Tired, crap, sleepy, shit, tired, blergh.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck. Today is going badly and I apparently have not the wit nor motivation to drag myself out of this... badness. That's a solid example of the type of mush my brain has been producing since about mid-afternoon. Apparently my vocabulary and sentence constructing abilities have taken an unannounced holiday and neglected to tell me, much less bring me along. I can picture them now, urbane sophisticates conversing about matters too complex for me to fathom seeing as to do so I'd need the very attributes which are at this moment sunning themselves poolside, Mai Thai in figurative hand.

I also seem to have misplaced my typing abilities also (also also? Fucking deserters), but that's due to mere motor function and I doubt he'd have the wherewithal to organize a sneaky sojourn without my noticing. As if to illustrate just how absent he is, I had to retype that sentence 3 times. Sojourn became sohourn, for example.

The question, then, is whether to press on or to call it a day when in actuality it's only been an hour and a half. I should hit the tablet rather than retreat to the warmth of my gaming habit, seeing as COD is poison these days. As put by a contemporary, it is now infested with "knife monkeys". It's settled, I'll read 2 more articles then fiddle with the tablet for a spell. Temptation, frustration, so bad it makes me cry. The maddening thing about COD is the occasional burst of exuberant efficiency that results in kills galore and fame forever. This punctuates the constant fuckwittery so popular with about 80% of its user-base. I'm leaping back and forth like a metronomic frog so that'll do for now.

Blah de blah de blah

Not a whole lot completed this week unfortunately. Preoccupied as I was with matters technical I only read a few articles and wrote barely a word. Not to worry though. I'll reset the deadline for another fortnight, which should be time enough to at least address each of the points I plan to cover. Looked over some excellent illustrative goodies and happened upon a tablet tutorial that nearly brought a tear to my eye. Next week I hope to begin fleshing out a few illustrations digitally.

Back is very sore, especially my left shoulder. I'm convinced it's a posture issue. I'm on the verge of collapse and the words are molasses slow in their arrival so I'll leave it at that and resume when I've had a decent meal, night's sleep and crack at completing this fucking literature review.

In closing, Michael Atkinson is still a deluded simpleton. Watch out for gamers at your next Bandidos meet chaps.

So much wrong, but a few things right

The right is the slew of work I managed to crank out early this and late last week. I'm gradually building a thong mountain of reviewed literature which would have frightened the me from mid December 09 to death or at least toward some sort of terminal disease that thankfully goes into remission without the need for some Lorezo's Oil style shit.

Foidamore, I've discovered that regular redefinition of the lit review structure is par for the course. The more I write, the more I recognize the flaws in the structure I'd constructed and the more compelled I am to redefine it. I have acquired a stonking expanse of literature on game development, from industry, educational and student perspectives, that I will spend the next week or so sifting through in search of pearls of lemon delight (minus the lemons).

Life drawing started last week and I overcame a stuttering start to finish strongly, reeling off Rubens-esque portraiture like Gok Wan undrapes fatties. I must spend any free time in Melbourne fiddling with the tablet.

The wrong, oh the wrong. Some names. Conroy. Abbot. Special FX. Atkinson. Fucking Atkinson. These people, these, politicians, these self elected moral arbiters have worn thinner than Brittany Murphy. Fuck. Their momentous fuck-ups are well publicized and need not be recounted here, but something is happening. Febrile with misguided and antiquated morality, they threaten free sppech in Australia. Apparently, the greater prominence a politician attains, the further from reality they drift until the feel the need to advise thr nation on topics they have litle to no notion of.

I also read a review of Alien vs Predator and that got right up my nose as the reviewer, to borrow a sample of his eloquent prose, sucked. Despite his utter failure to adequately review tha game in question, I iz buyin it neway yo yo.

P.S. It's really fucking hot tonight. To hell with summer, bring on winter.

It's go go go in Australia!

Unsure of the reason for the title. I was impersonating Murray Walker this morning so perhaps he has infiltrated my unconscious mind a la John Cusack in Being John Malkovich. Hopefully he doesn't make me go to swingers parties. If you're listening in there Murray, back the fuck out. The mud in that tunnel wasn't actually mud either.

Anyway, we have started developing our little iPhone project today. Before delving further, a digression into a few point 'bout the fud and its current status.

I have an office. Well, I have part of an office. Well again, I have a small part of a room that is unused but we like to call the office. I have a cubicle, a computer that is grotesquely outdated and a few shelves upon which, if I share any affinity with the cubicles former occupant, I can store a half eaten box of cornflakes and a ziplock bag containing an unidentified powdery substance which I suspect is cocaine but is most probably milk powder. I even got some work done in there, how about that.

I met with Mick and briefly chatted to Jo who both opined that I should crystallize, define, realize, specify, concretize. Yes yes yes, in good time. They are right of course; the longer I remain unsure of my exact goals the less likely I am to successfully, erm, succeed. Perhaps a revision session is in order; reconsider the issues, cleaerly define the research questions and, by Satan's cloven hoof, stick to them. Maybe next week.

Did some reading on programming and CS education in general, though largely from a constructivist viewpoint. CSE seems to suffer the same scarcity of literature as game development, so I've hitched my star to the wagon of an Israeli academic who seems to be one of the few to have covered the issue of constructivism in CSE. So far I have no concrete evidence that behaviourism is still the dominant pedagogy, but it is strongly hinted at.

Games I say. About to set about defining an art style for the wee iPhone game we're making having had a pow wow on the mechnanics behind what is sure to be a stunning piece of software genius. I'm now spouting utter crap, but for a solid, decidely motivational reason, that being a need, the origin of which is hidden somewhere in this very sentence, mustgonowgrelpstoomanycommas

Learning aboot learning

So, while flitting to and fro between the various elements of my lit review, I am drawn back to the basic issue of which learning theory best suits my potential model. As I previously surmised, a mix of behaviourism and constructivism makes the most sense (or made the most sense) but I am yet to properly explore cognitivism.

It seems the best way to do this is to cover the theory behind each of the 3 major approaches (there are subsets and subsets of subsets whose warts have warts but if I don't draw the line somewhere this thing will ballon to such grotesque proportions that I'll have to enlist some sort of educational theorem pest control company to douse it in opposing viewpoints until it is nullified, conceptually), then summarize the appropriateness of each. I imagine there will be cherry picking aplenty as I build my own little customized learning theory that is suited exclusively to game design and development.

That's the goal then; take what I produced in 08 an add cognitivism to it, then summarize a theory for 'best practice' according to the desired learning outcomes.

In the meantime, I need to summarize each of the main roles within game design and development (programming, art and design) without restating the obvious. Let's see... I need to avoid expanding on the topic from an industry perspective, as the roles are too specialized to specifically cater for in a curriculum. Therefore, I need to nail the underlying principles of each so that a student who is exposed to said principles and equipped with a particular skill-set (let's say programming) can adapt to a more specialized role once out of the kiddy pool and into the Atlantic.

I'd like to cover the type of personality a budding programmer would typically possess, but I'm not entirely sure how I would do it.

Some common elements to each:

1) No matter the role, quality of soft skills is paramount. I should investigate methods for enhancing soft skill development that can be integrated into a game development course.

2) The application of skills outside of the more behaviourist skill acquisition should be wholly constructivist and subsequently collaborative.

3) Whatever a student's specialization, he or she needs a reasonably developed understanding of the entire development process; that is, not only of disciplines that are not their own but also of the publishing and marketing process. If the rumblings prove true and Australia's chief gaming export in the future is delivered via Wonkavision, a well rounded skill set supportive of a core skill will allow graduates the wherewithal to develop their own projects.

I'll get back to this tomorrow. In the meantime, have a manatee.

A Clever Subversive Title For A Post

I made some teeny weeny progress this week, as in I actually did something. Wrote a bit, read a bit; it's a start. Expectations are currently low, so I feel as though they have been met. I'll be getting my own office next week (or part of one at least) and have sorted part of my teaching load for the coming trimester, so bully for me.

Even the ickle smidgen of writing I produced last week felt promising, a portent of slightly more words in the following week. I organized my literature review structure a little more and it is gradually starting to make sense thematically.

Not such more to write on the subject; I've started, that'll do pig.

In other news, the word is full of morons, sometimes disingenuous ones but always moronic to a degree. Apparently video games cause rickets, though upon contacting the people behind the research referred to in the numerous articles on the subject, Nick Lovell concluded that this story was in fact bullshit. The research was misused by the no doubt well meaning journalists without an agenda in support of a preposterous (do enjoy that word) assertion. Moving on.

I have discovered ChatRoulette, though am yet to fully engage with it. Amusing in theory but distinctly unpalatable in practice (I am yet to witness any real-time perversion), I expect it's merely a matter of time before mainstream media catch wind of this diabolical new apparatus that could facilitate some innocent child's exposure to a man with two fish perched cheekily within his dilated rectum. I say the sooner the better; the cultural importance of such a thing cannot be understated. Other items of even greater social significance than fish, adumbrative of the zeitgeist, are no doubt in the pipeline so to speak. iPods, Cadbury Pods, assorted miniature literary classics, a milliner's hat block, numerous species of succulent; these could by framed by one's anus and shown to the world. It's the for betterment of society and I heartily endorse it.

An Unexpected Party

Right then, to work. The aim is to concoct two delicately waspish musings a week, this being the first official one.

These will be short most like, unless inspiration strikes and the words tumble out of me like so many dwarves from a hobbit hole.

I suppose this will be a mix of the random and the research focused, or more specifically how far I am from possibly meeting a milestone in the next century.

I've acquired the necessary goodies (folders, pens(!), accoutrements; trappings (or accoutrements if you will) of organized academic pursuits. It is my hope that being more organized and having more stuff will create a sort of cocoon conducive to good work practices. I could be fooling myself and probably am, but if I can trick myself for long enough that solid work practice within the cocoon becomes habit, I might just have a chance. No doubt I'll sprinkle the odd dribble of arty business as that gathers momentum.

Dump the crocks in a boiling bowl;
Pound them up with a thumping pole;
And when you've finished, if any are whole,
Send them down the hall to roll!

I won't be doing that, just research and some drawing.

P.S. This is an utter travesty, a joke, a heaped, rotting pile of fuckoff conservatism forced upon people who really ought to know better than to elect such morons. Sigh. To work.