Development Arrested

I recently finished watching all three season's of the show Arrested Development. I know its been off the air and that I'm really late to the game but I have to say I really really love this show. But what I love about this show is not just the humor but for its commentary on television, censorship, and the modern family dynamic.

The first season has most of my favorite episodes and the second season follows up nicely. It wasn't until the third season did they know that they were being canceled and decided to go all out with the show. The story lines became increasingly insane where as the first and second season was much more character based.

But what really got me was the way the show was very aware of itself without over stating that fact. I think its that the narrator contributes so much and acts as another character in the show. Every once and a while the characters make references to being on a TV show or something of that nature but the narrator out right talks to the audience and gives us the answers to questions that the characters don't know about. The narrator gives us insight into the show without the characters looking at the screen and winking all the time.

This pretty much turned into a love fest but I don't really give a shit. If you haven't checked out the show all the episodes are up on Hulu.

Spore: The Sum of its Parts?

Everyone right now is throwing a fit over the DRM issues on Spore, and has become a huge talking about amongst gaming journalists and bloggers. But I don't really care that much about it because its just pandering between the people who want money and the people that don't want to spend it. And yes I am referencing Penny Arcade.

No, I want to talk about the game of Spore itself. Now I do understand every one's complaints. Most of the stages are very simplistic and aren't very compelling in of themselves. The only stage that is actually interesting is the space stage but even then its very repetitive which isn't good when your the longest stage in the game. All in all Spore is nothing more than an elaborate game of Play-Doh.

However I don't think the game is any of those things but the conglomerate of all of those aspects. The game may be split up in separate stages and the creation tools do seem slightly separate from the rest of the game but I viewed it was one huge game. Everything I've read about people's reaction to Spore is the fact they view each part as if it were a separate game. When I play the game I viewed each part more like a level instead of a separate game.

Perception is relative and I think that is the main difference between the people that enjoy the game and those that don't. That's not saying not liking the game is bad and this is more of a blanket statement on most games out there. Different people enjoy games for different reasons and Spore brings that to the forefront with its unique structure.

"Steve Holt!" - Steve Holt from Arrested Development