What's Really Good?

I was going to go for four in a row, but since I've gotten to the point where I'm adding NPCs to Velprintalar and the general layout of the city is done I thought it'd be a good time to post some screens out this piece. So what's really good?

Basically what's happening is this area is huge, so what you're seeing there is all from the same area in a lot of different corners of it. What you're not seeing is the vast majority of it. The entire exterior of the city will be comprised of three areas, though this is easily the largest of the three.

I devised a simple system of spawning random NPCs (out of a possible 16) at random waypoints throughout the city. I believe there's between 20 and 25 spawned when you enter the area, and all deleted when you exit it (I'm assuming this helps with performance. Whether or not a few NPCs walking around in areas you're not in makes a big impact is up for debate, really, but I figure every little bit helps), and it still feels really empty so I'll need to add some that just stand around with no point. I'm a little loathe to do that, however what's supposed to be the largest city in the country should be a little bit bustling. Maybe I'll just increase the number of random walkers instead and still add fewer that stand around. I haven't decided yet.

But yeah, I think it looks pretty cool. The design is interesting, a lot of hills and height variations, if not unconventional. According to the sourcebook, Velprintalar has a distinct elven flavor to it, which basically translates into I have to throw in a few of those illefarn statues where there's like a dozen variations but they all kind of look the same and a lot of plants. There's really not much to work with in the toolset that's elven, and dwarven is even worse, but I did my best. I have dozens of buildings to add random things in, which I won't utilize every doorway but it's nice to have options. There's not a whole lot of minute details, however there's a lot of color because I made it for the fall season and a ton of plant life (there's like 30 different kinds of trees in there. I stuck to the five seed rule on it, though, so theoretically performance should not be impacted. It hasn't so far, it's actaully getting much better FPS than I would have expected, but we'll see when it's all said and done and all of the NPCs are there...) so that should keep the eyes entertained.

I'm happy with it. Over the next week or so I'll be working on the other two parts of the city, and then it's on to actually building the quests, and I'll add interiors as needed until I'm done. Finishing the city will be another huge milestone, then it's the ending areas to wrap up the Chapter. I may make a summer release if things keep along this smoothly.

I'd also like to take a moment again here to thank everyone who has been doing the ongoing testing. They've been really diligent with offering suggestions and pointing out things I missed, and playing the same thing multiple times can be tedious but it's really important to know things are working as you move along and taking the time out to help...I don't know, I appreciate it is all. So thanks.

But, let's talk about the History Channel. There's a few channels on TV that are the "boring" channels, and really the only one worth watching most of the time is Discovery (and maybe the Science Channel), but even they have their fair share of crap like American Chopper or American Hotrod or American Air Compressor (tricking out a compressed air tank with flames = awesome and patriotic!), and I also think How it's Made kind of blows but there's some educational value there if you can stay awake through the boring narrative about how to make a bicycle seat cover. But Mythbusters, Future Weapons, MF-ing Survivorman, and Dirty Jobs are all dope, plus I really like the random specials they have like Planet Earth or the six part series on the ocean. The one on the Abyss, the deep part of the ocean where the sunlight doesn't reach, is an absolute must see. It's better than most movies, there's things down there that range from bizarre to frightening, and it can all kill you. That's why I won't set foot in an ocean, I don't care what I'm missing. I'm not trying to get jellyfished or stringrayed or eaten by a shark, you know what I mean? I'ma stay right here in the midwest, thank you very much.

But the other two, The Learning Channel and The History Channel, are mostly garbage programming. The Learning Channel I have less beef with. It's just it kind of turned into a subsidary of Oxygen and Home and Garden TV, all they play is house remodelling shows and how really, really fat people lose a full person's weight and are still fat and then die from being fat shows. I don't mean to sound non-PC, so if you're a little chunky don't be offended, I'm talking about like 800 pounds+ that can't get out of bed, literally no BS here, without a forklift. I don't understand that, who is feeding these people? It's not them that disgust me; I really can't blame them at that point. If you're bed ridden and somebody keeps bringing you fried chicken, what else are you going to do all day but eat it?

Point is there's not much that's watchable on that channel.

But the History Channel really trips me out. There's a lot more there that's watchable if you're into World War II. Personally, I'm not a big fan of history in general outside of the Roman Empire which I find fascinating, but the rest not so much. I'm also not sure that it should get as much play as it does past middle school. I understand the value of learning from history, but unless you're in a position to really capitalize on it like a world leader or some such, I don't see the value of it in every day life besides winning a game of Trivial Pursuit...which I'm not even sure anyone even plays anymore. I don't even think the Civil War was over when that game was written because the entire medical pie piece is about blood letting with leeches.

It ain't even that though, it's that they air so little that has anything to do with history. For real, like half of the shows are about the Bible, Nostradomus, and the Paranormal, and the other half is World War II documentaries. I just don't get where the first half fits in to all that. I don't buy in to all that, psychics and future predictions and whatnot, mostly because it's entirely fake but partly because even if it was real it'd be explained scientifically in time anyway so it wouldn't be exceptional anyway. For instance, today there was a marathon of this show called Monster Quest, where they get a bunch of otherwise intelligent people to try and prove things like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster are real, where they end up not really doing anything and interviewing assorted "experts" (they're heavy on the kryptozoologist, which is sort of like a zoologist but no formal training is required and it's not actually a field of science...), "witnesses" (which are just people who think bigfoot is real), and actual experts (who disagree with pretty much everyting), and overlay it with creepy music, half assed CGI (because, obviously, they don't have any actual footage of fake things), and ominious narrative for an hour, then a big "alright, we didn't really do anything, but maybe it's real...or is it?" at the end and call it a day.

It's awfully stupid. Not quite as stupid as those ghost hunter shows where they bumble around in the dark with night vision cameras and scare themselves, but very, very close. But shows like that are like half of the History Channel's programming. Or, should I bring up "UFOs in the Bible" as further evidence of what they'll play? They also aired Loose Change once, which I won't link to out of fear of sullying my blog's good name (heh), but you've probably heard of it anyway.

Basically, it's a real disappointment that the History Channel has to sink to that level, you know? I'm assuming that in order to sustain a big enough audience to keep the channel running they have to air Sylvia Browne-esque (I will link to this, I even bought the T shirt! Don't think anyone is going to get the reference, though) shams to the "true believers" at the expense of distributing actual knowledge and truth, which begs the question is there too many people like me? History just does nothing for them? Because it's a shame that their prime time programming is based around a bunch of lies and the real stuff is stuck during soap opera hours.

Alright, till next time, stay with it.