There are many lines in Slay the Princess that I find remarkably beautiful, in particular ones spoken in the... I don't know what to call it... by the shifting mound beyond the mirror before it becomes itself.

This is a game that belongs to the question-asking genre that's been on my mind lately, the genre of allowing the player to ask questions, but more importantly the genre of asking the player questions, asking them to judge. That's all this game is: the player is asked to pass judgement.

However, compared to Slay the Princess, I found my 'asking' and 'choosing' abilities to be much less satisfying:

My choices were not my choices, but floodgates. I did not have a mouth... In StP, there was no character who spoke for me after I made my choices. I am comfortable being interpreted or misinterpreted by characters who are not me, but in the case of The Trials of Goodbye, my choices were being interpreted by my avatar and I did not feel as though I could ask the questions I wanted to ask, or give the answers I wanted to give.

It's been a whiiile since I've kept up with Eggplant! I'm listening to this episode specifically. I love Eggplant! But I'm going to be my usual ornery self regarding this episode because it's very important for me to slice and stab at things to figure out how I feel about them.

Regarding Christopher Alexander's
"The Nature of Order"
(Book 4, The Luminous Ground)

Who would do such a thing? The library's website... where I go to check my holds on books that I want to read... the library, a shining bastion of light...

:(

QuoteToronto Public Library Website Update
Friday, November 3, 5:00 pm: We are actively addressing a cyber security incident that came to our attention on Saturday, October 28.

As a result of the incident, the following services are unavailable: tpl.ca, "your account", tpl:map passes and digital collections. Public computers and printing services at our branches are also unavailable.

Branches are open as scheduled. Wifi is available in library branches, and branch telephone lines are working. Materials can be borrowed and returned in branches until further notice.

There continues to be no evidence at this time that the personal information of our staff or customers has been compromised.

TPL has proactively prepared for cybersecurity issues and promptly initiated measures to mitigate potential impacts. We have engaged with third-party cybersecurity experts and law enforcement to help us in resolving this situation.

Based on our progress to date, we anticipate that it will take a week or more before all systems are fully restored to normal operations. However, we expect that some services will be brought back online before then.

We will update this page as more information becomes known. We appreciate all the words of support that we've received, and thank you for your patience and understanding while we do everything we can to resolve this matter as quickly as possible.

I went on a cruise with my mom in late March 2023, and on this cruise they had a library -- I took out a couple books, and wrote my notes for them on these crappy little sheets of paper.

It is now time, at long last, to review my notes from the cruise. So I can throw them out and free up some space in my little cabinet of things to remember.

For 3 years I did droqen was here, and mailed it out to various people. It was a very satisfying and fulfilling project to me. However, there were some issues:

1. Not enough direct feedback about what people thought of it.

2. I don't like mass-producing physical artifacts. Even "mass"-producing ten copies feels like too many copies.

3. I like having them in my hands for a time but not being responsible for keeping them.

Therefore, what if I produce exactly one copy of a moon's zine, and sell it -- a one-time fee -- but ask kindly that when the recipient is done with it, when they don't need it anymore, that they make sure it comes back to me. --> If they give it to someone else, I would request that they bind that person to the same rule.

my experience with Pikmin (1) as a child was one of trepidation, fascination, resignation.

i was exposed to a breadth of emotion, both positive and negative: when my pikmin died, when i wasted time, i felt.

Lars Doucet's "Oil it or Spoil it" suggests that it is generally good to remove pain from our games:

Quoteadding "oil" is literally about smoothing off the sharp corners!

through a new lens, Question-Asking, i suppose that these sharp corners are good to experience exactly enough times to want them smoothed off.

through an old lens, Mirror of the Self, i suppose that this is because a game that contains a larger body of feeling is more alive.

pain is feeling.

I was tidying up my disorganized Documents folder and thought about where to put all these files, and it made me think I wished I had something like xkcd's refrigerator with timers for my files, for organizing my files. Maybe not something that would delete/destroy the files, but I'm imagining a file organization scheme which includes some kind of purpose-flagging and timestamp about the future; not just "When was this made?" but "Why am I keeping this?" "For what?" "For when?"

people talk about strategic depth in games... you move through little local maxima. strategies for playing the game more productively in the language of the game
im interested in the idea of playing well... but designing for playing well... depth in playing well
playing the game more productively in the currency of the soul
i wonder if it's better to prevent someone from playing badly, or to let them play badly and then help them to dig themselves out
the latter feels like an experience with more strategic depth, which is often lauded when it exists in the realm of winning/losing. i haven't seen it much applied to the realm of living well

chants is what it is and there is another way to play it. but maybe most people who play chants will play it in a way which may be the worse way? as a designer or artist, is it your responsibility to predict or discover that ahead of time and decide what you want the experience to be? to 'fix' it? to fix it according to what principle?
as a player or a critic is it your responsibility to notice these statistical things, these patterns, and to... to draw attention to them... hmm not to fix it, but to bring an awareness of them? to whom? to anyone who will listen? to anyone who could use them? to future designers who might stumble upon that problem themselves? to illuminate the path better for future designers and artists
is this all 'good' stuff to do or is it just what naturally happens, what is inevitable
if this is technology (and i think it is) then is technological progress good? is it good because it is inevitable? is it inevitable because it is good?
is it always better to move forward faster than slower? is moving forward even good? or is it only inevitable? is it inevitable?

My first thought was tech companies X the lyrics, "I don't want to set the world on fire // I just want to set a fire in your heart."

I thought about what Chris said w/r/t Hayao Miyazaki's "longing, or desire." ... It's easy to miss, or forget, when working and thinking at an internet-enabled global scale, about this second kind of fire.

the real world has lossless compression

uncompressed real world infinite file size

damn there's something to that... the feeling of trying to calculate the file size of the real world, or anything real. just watching the number go up forever

Regarding Italo Calvino's
"Invisible Cities"

1. In ~ The Nature of Order Book Two, Alexander wrote (paraphrasing):

Quote

The artist putting their feeling into the work:
THIS IS NOT VERY INTERESTING

The work generating feeling in me:
THIS IS ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT

There is a subtle but critical error here: Alexander is contrasting a process (what the artist does) with a goal (what the art does). I agree, one thousand percent, with what he wrote... but how is the artist to move forward, knowing this? The two items are not immediately usefully comparable and I'd in fact argue that choosing to pursue a goal over a process is extremely detrimental.
(See ~ Atomic Habits - todo: link to more detailed/specific notes when I have them)

2. In ~ The Creative Act, Rubin wrote:

QuoteA point of view is different from having a point. . . . It's of no use to know [or portray] your point of view. . . . The true point is already made in the innocent act of perception and creation.

This presents a better angle towards a potential system or process for achieving Alexander's ESSENTIAL AND IMPORTANT feature of art, although it's by no means complete. (Maybe I could mine The Creative Act some more and find a good quote, but I don't really care to do so at the moment)

(Alexander actually says this more or less directly in that chapter, but I'm highlighting how his big-picture summary fails and how we must summarize it differently -- through describing two processes: a good process and a bad process)