Intellectual Theft

At what point is an idea theft?  At what point is it borrowing?  At what point is it influence?

Lets take a popular show/movie whatever.  Or better yet, lets take something that hasn't been around in awhile.  I mean, everything old becomes new again, and if I'm the one who is making it new, then that means I'll be on the ... top of the wave thingie.

How about, Japanese animation?  They have tons of stories that used to be popular.  So lets see.... Sailor Moon!

If I were to write a story about an ancient moon princess, who is reincarnated on Earth, and gains super powers by transforming into a skimpy outfit, along with her 4 other friends, all with different personalities, to fight the same evil that destroyed her kingdom eons ago, I'd be stealing the story of Sailor Moon.

What could I remove from that equation, that would still be Sailor Moon (teenage girls with powers fighting evil), and not be Sailor Moon?

We could change the basis of the powers, the number of friends, and get rid of the reincarnation stuff.  In this case we would lose the planet motif, and make 3 girls (the main character with her two best friends), we'd pick our favorite 3 personalities, and completely redo who the main villain is.  Also, set it in the present, or even the slight future.

Now a great deal of what made the Sailor Moon setting is gone, and what we have left is the personalities of the main cast, and how they influenced each other.

If the setting was not modern, but lets say fantasy, we might be in Magic Knight RayEarth.  If there were only the two girls it might be Pretty Cure.   As is, it might be Powerpuff Girls Z.

Are we now so far removed from its origins that we are now writing under the influence of having seen Sailor Moon, or are we still stealing?

I leave you with this interesting link.

Father's Day

Growing up, most of my life, without a father, I tend to seek father figures in my life.

Some failed me completely, and others, surprise and enlighten me.

I look at my son, and I wonder if I'm being a good enough father for him.  I think that too many young people out there undervalue experience and age, which leads to young parents who end up messing their kids up.


So this father's day, I want all the dads out there to re-evaluate how much of a fuck up you really are, and to ask yourself, is it too late to be a better father?

Struggle with writing

I've been struggling with my writing lately.  Two weeks into June and I'm realizing the error of my layout.  My scenes aren't exciting enough.  I'm not saying every scene needs to have a fight, but I have some scenes where I can't seem to find a reason for it to be in there other than as an excuse to show people how things are.

So my current plan is to sit down and figure out how to not only show how things are, but also get something in the story-line moving forward.  This means that the story will be "denser" than it currently is.  I don't know if that will result in less words or what...

Anyways, this also means that my blog posts might slow down a bit, and I apologize for those who just got into the once a week groove of things.  I'll try to empty my brain here once a week still, but I'm not sure how much that content will be, especially since I've been aiming at improving my dialog.

I do have a post half finished, but I'm not sure how to finish it up yet, so that might come up in a bit as well.

Questing, how it should be

Over at Tobold's Open Sunday Thread, a discussion began about leveling up, and I gave my idea of breaking the current quest system into a 3 tier system, so that quests can feel more like Quests.

The three tiers would be: Errands, Missions, and Quests.  I'll break it down, and give some examples, based on the Human Starting Zone in WoW.

Errands - Rewards are based on distance needed to travel to get to the turn in.  Reward would be the unlocking of Missions or Quests, monetary (for delivery), with a small experience gain.  Typically Errands would be used to help guide a player, much like such “quests” are used currently.  Errands typically would not include killing 10 foozles.  Errands text would be minimal.

Missions - Rewards  are based on difficulty of the mission.  Rewards would include unlocking ‘next level’ missions, monetary or item reward, and good experience gain.  Though most “quests” would fall under a mission, the changes would be that a mission would have a more ambiguous goal.

For example:  “We’ve been having trouble with Kobold’s lately.  We’d appreciate your help in eradicating them from the grounds of the Abbey.”

Mission now says, Kill Kobolds near the Abbey.

You go and start killing Kobolds, algorithm kicks in and you’ve killed enough that they fear you and run away.  Mission updates to have you chase them down.

You follow them (UI helps guide you if you lose track of them or have to AFK) into a cave.  There it updates for you to finish the extermination (Paladins should understand that Kobolds, though sentient, are no better than rats).  You go in killing them, when you run across a demonically possessed crystal that has been driving them insane.  (note that the mission may not update).

You now either finish killing them all, or you destroy the crystal.  Destroying the crystal snaps them out of their possession, and you are approached by their leader for a peace treaty (at this point you can make a choice).  Mission is now over, and you go submit your report (turn in the mission and get your rewards).

These types of missions would replace 3-4 WoW quests.

Quests - These are overarching with a zone, dynamically updating (much like missions), and should be the MAIN storyline of the zone (with Missions providing supplementary stories to a zone).

Quest rewards are massive, magical items and large payments, large experience gains.  Typically you would have 1, maybe 2 quests per zone (though usually not at the same time).  Quests would also fall under Class quests, and Rep quests.

For example:  You have talked to the first guy you saw after starting the game, and he gives you an errand to speak with the Marshall.  The Marshall, gives you the quest for helping out around the Abbey (notice how open that statement is).

You start out by helping with a wolf attack (mission), meeting up with your class trainer (errand), destorying the Kobolds (mission), grabbing some grapes (errand), stopping the defias (mission), and finally killing the leader of the invading defias (end of mission, and end of quest).

The Marshall thanks you for all your help, rewards you, and gives you an Errand to go to Goldshire.

Champions Online, running better than ever

It has been over 5 months since I've played Champions Online.  Somewhere in those five months, a free expansion has come out, and it now runs better than it did before.  I actually got to play it on my wife's computer (which was having problems running it before).  Now I plan to explore more, but some things I've noticed in just a short play time.

1)  Zone chat now crosses to all instances of that zone, greatly increasing finding people to group up with, and chatting in general.

2)  Costumes have WAY more glowing, and it beautiful.

3)  The game is still fun, and much like playing an enhancement shaman, I find myself killing through hordes of enemies, before I remember that I had a mission I was headed to.

4)  The power level feels just right, where you feel like a superhero.  In other words you can take on a group of enemies without being overwhelmed, while still needing some form of strategy so as to not be killed.

This game is still a lot of fun.