The Source

So I was reading Wired magazine's yearly awards for spectacular achievements in the tech world. One of the winners was a game developer: Bungie for their work on Halo 2. "Okay", I said to myself, "They did make a real popular game". Then I saw who else was on the list of nominees:

Gabe Newell and Valve Software.

Now perhaps its the Half Life fanboy in me speaking, but I don't understand how in the world Valve didn't win for their work on Half Life 2. Wired has always seemed like a publication that recognized and praised creativity and innovation. Yet their reasoning for Halo 2 was its "deep story, incredible gameplay and amazing multiplayer". Take a look at any gaming website and you'll find as many die hard Halo-ites disappointed with the sequel as thrilled with it. I'm not going to debate the quality of the game(although I very much disagree with the first two points) , but these deciding factors seem a little too subjective. It just reeks of a popularity contest.

So why do I think Valve should have won? Anyone can debate the relative quality of their game, just like Halo 2. But its hard to debate the significance of the Source engine and Steam. With Source, you have a incredible visuals, a powerful physics system and sophisticated animations. And the entire thing was built from the ground up to be as easy as possible for the mod community to use. Modders have done some impressive things over the years with just the original Half Life engine, and already some interesting Source based projects have started up. This time however, the potential to shake up the industry is even greater. As for Steam, there have been many complaints about its reliability and privacy practices (the latter of which seem completely unfounded), but no one had thought of an online content delivery system as a viable platform for game delivery until Valve stepped in. Game journalist everywhere have been calling for more industry big-wigs to follow suit and offer similar services, and when it finally happens it will be Steam that everyone uses for inspiration. Through the technology behind Half Life 2 Valve is once again trying to shake up the system, and how Wired was unable to recognize this is beyond me.

But then again maybe that's the fanboy in me speaking again...

I saw Grave of the Fireflies last night, and while it was one of the most depressing films I've ever seen, I can see why it is regarded as an anime classic. The story is a side of World War II rarely told by anyone, and the mannerisms and dialogue of the characters are some of the most natural and believable I've seen in any anime. Two thumbs way up.

The Mets played their first exhibition game against the upstart Washington Nationals. They lost 5 - 1. I hope this isn't a foreshadowing of the regular season.