always liked the upside to this. This really and truly does get as many people into the Christmas spirit as possible.

And, it does give the non-Christians a chance to enjoy something about the holiday as well.

Now like I said, there is nothing on Earth that could take away the religious section of Christmas. The only thing that could be done would be one of two things: It would be the businesses somehow buying all of the churches, or the death of Christianity. As for the former, don't get me wrong, I can think of many businesses of the top of my head that would gladly buy out every church in the world if they could, but the power of the church is something too strong even for the raw power of corporate greed. Even the ones that already go hand-in-hand with them, but I'll stop there. As for the latter, for any one of you that wants to point out it is not unheard-of for a religion to die, remember that no religion truly evaporates from existence, and also to be real, if Christianity is going away at some point it is not in your lifetime nor mine. It has been around for thousands of years even with it's detractors.

To get back on point, have any of you heard of how Christmas goes in Japan? Japan does not associate Christmas with the usually associated religion, but they do celebrate it, and it is very commercial. Lights and decorations everywhere, all the good cheer the holiday can bring, Christmas trees everywhere. I love this idea. While it may in the end just be the demand of the almighty dollar, we can still use this as a way to love and cherish everything about the holiday, no matter your own personal beliefs.

And not only will I say more power to you if you disagree, I am going to make you happy by adding something else. If you are so unhappy with the commercialization that you refuse to take part in buying the merchandise, than you are in fact doing exactly what the corporations are hoping you do not do. Their plan is you get your money, and by denying them your wallet out of protest, you honestly are hurting their end goal. You may only be one person, but the goal is not to just make money, it is to make everyone's money. They may not know your name, but they know, as corporations are more than ever ready to bleed everything dry, they know when they can’t get everyone, and some of them furiously hate that. Go ahead and have your small victory, but it may only feel small to you, believe it or not.

So, in the end, my point is that a holiday is a holiday. It is our own right to celebrate however we feel, and personally, I like knowing that my favorite holiday can reach the hearts of millions in any way they see fit. If you feel this has gotten out of hand, then again, more power to you, celebrate the holiday as you see fit.

It is too late to wish a Merry Christmas in this post, and both Hanukkah and Kwanzaa are roughly halfway done at this point so wishing a Happy Hanukkah or Merry Kwanzaa is a little strange I suppose. It is not, however, too late to wish a Happy New Year to all of my readers. There is a lot about the upcoming year. Some of it frightening, very frightening, although I do hope we can come together and try to understand each other a lot better. No matter what holidays we love, or how we celebrate them.

Why My YouTube Channel Will Never Be Successful

In July of 2012, I created a YouTube channel for the purpose of creating and uploading videos. The idea was never to make money off of this channel, from the very start the idea was to use the platform as a way to get my creative material out there for the world to see. When I first started it up, my views weren't necessarily bad for a brand new channel. Looking back at one of my first videos, it is just shy of five hundred views, and for an unknown channel that is not a bad number. It is not even my most viewed video, but, it is definitely up there in that regard. Said video was the first episode of my nine episode horror-comedy about an Apple fan who was also a serial killer, and if you'd like to see why so many people watched this first episode, which had no reference to the second half of the premise, you can simply watch it down below:

I'm proud of many videos I have made, and many of the ones I regret were erased from my channel (with a back-up copy in my possession should I ever change my mind), and when it comes to those videos I erased, if I had left them up I sincerely think they would get roughly the amount of views they do now in the form of non-existence.

I have learned how to do good videos by this point, and I am fully aware that my efforts are gaining no reward. I remember years ago, when I first started, when YouTube was more open to letting the unknown channels get attention. I am far from the first person to complain about the fact that this no longer seems to be the case.

I will play devil's advocate, however, for something I do believe is fair. As I do not monetize my videos, I understand why YouTube does not feel the need to give me more attention than a channel they do profit from. YouTube does not make Google any money, it's been stated as much several times, so I do understand why they don't need to bother too hard with someone who does not make them money.

On the other hand, YouTube breaks even for Google, according to the reports. They are not losing Google money, at least as far as I am aware. In that regard, I do think I'm gaining less attention than I and several other unknown channels deserve, and when it comes to myself I am not asking for much. As the thumbnail shows I currently have 26 subscribers, over the course of 4 years. While I would easily appreciate more, I am very proud of the fact that there are people who plan to watch content that I make.

But my views are not reflecting that. Out of my 26 subscribers, I cannot tell how many of them are watching my videos. My view count is terrible, and while I may not be the greatest creator on YouTube, I know I care way more about my quality than other creators who are getting much more attention. I have seen some of the completely hated videos that gain massive attention, and I am just as upset as everyone else who suffered through them while their uncreative makers profit. Be it from the monetizing meaning YouTube pushes their stuff out, or from all of the click-bait that they have in their titles, there is something wrong with certain people who are getting a good deal of views, and a few years ago, myself and other unknowns would have at least been given a little bit of that viewership.

As for my personal complaining, honestly, a lot of that is out of my system. There are a few things I would like to say, but they would be better covered in a post about everything that has been going on with YouTube. The frank reality is, right now I'm luck to get 10 views on a video, and a majority of my older videos got more than that in a week when I first uploaded them. I have gotten better, and I even receive less dislikes, but the algorithm doesn't wish to help me the way I would like it too, and this is true for not just the lesser-known channels, but some of the biggest channels have now started to find out that a good deal of their subscribers aren't even aware of their new videos on plenty of occasions. This is the very reason I now use this blog instead. I don't know how many people read this, as I don't get comments or likes just yet, but I do know that I pay Squarespace every year to have this website and they are helping me out, because I directly paid them. My chances of attention are far better here than there.

I don't dislike YouTube, but I did temporarily give it up.

The next few uploads I did, would be stuff like this:

Neither of these videos were made for YouTube. They are pieces I did for a class, and I recorded them because I simply felt like it. They did better than the stuff I recently made directly for YouTube, so until my channel gains any form of attention, they are all I am planning to do.

I miss doing stuff just for YouTube. At this point in time, I have the footage for a video I was working on for quite some time. When my last video bombed with only one view over the span of currently three months, I realized there wasn't enough reason to care about it. It is shelved until something can be done.

Maybe I'm just on a high horse. I'm complaining that my life isn't working out as well for me as I wish. Well, personally, I've been there before and this doesn't feel like that. After all, this is the only YouTube post I've made on this blog, and I have yet to rant against the system and even played fair. Honestly, I do care, just not enough to get all that mad. Ever since I was a child I have wanted to make other people happy. I wanted to entertain, to make people laugh. Like all artists and creative types, I do want to be well-known, as that means more people can hopefully enjoy what I am doing. YouTube was supposed to be the thing I could do before all of that happened, even help me achieve that, but that possibility is likely dead and I have to face the reality that my channel will only be successful if I'm successful first.

I think time will be on my side, but I needed to face the fact that the current system is technically against me and there wasn't really anything I could do other than go for another outlet as far as web videos. I chose blogging because it allows me to keep writing every week, and besides, there are no other successful forms of video for the internet. Blip crashed and burned, and to speak candidly for a second, I have no f#(*!ng idea how Vimeo works.

But I miss making videos like this:

And I miss being surprised at when a video of mine becomes a success:

But, I've moved on for now. I really do not believe I will ever be the kind of channel to rake in the remarkably big numbers, especially with the system that is currently in place. I'm taking a break from the platform because I know it's current state, but I look forward to a future where I can return and have some fun.

Anyway thanks for watching be sure to like and subscribe it totally helps me out! Share a comment below in the comments, I'll make a video where I read some of them or something everyone likes those! Tune in soon for when I edit parts of Bee Movie because that's a funny thing people are currently doing right now and I may as well completely steal from them for attention instead of watching the video and learning from their success on how to make good content! When I get a million or 2 subscribers maybe I'll even show you my pe-

I was going to say p#$&s because I censored this post and that's funny.

Why Must Our Artistic Tastes Have To Change Over Time?

Please bare with me on the writing style of this blog post. I try to stay stone-faced professional when I write these, unless it is pure comedy like with my Top Ten Things You Can Do In Naughty Bear post. This one is not a pure comedy, however, this one has a more blunt and personal feeling and I think speaking the way I normally would (barring curse words) is the best way to get this point across.

As of only a few minutes before I started writing this post, I went through my rather long list of YouTube subscriptions. I have had a YouTube account for many years, and with the account I have both created my own videos to help promote myself, and watched content for almost every day of my life for the past few years. There are several channels I still watch often, and some of them are channels I only recently started watching. This content ranges from Let's Plays, deep frying multiple foods, podcasts, animation, video essays, and other notable styles. 

If you had asked me only a few months ago, I could have gone on much longer.

I made the mistake of not counting how many subscriptions I had before, but I have since unsubscribed from a great deal of channels I used to watch all the time. I no longer like videos such as movie reviews where the person just recaps the whole film and adds jokes or pointless pop culture references to eighties kid's films. My patience has worth thin for many half-hour videos I used to set aside time for. While I am willing to wait for a product I really like to release a new episode, I have also decided that some of them are taking far too long compared to my personal investment and interest. To put things in a retrospective for just how many videos I do not care about anymore, I also just reduced the amount of videos in my "watch later" list. The number used to be almost two-hundred, now it is only seventy-three, and a few of the videos I left in had a good deal of hesitation.

Funnily enough, the deleting of over half my "watch later" list came from me looking at it and basically saying the true yet cliched line of "I'm not going to live forever". My head was sick of the fact I was never going to actually watch most of these videos in my too short lifetime, and in doing so, I further questioned if I really cared about what I was admitting I wouldn't watch. Most of the videos that were scrapped came from channels I decided to unsubscribe from. Granted, there were some channels I am still subscribed to and still love that also created videos I deleted from my list, but in many of those cases it boiled down to the fact that I still liked other content they made but no longer liked the kind of content I chose to delete.

Online content is not the only art form I now have different opinions on.

I would like to admit that this and the previous year is the first time in a long time I started reading for pleasure again. My reading choices varied from classics, to unheard of, and to everything in-between. My time reading again not only reminded me of just how much reading is, but I discovered that for the first time in my life, I really love the murder-mystery genre. I used to hate it. I used to think it was cliched, either completely predictable or so unpredictable that it made no sense , or they were just plain boring. And yet after reading The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, I have been going in and out of phases were all I watch or read is murder mysteries. Even bad ones catch my attention and interest.

This sudden genre-love was not my only discovery. During my time reading again; I have fallen in-and-out of love with J.K. Rowling's style (Loved Casual Vacancy, thought Cuckoo's Calling was way too long and padded,), I have gotten closer to liking super-heroes other than Spider-man, and I've outright grown a respect for literature that is far stronger than the one I used to have. That is saying something considering my career is "writer".

After graduating college last December, I took this year to relax and take in all the art and media I didn't have to time for before. I never expected to learn so many things about myself and my personal tastes. Some things are still true; I still love crime-dramas, I still love realism, I still think satire is the hardest and highest form of comedy, and I'm still completely disinterested in high fantasy.

And yet there are many things that aren't the same anymore. I went from regretting that I had a list of video games I never finished, to realizing that there are many good reasons to not finish certain games. I went from being the kind of person to argue that story-telling in video games is more important than gameplay, to realizing that there were too many examples of a good or great narrative being undermined by the fact the controls were nothing short of awful. I have realized that even though it remains my least favorite genre, there are many country songs I genuinely enjoy.

The real funny thing about this, is that I always knew this could happen for things you liked or disliked as a child or early teen. I have always encouraged people to re-watch shows they loved as a kid, to see if it held up to their expectations or not. I've heard too many people defend something with "I loved that as a kid!", meaning they could very well be defending something they don't even actually like anymore as they haven't given it a watch as an adult. I also very recently re-watched the entire CatDog series and discovered a show I thought I didn't care about was in fact very entertaining to me.

We are often told, and just as often talk about, how we become different people as we grow. We even discuss how our literal taste buds change as we get older. Children don't tend to care for vegetables and no one likes beer the first time, that sort of thing. I am very much a different person than I was only a few years ago. Still, I never, never suspected that I would so quickly grow out of something. The very stuff I appreciated everyday of my college life, I now find unfunny and uninteresting only one year after my graduation. I take no regret in my former interests, but it is shocking to look at something I spent so much time admiring, and having to admit it was basically just a phase I was going through. I also never expected to go through phases as a full grown adult man, but I guess those can be more mature than we're often led to believe.

You know, when I was a kid, I hated mint. It disgusted me as a flavor, it killed anything it touched. Now I think mint is one of the most delicious flavors I've ever tried, and I think it goes good with everything. When I was a kid, I thought Tiny Toon Adventures was a good show, and now it's one of my favorites because I know understand so many animation in-jokes that they snuck in, blatantly or otherwise. When I was a kid, I liked the Teletubbies, and I don't need to tell you the utter disdain I have for that show as an adult.

You want to know something else though? In high school, I hated Dr. Pepper. I do mean the cola, in case that is the name of an actual person or a TV show or something. For years, I've wanted to buy it and see if my taste buds are different. See if I'd like it now. I feel it's worth doing, even if it would have been less than ten years ago when I hated it. Seeing how fast I've grown out of media I loved in college, maybe I should revisit some things I used to not like five or six years ago. I remember thinking The Graduate was boring, maybe I'll understand it now. I remember thinking Jaws was a chore to sit through, maybe current me thinks it's a suspenseful experience like I always did with Alien.

What I'm saying is, I think it may be important to find your Dr. Pepper. Something you remember having a strong opinion on, but can't shake the fact it may be different now.

My title for this post is still a question, and I guess I should try to answer it. The truth is, it really just confuses me that said tastes can still shift so hard later in life. I know that I like different things than I did as a child. I know that my early teens have little impact on my tastes in adulthood. I don't understand why there are things I enjoyed as an adult, that I almost despise one year later. I understand growing as a person, I can understand having a completely different personality even after a short amount of time, there are too many life experiences to list that can that to you. I just don't see a reason why my artistic taste buds have to have a drastic change again. I don't think I'll ever again like the stuff that helped keep a smile on my face during college's hard times, and I don't get why.

Sometimes your favorite movies are removed from the list when more come along. Sometimes a growing problem with a TV show makes you give up on watching the newer seasons. And I guess, sometimes you just sit down and go "I don't like this anymore and I don't think I ever will again".

I don't know what to tell you in this case. Things change, even in the span of a year. You can devote a good chunk of your time to something you won't care about anymore down the line. Again, there is no regret for me in this, I will still cherish the time I spent caring about something. It's just weird to live in a world where that can be the only positive thing to say about something you adored not that long ago.

Is Depressing Music the Best Music to Listen to?

The first post I ever wrote for this blog was about my musical tastes revolving newer and older styles. I remember that practically from the second I mentioned Harry Chapin's Cats in the Cradle, I had the urge to listen to that song again versus everything else I mentioned. In the back of my head I never really questioned this, and that is because of something I simply always felt was true, but maybe it is time that I fully questioned it.

What is the novelty or songs about depressing subjects that are more intriguing than songs about more uplifting subjects?

For whatever reason, I can not remember the last time I sat down and listened to a piece of music that was about someone simply having a good time. I can think of several songs of this nature, and several that I like, but I cannot remember the last time that I picked one of those out to listen to. More often than not, I prefer something like the aforementioned Harry Chapin piece. Or perhaps one of Jim Croce's heartbreaking pieces on broken relationships or horrible people.

It does not help that even upbeat songs can get into these subjects. Take the classic song Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head, by BJ Thomas. The beat tells me I should be happy, and the lyrical flow talks about a man who seems to roll with the punches, but the lyrics themselves very much imply the guy has little to nothing to be happy about. Granted, that certainly makes the piece uplifting for the many who need to hear that, that life doesn't have to get you down.

Honestly that's sort of the main reason I wanted to talk about depressing music. Out of all media and forms of art, I find music the be the one that can nail this message very well. Music has the power to make us connect with what is going on, on an emotional level that things like books and movies can't even get to. It is weird how a purely audial art form can make us connect better than something we see as well as hear, but I suppose the idea of closer your eyes and picturing it for yourself has some power when it comes to raw emotion.

When I was in high school, I remember often listening to the music of Vampire Weekend whenever I was feeling down. My idea was that if I wasn't feeling all that great, I may as well listen to the melancholy or overtly depressing tones the band would over, so I could ride out my emotional state faster. I have no idea if this was smart nor practical, and certainly no idea if it worked, but it is interesting to note that while I could have just laid down and cried my eyes out, I instead decided to let my emotions be carried away by music.

Maybe my question isn't so much why depressing music is the best kind, but why we can let music ride our emotions more than anything else. Of course, I will still argue over the depressing lyrics or tone over something bouncier or carefree, as I do not personally have experience listening to happier music to get over a funk, but that is a personal experience and I am sure there are many who could argue the opposite. That's the fun of art. No one is truly right or wrong, it is all based on interpretations and personal experiences. One person's favorite song of all time is guaranteed to be someone else's most hated song of all time, and there is nothing wrong with that.

I suppose what I was trying to do was decipher the feel meaning of personal connections toward music styles, lyrics, bands, and overall feelings people have with them. This is hard to do with any art form, but thinking it over, I think music may be one of the hardest ones to do this with.

 I guess the answer to my question is that for myself, yes, the raw emotional dump of something like Don McLean's American Pie or Wham's Everything She Wants is more powerful over something like Grand Funk Railroad's We're An American Band or Lou Bega's Mambo Number 5. Just for comparison sake, all of those songs are ones that I have purchased and listen to, my argument is that while I like many songs, there will most likely always be that connection I personally have to them that makes me crave listening to one over the other. I can enjoy Tom Jones singing about an attractive woman, whilst enjoying a break-up or falling out of love song even more.

And I guess that is as far as my point can be made. Music is special to all of us, and whether we prefer the blues or country, I think there may be some kind of correlation that is special to each and every one of us. Whether you like ballads or songs that only last a minute or less. There is something special about our connection to music. 

The Rise and Sadly Possible Decline of Toys-to-Life

In the year 2011, Activision decided to give a completely new concept for a character they owned the rights to. This character was Spyro the Dragon, the hero of games such as Spyro the Dragon, Spyro: A Hero's Tail, and before this newest series, a trilogy under the franchise name of The Legend of Spyro. This new series was named Skylanders, and it started with Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure. The idea was that Spyro, and every other playable character in the game, was usable by placing a toy onto a device (called a portal) that would read the chip in-bedded in the bottom. These games were aimed for children, and at the time of release, I did not think it would be something I'd be interested in. I'll also be the first to admit that a bit of my teenage arrogance had yet to shake off, I had only just gotten into college, and at the time I was simply nothing more than mad that a franchise from my childhood was receiving another reboot that was not enough like what I was used to. A completely unfair mindset I am glad is long gone from my personality.

In hindsight I can easily call this a genius bit of marketing. Children already hound their parents to buy them toys and action figures, and in today's age, video games are hardly the niche crowd they used to be. I'm willing to bet most children today now own a gaming console or handheld, or at the very least have parents who are willing to let them use theirs with the parental controls turned on or maybe even off. Plus, aside from Spyro and Cinder (another The Legend of Spyro character), all of the games characters were new and unique to the game (and that has held true until the inclusion of Crash Bandicoot characters from this year's installment and the brief cross-over with Nintendo characters Donkey Kong and Bowser). Any child who enjoyed the game would want to get more of them, without needing prior knowledge to all but two characters. This was a completely new game franchise, and they had nice advertisements as well. Ones that showed you just how many unique characters you could collect and play as.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yYMw0TnZRY

The games ended up becoming a success. Activision has even admitted the franchise has, by this point, earned them over a billion dollars in sales. As with any major success, there are always those who decide to try their own hand at it. Enter the Disney Corporation, and their toys-to-life game, Disney Infinity.

Infinity's goal was to let you play with your favorite Disney and Pixar characters, and once the second game came around they added in Marvel, and the third game added the Star Wars franchise. Disney Infinity 2.0 was the first toys-to-life game I played. I randomly decided it was time to give this genre a chance, and I figured I might have fun collecting the toys.

I was more right than I thought. I immediately fell in love with this style of game. I'm the kind of person who has always liked collecting things, but many times I ended up getting rid of my collection because I came to the conclusion that I never used them for anything. I understand why many people my age will buy toys or figurines and place them on their shelves, but for me, I always just sat there wishing I could actually use them for something. Disney Infinity solved my problem, and I could now collect very impressive looking figures, and I could use them with something, in this case an addictively fun video game.

I have heard from some that they do not like this genre, without remotely trying it for themselves, as they believe it is the gaming industry succumbing to greed. I have always been a realist, and this outlook makes it a little easier to counterpoint this kind of idea: finding smart way to charge customers for more money was not remotely new when the original Skylanders came out. I will even be the kind of person to argue that this formula is kinder to the customer than others ways.

This is far kinder than buying an extended warranty for something that some makers have intentionally made sure will have an issue just after the regular warranty will run out. This is far kinder than paying up to two to five dollars for an extra outfit your character can wear in a game, or for an extra weapon for them to shoot. Toys-to-life had to pay roughly fifteen dollars for an action figure or well designed figurine, that you could use with a game you've bought or just something you could look at. You never had to buy the game if you just wanted some of the figures, and fifteen dollars for a toy is fairly average a price when you see what some collectibles are selling for today. Especially since whenever they released a variant, they tended to be the same price as the usual toy. Infinity had crystal versions of eight characters that were exclusive to Toys-R-Us (supposedly the variant for Mickey Mouse was not exclusive, but I never saw him in a store other than Toys-R-Us), and would later take their Star Wars figures and release a version where their lightsabers would glow when placed on the portal. Skylanders on the other hand took their most popular characters and would release several different paint jobs for them.

My personal experience for Skylanders only goes as far as the most recent game; Imaginators. It has made me wish I'd given one of the older games a chance, as I really enjoy the beat 'em up style, and I think the humor and writing is very solid. It reminds me a lot of the Ratchet & Clank games, it's made for children and you can tell, but they make the characters unique from their first word, and there are several jokes smarter than you'd expect. As for Infinity, I have played all three games in the franchise, and I love each one for exactly what they are. Infinity 1 is a fun sandbox game that lets me play very fun stories set in Disney worlds, Infinity 2.0 is a very in-depth builder that lets me create whatever I want and then some, and Infinity 3.0 is an even better mix of both.

Now, there are other games of this genre. (Heads-up but even with the new editing I’m doing in 2019, I haven’t played Starlink: Battle for Atlas or Lightseekers. I own a Lightseekers toy and I want to play Starlink, but i can’t comment on what I know far too little about)

- Amiibo -

The one to release after the first two was Nintendo's example, the Amiibo. I only have six of these little guys myself: Kirby, King Dedede, Metaknight, Wedding Suit Bowser, and Pac-Man. They mostly sit on the shelf because the idea was they are useable in any game with Amiibo support and not just select games, but when I have used them I’ve loved what they do. I did in fact get every purple coin in Super Mario Odyssey thanks to Bowser, and I don’t regret. They may mostly be decorations, but they did help bridge the gap for me maybe more than Infinity did for buying collectible figures. I still have less non-toys-to-life figures than other people my age, but I get the appeal now and it’s probably because of Amiibo.

- Lego Dimensions -

I was very excited when this one was announced, as I have been a fan of the LEGO video games since LEGO Star Wars, and I had already started playing Infinity 2.0 by that point. Having played it, it does feel a little too close to a LEGO game than a Toys-to-Life game, if that makes any sense, but it also features some of the greatest levels and game play moments that I have ever seen in a LEGO game. I also assume they made some decent money from LEGO collectors, who can now buy single characters plus a vehicle, versus the hundred or so dollars per building set. Especially with some characters/franchises who are exclusive to the game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGT9PrwRHdY

And now, for the other part of this posts title.

Earlier this year, Disney Interactive made an announcement that to many, myself included, hit very hard. Disney Infinity, for reasons they would later reveal, would be cancelled. The company behind the game was going to be closed, and Disney Interactive would basically be shut-down, the only games from the studio would now be licensed out to other companies. At the time, it was hard to see where the complete sense came from. I could not kid myself that they had to still be making enough money, cancellation would mean they weren't making enough in some fashion. Part of me felt like they should at least release the rest of the intended figures for 3.0, but I give them my respect for deciding to release as many as the did, as the original deadline for those chosen was so close to the cancellation announcement. We still got Alice, the Mad Hatter, Time, Nemo, and Dory, even if Peter Pan and other announced and soon-to-be-announced figures will not see the store shelves.

They have since explained more. Basically they could not keep up with how many extra characters they had unsold, as they put that duty on themselves versus another company. These are still the best looking Toys-to-Life toys, so I can easily look at them and believe that were too expensive to make for them to allow these problems.

But it was also no secret that Disney Infinity still managed to top the charts (when compared to competitors) before it's cancellation, even with Lego Dimensions stealing that spot on it's release date. The death of the strongest led many to question the entire genre's demise, but at the time Activision and Warner Bros. attested that they were not leaving the scene. LEGO Dimensions currently had a four-year plan, they will release toys for the game for four years, and then after that, they either create a sequel or they continue with just the first game, depending on what audiences crave after the time limit. But, since the original post, Dimensions was cancelled after their final character packs. Unlike Infinity, they left the game with all promised characters, but, unlike Infinity they did not give a compelling final playset, making the end still hollow when if it was some of their best characters. Beetlejuice, the Teen Titans, and the Powerpuff Girls were still great even if they had nothing much to show for it, even counting their fairly robust worlds and an exclusive episode of Teen Titans GO!.

As I said earlier, Activision has now released the sixth installment of their franchise.

And it has sold worse than the last year's game. If that sounds bad, I have a tweet that is unfortunately far more worrying.

I found it through a retweet from the Toys for Games Twitter, so both Twitters are good sources for further information.

Skylanders had already spawned off into Skylander Academy on Netflix. With no irony I can say it was one of my favorite exclusive shows on the platform, and as of 2019 the show has ended after three fantastic seasons. Activision is currently no longer keeping it a secret that they are trying new things to stay on top, the last Skylanders game was only on mobile, and Spyro was given a remaster/remake for the original three games. I feel it is safe to say the series is dead, but, I can’t shed too many tears as this finale felt more like a finale than the others got. Dimensions and Infinity tried their best to end on great notes, and both did and didn’t. Skylanders had a great last game, and a TV show with a finale that while did feel open enough to expand did in fact conclude the themes and story.

As for myself, I will of course still play the games I have bought, and am still going to buy more of the toys. I have earned the Platinum trophy for Infinty, Infinity 2.0, Infinity 3.0, Lego Dimensions, and Skylander Imaginators, and I even got the DLC trophies for 3.0 and Dimensions. I even got a second copy of both Infinity 1.0 and 2.0. Toys-to-Life started, for me, as a way to get collectibles I could justify owning. Now, it's a genre I have had countless hours of mindless fun in, and if its future depends on me spending a little more of my money, I won't complain. It may have been a fad, kind of like pogs, but I’ll be damned before even feeling remotely upset that I found my personal equivalent of pogs!

Many of us have a weakness when it comes to our money. Some of use shill out for fun mobile games, some of us like bar-hopping, expensive cars. For me, I have no problem admitting I am a grown man who likes buying video games where you can place toys on a device to play as that same character.