tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36969002055061710512024-03-14T18:05:43.828-07:00The Musings Of The ConsensusGethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.comBlogger408125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-71644946380607194312024-03-14T18:05:00.000-07:002024-03-14T18:05:01.420-07:00Gamergate 2 is on, and I want no part of it<p> This will not be a long post, but I just want to make clear, as someone who was involved in the first go-round of Gamergate, I want no part of any notional sequel.</p><p>For starters, I already found my niche as a games reviewer for ChristCenteredGamer, a place where I feel free to review games on their merits with no chains on my work save our Christian focus and my own conscience, and that is enough for me. My only service to the world as regards gaming is to continue to review games as honestly as possible on their technical merits, unbiased by anything else, and I'm pleased to remain doing so as a reviewer for CCG.</p><p>That aside, I want to make perfectly clear I do not want to get in the trenches of any sequel (which appears to be on right now). For those that do, on any side, you do you, but I found my place in the world, I shall stay uninvolved.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-76976078904075866012024-03-05T14:24:00.000-08:002024-03-05T14:24:29.597-08:00Review of some Italian and Gouda Cheeses<p> It's been awhile since I and my mother got some cheese to review, but we recently sampled four different types of cheese, two of Italian extraction, two being wildly different Gouda-style cheeses.</p><p><br /></p><p>First, let's start with the cheese I got free thanks to my regular cheesemonger Murray's tossing it in free with my order. That being a Parmigiano-Reggiano, aka that cheese most people have put on their Italian dishes in powder format.</p><p>I got a fresh if aged by 5 years slice of said cheese, and the taste in general is not much different from the powdered variety. Like the powdered version, it is a raw cow's milk cheese given a protracted aging process and made with a high density of salt to promote the flavor of Parmesan-style cheese most are familiar with. However, in its fresh state, it lacks much of that concentrated tanginess the powdered, condensed variety often has, while still retaining a gentler flavor despite being a hard cheese. If you want to have Parmesan without it being super tangy and dry as a bone, it goes great with meals, as a snack, or can be crumbled atop your Italian dishes as a fresher alternative to it's dry, powdered version.</p><p><br /></p><p>The other Italian cheese we tried was SarVecchio Satori. Despite the name, it's actually made in Wisconsin, not Italy, though it's heavily steeped in the same processes as Italian-made Asiago-style cheeses. It's made from pasteurized cow's milk and around 2 years old worth of aging.</p><p>As far as I'm concerned, where I didn't like the dry, unrelenting grit of Asagio d'Allevo, this had a similar flavor profile but was far less dried out and more pleasant to chew and savor. My mother noted it was quite salty, as Asagio and Grana style cheese tend towards, and both of us concur it's best served as part of a meal and only usable as a snacking cheese in small portions at best.</p><p><br /></p><p>The Goudas I got are practically polar opposites of each other, and I'll cover the milder of the two first.</p><p><br /></p><p>Honey Goat Gouda is a super approachable, creamy even by Gouda standards pasteurized goat milk cheese. With an age of 6 months, it is very soft and not at all hard to eat. It's a farmstead cheese from Holland and its name comes from the infusion of honey into the flavor profile.</p><p>To be frank, this is the creamiest, sweetest cheese you are likely to eat that isn't the consistency of flat-out cream cheese, and it's perfect as a snack cheese and very sweet and gentle to the taste. As a washed rind cheese, it's strongly lacking in an acidic taste profile, practically the polar opposite. If I had to rate the various Goudas I've tried, this is at the far end of the shallow end in terms of taste when it comes to tanginess. Both I and my mother enjoyed this one immensely.</p><p><br /></p><p>Noord Hollander Gouda is basically the Mirror Universe doppelganger of the first one I mentioned. It's pasteurized cow's milk cheese aged to around 4 years, which is pretty long by Gouda standards. It's a PDO (Protected Designation of Origin) cheese specific to the Noord-Holland region. It's a washed rind cheese like the Honey Goat Gouda, but since it's aged a lot longer, it develops an acidic flavor profile as it ages instead of having one earlier on. This makes it have quite the adventurous and tangy flavor profile.</p><p><br /></p><p>My mother commented it's like if Parmesan was made by Gouda cheesemakers to be as tangy and flavorful as possible, and I can't disagree. It still retains a high amount of the traditional creaminess of Gouda, but this not a cheese that is so gentle on the tongue you can snack on it without getting a lot of flavor as you savor. It can be snacked on if you want something adventurous by Gouda standards, but it's best paired with a meal or as a cooking cheese if you want dilute some of the tang while still enjoying the taste.</p><p><br /></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-88470601677639409282024-02-21T11:21:00.000-08:002024-02-21T23:11:02.732-08:00Because I Feel The Need To Clear The Air On My Take On The Beliefs of Mormons Part 2<p> In my last post on the Mormon faith, I established why I consider their doctrine heretical, inconsistent, and so full of contradictions I believed it and still believe it to be lies. In that post, I mostly pointed out where it contradicted the Bible it claims its own literature is deuterocanonical too.</p><p>This post is going to point out the flaws in in it's "brick and mortar" arguments, specifically, the real-world facts it does not line up with as regards historical plausibility and where it cannot possibly make logical sense when compared to its own logic with real-world fact.</p><p>For the Mormon reader, no, I am not going to going to go for the low-hanging fruit and attack Joseph Smith as a charlatan (though I believe he was). I will not go after any "picky points" about real-world Mormon practices, we could argue the validity of that for years and get nowhere.</p><p>Instead, I'm going to show why, by Mormonism own logic and that of the Christian faith it claims to be a perfection of, it cannot be as it claims.</p><p><br /></p><p>1. The backstory is riddled with "dated" flaws and logic issues.</p><p><br /></p><p>One of the key reasons I believe Mormons are believers in a lie is that it was very clearly a product of its time. It bears a lot of artifacts of Joseph Smith's day and age that would have made sense by the knowledge then but by contemporary standards the cracks are beyond obvious and the contradictions beyond resolving.</p><p><br /></p><p>The Book of Mormon claims the true Jerusalem is in America, specifically, the North American continent. In fact, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/topic/American-exceptionalism" target="_blank">this focus on North America as special is not a new idea</a>. Further, the Book of Mormon hinges on this concept to make sense of itself. If any physical location on the planet is ultimately important in the long run to God's agenda, then they might have a point.</p><p>The problem is that their own doctrine states before we were born, we existed in a spiritual state of grace we need to return to and that their idea of Heaven is multi-tiered, with this world and its physical environs nowhere near the top of the list of places you want to be in their concept of the afterlife.</p><p>Of course, Mormon doctrine also does not believe this world came from nothing, essentially rejecting the idea God willed this world into existence. In fact, according to their own theology, everything existed in some form before it attained a physical substance as we know it now.</p><p><a href="https://www.space.com/25126-big-bang-theory.html" target="_blank">To be fair, the Big Bang theory postulates a similar concept to explain why all we have all physical reality as it exists today</a>, ironically the invention of a Catholic in 1927.</p><p>The problem is that their logic smashes headfirst into how both God and his Son made clear this reality is temporal, as is our mortal shells, and even the heavens and earth as we know them will one day pass away to be replaced by something else. This renders their concept of how this world fits into their concept of an afterlife patently absurd.</p><p>Worse, it also just recycles the early geocentric theory (which stated Earth was at the center of everything and everything else was in orbit around it) differently. Rather Mormon doctrine states this reality is but one ring in a multi-tiered afterlife, <a href="https://www.mormonwiki.com/Kolob" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">yet oddly places God's own place in the universe near a star called Kolob</a>.</p><p>This leads me to question their entire premise because the logic here is tortured. By their own logic, they claim the Bible (at least in its KJV form as clarified via Mormon deuterocanon) is true. They also claim God has a physical reality, so does his Heaven, which by their own logic is on another plane higher than this physical reality (where Earth sits), but somehow exists in the same tangible universe we do. If both Jesus and God made clear this world is a temporal thing and God made it exist by saying, in the very first verse of the Bible, that the heavens and earth as we know them did not exist until He willed it be by His own effort, then how did God exist in a mortal plane like us before it existed by His own words?</p><p><br /></p><p>2. Their claims their deuterocanon and the Bible match up are absurd due to basic knowledge of history.</p><p><br /></p><p>Mormon doctrine states everything after the original apostles of Christ died cannot be trusted. In fact, all of the early church history past the original disciples of Christ is a crock. Catholicism and Protestants until Joseph Smith got it wrong until Joseph Smith filled in the blanks to fix that.</p><p>With this premise in mind, they oddly, for some reason, still trust the Bible as truthful, albeit it must be accompanied by their deuterocanonical Book of Mormon and other related Mormon-specific additions.</p><p>The translation of the Bible favored by Joseph Smith was, like many others, the <a href="https://digitalcommons.cedarville.edu/persecution_project/">King James Version</a>. This presents the first logical problem.</p><p>The King James Version was compiled in 1604 by King James I for the use of the Church of England. This is a synthesis of earlier efforts dating back to 1525, with at least one of those earlier efforts being Roman Catholic in origin.</p><p>Bear in mind, in turn, that the KJV version is based on earlier efforts dating back <a href="https://christianhistoryinstitute.org/study/module/nicea">to the Council of Nicea</a>. Mormons do not consider anything by the Nicean councils valid, nor do they accept anything from any other Orthodox, Catholic, or Protestant sect valid. To them, the Church was a podperson parody of itself until Joseph Smith restored it.</p><p>Unfortunately, the Book of Mormon and other documents like the Pearl of Great Price quote mine the KJV extensively, with the Book of Moses in the Pearl of Great Price being a largely recycled version of Genesis as dictated by God to Moses according to said source.</p><p>This leads me to one basic question: If Joseph Smith was not lying about the Church being invalid after the original apostles and we cannot trust the Catholic nor any other Protestant take on things, why did he base his own work on the KJV Bible written for the Church of England which in turn forked off Catholicism?</p><p>One would think he'd rewrite the original Bible to be correct instead of using a translation from a church he declared illegitimate to base everything else Mormons believe on.</p><p><br /></p><p>Frankly, just these two points alone massively undermine the very idea their beliefs are in any way consistent and effectively dismantle the validity of everything else by proxy.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, I am but an amateur scholar. For a far more in-depth analysis of Mormon documents by someone who did far more extensive scholarly analysis, I would highly recommend the following link, they go into exhaustive detail comparing Mormon source documents and claims to actual reality, written by someone in that faith who, while I do not agree with some of their conclusions, nevertheless points out far more logical errors that make a hash of all it claims.</p><p><br /></p><p><a href="https://cesletter.org/" target="_blank">I recommend getting the free PDF version of the book at this link for optimal reading on desktops and laptop computers.</a></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-87811679427717442712024-02-17T14:40:00.000-08:002024-02-18T18:45:16.957-08:00Because I Feel The Need To Clear The Air On My Take On The Beliefs of Mormons<p> Recently, I had a little incident where I offended a devout Mormon by throwing shade on the Book of Mormon as a fanfic that does not withstand the light of scrutiny. Out of respect for the party in question, whom I apologized to for being unduly rude, I shall not name names nor discuss exactly where it happened or the circumstances. However, because this is my personal blog, I shall set forth my views on Mormonism, with no evasion or sugarcoating, just to clarify my beliefs. If any devout Mormon wishes to offer a rebuttal, I shall accept that maturely and welcome it. </p><p>The only caveat I ask is that the rebuttal give evidence for its views from secondary sources to back up the TANGIBLE claims made by Mormon doctrine (such as geological facts and historical events that should be provable by historical evidence of some kind or backed up by a secondary source). The reason I make this distinction is that Christians and Jews can easily meet this test with their holy books and beliefs, and secular historians of all shades can confirm to varying degrees facts of a non-faith-based nature such as persons, places, and historical events mentioned in the Old and New Testaments that involved other civilizations and peoples who confirmably existed in the historical record. Matters of faith I will not dispute except where I can prove via the Bible (which Mormons claim albeit filtered through their own interpretation via their own deuterocanonical additions) there are clear contradictions.</p><p>That all said, let me be absolutely clear. Those who subscribe to Mormon beliefs I have no issue with as people. I know Mormons who are nice people who I respect as human beings with intelligence, conscience, and the free will to choose their own beliefs. However, I have come to the conclusion, frankly, their beliefs do not have any foundation in logical consistency, the tangible evidence cited by their doctrine cannot be falsified (the historical process of confirming or denying its authenticity), and that while they may believe to some extent in actual matters they have common ground with Christians over, that Mormon doctrine is fundamentally a false doctrine that wears the title Christianity as a skinsuit, a cult with well-intentioned people who have been deceived for the most part, and just because their beliefs may be sincere and long-held, it is at its core false teachings that I cannot respect as having any moral value on equal standing with mainline Christian doctrine as considered basically acceptable to most Protestants or Catholics.</p><p><br /></p><p>First off, let me start off by saying I revere the study of history, and since Mormon belief posits as a foundation of its core concepts an extensive retcon of actual real-world history to retroactively make it line up with both doctrine and history otherwise canon to the Bible and real-world secular history, then I believe if it cannot be made to square with either, then it's fundamental beliefs must be lies.</p><p><br /></p><p>1. First off let us examine core Mormon doctrine.<a href="https://clearlyreformed.org/7-reasons-why-mormonism-and-christianity-are-not-the-same/" target="_blank"> I shall refer to this site for the basic arguments and my take on them.</a></p><p><br /></p><p>A. Mormon doctrine essentially repudiates everything after the death of the original apostles of Christ as illegitimate. While Jesus did say that Peter would be the rock he would build his church, that did not mean Peter nor any other apostle was any more special than any other mortal for determining the continuation of the Holy Word or the spread of its message. Mormon doctrine essentially claims until Joseph Smith came along, humanity was stumbling in the wilderness with a flawed, perverted version of the actual beliefs in God until Joseph Smith and his successors had the perfected version restored.</p><p>Frankly, this is not a new argument. Islam also claims to be the perfected version of the revelations of God, given by the Prophet Muhammad, and that Jews and Christians had an imperfect version of the actual truth.</p><p>Mormons (though of late they have come to not want to be called this anymore due to negative historical associations they wish to distance themselves from) are frankly making a gigantic ask here, basically saying past the life of the original apostles' everything between then up until the 19th century was a perverted, twisted version of the truth, essentially recycling the same argument as Muslims, just in the 1800s instead of in the 600s of the AD calendar. As they make an extraordinary claim, this requires extraordinary evidence, which I can prove, citing the very Bible they claim to adhere to, does not match up with their take on things.</p><p><br /></p><p>B. The Mormon view of the Bible is that is it not inerrant nor complete. Again, this is an argument many like Muslims and many splinter cults from the early church like Montantism made to "retcon" the Bible and add newer content down the line without the messy problem of repudiating the old.</p><p>However, this presents the first logical problem. If Christianity was a flawed, perverted shell of itself after the original apostles of Christ died, and the first canonization of the scriptures which even they largely accept was done by the Council of Nicaea a few hundred years after those original apostles passed (and later translated to English in the first form they accept as the KJV version), then how can they accept the current Bible as considered canonical by most Protestant denominations (with Mormons defaulting to the KJV version as a base) a remotely accurate basis for their deuterocanon? If they suspect anything after the original apostles died, and the canonization of scripture was not done by anyone they considered proper Christians, then their core premise that the Bible is not inerrant nor complete means one of two things. Either they need it to be true because it's the only way their retcons can be justified, or they are being inconsistent and giving the canonization of the Bible some degree of legitimacy, which undermines the core of their argument they cannot trust anything after the death of the original apostles. I respectfully contend their arguments don't wash.</p><p><br /></p><p>C. Mormon concepts about the nature of man I find entirely incompatible with Christianity, let me cite the description from the above-linked website, and then I shall present my analysis. (original in italics, my commentary in regular font)</p><br /><i>According to Mormon theology, men and women are the spirit sons and daughters of God. We lived in a premortal spirit existence before birth. In this first estate we grew and developed in preparation for the second estate. In this second estate we walk by faith. A veil of forgetfulness has been placed over our minds so we don’t remember what we did and who we used to be in our premortal existence. Our purpose in this life is to grow and mature in a physical body to prepare us for our final eternal state.<br /><br /><br />Mormons do not believe in human depravity. We are not implicated in Adam’s fall. We are basically good in our eternal nature, but prone to error in our mortal nature. The human is a being in conflict, but also a being with infinite potential.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div>For starters, the first sentence I won't split hairs over. The next two sentences I do not see proof in the Bible for and frankly, I won't argue too much YET. The fourth sentence is where the first major contradiction crops up.</div><div><br /></div><div>Mormon doctrine argues our premortal existence was essentially blanked out so we live our lives without a conscious remembrance of it, rendering it superfluous. This does not mesh with how the Bible says it was appointed unto man only once to live and die, and how upon reaching the age of accountability will our actions for or against God be weighted against us.</div><div><br /></div><div>The Mormon concept of a premortal existence we are not aware of has seen use in another form in the beliefs of Scientology, which has a variant on the concept being memories of a past life. Again, if this premortal state is effectively irrelevant to how we are judged in the eyes of God, then its mention is effectively without a point. The entire concept falls apart on this basic logic error.</div><div><br /></div><div>The last sentence after this part I won't split hairs over, but the next paragraph is full of contradictions.</div><div><br /></div><div>The essential concept of salvation is that humanity CANNOT save itself. By the fall of Adam, man became marked as unregenerate without the intercessions of God to save us from our own inquiry. Mormons accept the basic backstory of the Garden of Eden and the events of its resulting aftermath, yet essentially reject the key result of Adam's action reflecting on humanity. If we take this logic at face value, humanity has nothing to prove, atone for, or have to accept we are flawed beings in need of outside intervention.</div><div><br /></div><div>Mormons essentially argue that the Garden of Eden was a failure of the direct participants in those events and affected no one else. This, despite God in the very same event making clear Adam and Eve's fall from grace, would place the curse of their sin on their descendants having to endure suffering and being denied eternal life free from toil and hardship such as was enjoyed in the Garden.</div><div><br /></div><div>If the Garden of Eden is just a burden on the direct participants alone, then that means Mormons argue God lied about the curse of sin having a knock-on effect on the descendants of the first man and woman. In short, their argument we are without innate depravity does not make sense.</div><div><br /></div><div>The rest is even more confusing. If we have an eternal nature that cannot be flawed while our mortal side can be flawed, they are effectively arguing for two entities in the same flesh, one of a mortal nature, and one of a divine, coexisting in the same mortal shell. Given they basically deny the innate sinfulness of man, this two-party entity in a mortal shell thus cannot be flawed by human weakness or evil, and thus renders any need to atone for sin irrelevant by their own doctrinal standards. The very last sentence is rather vague and also contradicts their own argument, saying we are in conflict with ourselves (which makes no sense if we cannot have our souls err and thus our mortal aspect is irrelevant to our immortal aspect) while also possessing infinite potential.</div><div><br /></div><div>D. I shall again cite the above-linked website, then present my analysis:</div><div><br /></div><br /><i>In Mormon thought, God has a physical body. According to Doctrine and Covenants, “The Father has a body of flesh and bones as tangible as man’s; the Son also;” but “The Holy Ghost has not a body of flesh and bones, but is a personage of Spirit.”</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div>We already run into a contradiction of massive proportions here. God is supposed to be an omnipotent being, by His own admission, outside the limits of mortality. God's entire premise of supremacy of over all creation rests on this premise. If God is confined to a mortal shell of any sort, that makes the being the Mormons worship NOT the same God Christians worship. Jesus, as God's Son, adopted a mortal shell but had a spirit untainted by the seed of Adam. Mormons thus argue the same discredited heresy of Arianism, which rejected the concept Christ ever had a mortal form of any sort, given their take on the Garden of Eden. About the only thing they agree on Christians with is the Holy Spirit's form.<br /><br /><br /><i>Whether God the Father is self-existent is unclear. There was a long procession of gods and fathers leading up to our Heavenly Father. Brigham Young once remarked, “How many Gods there are, I do not know. But there never was a time when there were not Gods and worlds.” What is clearer is that the Mormon God is not a higher order or a different species than man. God is a man with a body of flesh and bones like us.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>Again, Mormons are at direct cross-purposes with the Bible. The very first line of the Bible said God created the heavens and the earth and before that the corporeal universe as we know it did not exist until He said so. This is rendered an absurdity under Mormon doctrine. Further, God made clear multiple times humanity was NEVER at any level equal or approximate to Him. If God is as they say, he is NOT an omnipotent being without mortal limits, and thus I contend they do not worship the same God as Christians.<br /><br /><br /><i>Mormons do not believe in the Trinity. They affirm the unity of three personages, but the unity is a relational unity in purpose and mind, not a unity of essence. The three separate beings of the Godhead are three distinct Gods.</i><div><br /></div><div>We've already established their own doctrine makes a hash of the very content of the Bible, and this part is even more absurd. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are a triune entity in Christian thought, but Mormons declare them all separate beings with a shared vision, which is logically absurd on its face. The Holy Spirit is supposed to be what leads men to God, the Son made clear he only spoke in the name of his Father, and the Father (God) is why the other two exist. They are three separate entities yes, but of the same being incarnate in three forms that share the same inherent essence according to the scriptures of which I am aware. Again, Mormons are recycling Arianism's discredited canards despite the logical errors they present.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>E. Their views on Christ first, then my analysis:</div><div><br /></div><i><br />Mormons believe Jesus is Redeemer, God, and Savior. He is endless and eternal, the only begotten son of the Father. Through Jesus, the Heavenly Father has provided a way for people to be like him and to live with him forever.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>So far,<i> </i>so good.<br /><br /><br /><i>But this familiar language does not mean the same thing to Mormons as it does to Christians. Jesus was born of the Father just like all spirit children. God is his Father in the same way he is Father to all. Whatever immortality or Godhood Jesus possesses, they are inherited attributes and powers. He does not share the same eternal nature as the Father. Jesus may be divine, but his is a derivative divinity. Mormon theology teaches, in the words of Joseph Smith, that Jesus Christ is “God the Second, the Redeemer.”</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>Again, Mormons recycle the canards of Arianism<i>. </i>Arianism just could not accept how a sinless spirit could coexist in a temporary mortal shell, so they claimed his mortal form was also divine because such a concept they could not resolve in their own minds, hence denial of his being born in a mortal form. The fact this makes his death in said mortal form an inherent absurdity is obvious and makes for a logical error they cannot resolve.</div><div><br /></div><div>Jesus made quite clear he had to die in his mortal form to redeem us, made it clear multiple times in the Gospels and it played out exactly as he said God intended. By Mormon theology, this was just an elaborate live-action roleplay exercise devoid of any actual meaning, making Jesus a liar and God one by proxy by their own logic.</div><div><br /></div><div>F. Now to cover their view on atonement, then my analysis:</div><div><br /></div><i><br />Mormons believe Jesus died for sins and rose again from the dead. The atonement is the central event in history and essential to their theology. And yet, Mormons do not have a precise doctrine of the atonement. They do not emphasize Christ as a wrath-bearing substitute, but emphasize simply that Christ somehow mysteriously remits our sins through his suffering.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div>I am already flabbergasted. If they accept everything up until the original apostles passed away, they should KNOW this is absurd. Christ died in his mortal shell on the cross to be the perfect sacrifice for all sin that no mortal could otherwise offer because their spirit was tainted by original sin. According to Mormon concepts already established, Jesus just suffers pain, and that somehow cleanses humanity of the burden of sin without elaboration. Even in the Books of the Law, God made clear no mortal sacrifice could ever truly wash away sin without his sanction of the sacrifice being worthy of doing so and even then it would not be permanent if one sinned again. Jesus' death on the cross, as Christ was also God, would have thus been the only logical sacrifice that would be eternally acceptable.<br /><br /><br /><i>While the atonement itself is not overly defined, the way in which the atonement is made efficacious is much more carefully delineated. Salvation is available because of the atoning blood of Christ, but this salvation is only received upon four conditions: faith, repentance, baptism, and enduring to the end by keeping the commandments of God (which include various Mormon rituals).</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>In this, they do not agree with Catholics or Protestants AT ALL. In Catholic and Protestant traditions, only God's grace through faith is the only sure guarantee of salvation. No good work will ever save someone on the basis of the work alone, no ritual will ever make one ceremonially clean before God entirely on its own, and if one dies hoping these will help without faith in the promises of God, then one is LOST. Protestants and Catholics have a lot of disputes over the proper sacraments and their meaning, but if either were denied any and all sacraments, such as the thief on the cross who was still saved through faith ALONE, they could still be saved by divine grace,</div><div><br /></div><div>Mormons are just recycling "you must do certain procedures and rituals" in just another form for another generation to be deceived. Worse, by making the exact nature of atonement not dependent on the eternal sacrifice of Christ for our sin, yet not establishing clearly what IS the proper sacrifice to make up for it while saying certain rituals are absolutely required, they do not walk the same road any Protestant or Catholic does on their way to salvation. Again, I emphasize in this regard Mormon doctrine is irrationally vague whereas Protestants and Catholics have a far more specific concept based on prior logic for how it works.<br /><br /><br /><i>Finally, it should be noted Mormon theology stresses the suffering in the garden rather than the suffering on the cross. Atonement may have been completed on Golgotha, but it was made efficacious in Gethsemane.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>This seriously confuses me. How does Jesus being scared and nervous like anyone would be of death and pain do anything? Jesus still died on the Cross for us, which even they will concede, even if they reject the end result as following the same logic of standard Christian doctrine. Since they reject the core point of Christ's sacrifice despite claiming as canon all that was in existence until the passing of the original apostles, who themselves backed up the Protestant and Catholic view Christ's sacrifice was essential, this is illogical on every level.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>G. The final part is going to cover their view of salvation, followed by my commentary, and be warned, this part is far longer and will require a lot of commentary:</div><div><br /></div><br /><i>The goal of Mormon salvation is not about escaping wrath as much as it is about maximizing our growth and ensuring our happiness. Salvation is finding our way back to God the Father and recalling our forgotten first estate as his premortal spirit children.</i><div><i><br /></i></div><div>I'm already stunned. Freedom from the penalty of the taint of sin on the human soul caused by Man's fall at the Garden, that's actual Christian doctrine. Mormons are using the same logic of Scientology that we have a past life we need to reconcile with our current one.<br /><br /><br /><i>Mormon theology teaches that we cannot receive an eternal reward by our own unaided efforts. In some respects, salvation is based on what we have earned, but what we earn is by grace. How this plays out in Mormon life may differ from person to person, but they stress that the gift of the Holy Ghost is conditional upon continued obedience. Mormons must keep the First Principles and Ordinances, which consist of the Ten Commandments, tithing, chastity, and the “Word of Wisdom” which prohibits tobacco, coffee, tea, alcohol, and illegal narcotics.</i></div><div><br /></div><div>More I'm stunned by. In Acts, which took place as Peter was STILL ALIVE (remember, Mormons accept everything up until the original apostles died), God struck down the ceremonial and ritual prohibitions that separated Jew and Gentile, and the early church while Peter was still alive concurred on this. If Mormons are actual Christians, fine, make your own personal rules for what you consider permissible, but your personal dietary restrictions are NOT canonical to actual scripture. Further, while I commend the following of the Commandments and chastity, and tithing when done by a genuinely giving spirit who does not believe salvation can be earned by doing so, the very last part is Mormon-specific and has no basis in Scripture.<br /><br /><br /><i>Temples are also important in Mormon doctrine and practice. Couples must be married in a Mormon temple to have an eternal marriage, and every Mormon must be baptized in one of their 135 (and counting) authorized Temples. Because of the importance of baptism in the Temple, baptisms for the dead are extremely common. Mormons keep detailed genealogical records so that their ancestors can be properly baptized. By one estimate more than 100 million deceased persons have been baptized by proxy baptism in Mormon temples. Those who received this baptism are free in the afterlife to reject or accept what has been done on their behalf.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>I cannot facepalm hard enough. Jesus made the point the dead are beyond saving, they had their chance to accept God's grace while alive, as recounted in the parable of the rich man and Lazarus. Ergo, this concept is heretical and absurd.</div><div><br /></div><div>Speaking for myself, and let me make clear this is speculation on my part, but the Mormon aversion to the concept of being denied the kingdom of Heaven strikes me as fear they can be denied Grace, hence all the dodges around the idea of the need for an eternal sacrifice and that even the dead who died without Grace can be redeemed. Frankly, the fear of dying unredeemed is understandable, but when you have to make up something not supported by scripture to give yourself an "out" to avoid this, then that tells me you don't like the fact Grace is something you can die without. <br /><br /><br /><i>Death in Mormon thinking is seen as another beginning, complete with opportunities to respond to postmortem preaching in the world to come. We will live in the spirit world, and at some point our spirit and body will be reunited forever.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>We have entered the realm of outright heresy. Our mortal bodies mean NOTHING. Humanity was made from the dust of the earth, our mortal shells, like this world, are temporal, they will pass away and in the end they will be replaced by something eternal. Mormon concepts and Christianity entirely part company on this point.<br /><br /><br /><i>There are four divisions in the afterlife. The Lake of Fire is reserved for the Devil, his demons, and those who commit the unpardonable sin. The Telestial Kingdom is where the wicked go. It is a place of suffering but not like the Lake of Fire. Most people go to the Telestial Kingdom where they are offered salvation again. The lukewarm-not quite good, not quite evil-go to the Terrestrial Kingdom when they die. This Kingdom is located on a distant planet in the universe. The Celestial Kingdom is for the righteous. Here God’s people live forever in God’s presence. We will live as gods and live with our spouses and continue to procreate. This is the aim and the end of Mormon salvation.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div>Mormon concepts of the afterlife is just Catholicism with extra steps that make sure no one can truly die without a chance at Grace. By their own concepts, they have spit on the words of Jesus, who said we not marry or be given to marriage, but will be like the angels in Heaven. They also assume that they can rise to level of godhood, another heresy that assumes we are in any way equal to God.<br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>I may write future posts on this topic to further share my issues with Mormonism and why it cannot claim to fall under the umbrella of Christianity by any definition that would be even broadly conformant to that known to Protestants or Catholics. In the meantime, now that I have finished, this should hopefully express with good reason and civil words my reasons why I consider Mormon doctrine heretical, unworthy of being called Christian, and why I believe those who are sincere believers in it have been deceived and that they should turn away for the sake of true repentance and salvation.</div><div><br /></div></div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-11409187140901969642023-12-08T18:00:00.000-08:002023-12-08T18:00:56.647-08:00Geth Reviews an Okay Gun: The Type 100 Submachine Gun<p> Now, I reviewed two weapons prior that were pretty terrible, the Chauchat and the Type 94 pistol. Both of these weapons had so many flaws I was forced to give them bad reviews. The Type 100 SMG of Japanese WW2 fame was far from the best gun deployed, but on the whole, it was quite good for what it was made for and the limitations its sponsor nation had.</p><p><br /></p><p>First, a little background. Japan was oddly late to the idea of incorporating SMGs into their arsenal during World War II. Despite having battlefields ideal for their deployment and being well suited for the mission they needed them for, they showed oddly little interest until very late into the war, and they never deployed the gun in question in very large numbers even after they proved their worth, likely due to shortage of materials over any other reason.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.imfdb.org/images/1/1e/Submachine_gun_Type_100.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="192" data-original-width="800" height="96" src="https://www.imfdb.org/images/1/1e/Submachine_gun_Type_100.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Like many Japanese weapons of the period, it is a product of Kirijo Nambu, who made and/or refined practically every weapon the Japanese would carry as small arms. While some of his designs were pretty horrible, like the Type 94, this was actually a pretty decent weapon design. After a few false starts with some earlier prototypes that never saw much use beyond proof of concept prototypes, the Type 100 (formal name <i>一〇〇式機関短銃, Hyaku-shiki kikan-tanjū</i><span face="sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202122; font-size: 14px;"><i>)</i> </span>was finally accepted for deployment in 1940.<br /><br /><br />Before covering the gun features, it bears noting this was a very late time to consider submachine guns compared to every other force in WW2. It would have been far more useful to their arsenal several years prior, as SMGs were ideal for use in the jungle and for close-quarters assault missions as opposed to rather ungainly long rifles and machine guns.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://www.awm.gov.au/collection/C236738" target="_blank">That aside, it had at least three variants, the 1940 original, the paratrooper version of the 1940 model, and the 1944 late model.</a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Here is the list of features common to the original model:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The ammo used was the standard, slightly underpowered 8mm Nambu pistol cartridge. While not as powerful as the rounds used by other nations, it was more than adequate for the limited mission needs of the Japanese.</li><li>The design takes a LOT of cues from the German MP18 of World War I fame. Given it was the basis of many designs of the period, including the Beretta SMG the Italians used, this was not a bad choice for the base concept. The gun was a mix of wood and metal, with wood making up most of the furniture of the weapon.</li><li>The feed mechanism was a good idea in theory but not so great in practice. It was designed so a round had to be fully chambered before it would fire. While an ideal safety feature, this meant you couldn't even do a dry fire to check the cycle of action, you had to have some sort of round fully loaded. This also hurt the fire rate, it being a rather paltry 400-450 RPM (Rounds per minute) at best on a good day.</li><li>It was plated with chrome for easier cleaning around the barrel. The barrel also had an integral compensator.</li><li>It had adjustable iron sights.</li><li>It had a curved box magazine with a 30-round capacity.</li><li>The firing mechanism was a blowback action. While adequate, the complex safety features hobbled the firing rate.</li><li>It had support for a bipod, muzzle brake, and bayonet lug,</li></ul><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.imfdb.org/images/e/ec/Nambu_Type_100-40_para.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="134" data-original-width="650" height="82" src="https://www.imfdb.org/images/e/ec/Nambu_Type_100-40_para.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The paratrooper variant was more or less similar to the original, except the stock was made for folding via a metallic hinge. While a practical idea, given the need for portability, it did slightly weaken the integrity of the gun due to the fact it effectively loosed the front and back ends of the stock, making for slightly worse recoil.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://smallarmsreview.com/japans-mass-produced-submachine-gun-the-type-100/" target="_blank">The late 1944 variant, which was most often encountered later in the war, was greatly simplified and was much cruder than the earlier versions, losing many frills and niceties in an attempt to streamline production.</a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.imfdb.org/images/8/81/Type100_1944.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="170" data-original-width="800" height="85" src="https://www.imfdb.org/images/8/81/Type100_1944.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">To cut costs, a lot of features were cut down, removed, or simplified:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The adjustable tangent iron sight was replaced with a fixed welded peep sight. This was arguably the biggest downgrade since this meant the sight could not be adjusted and if it was welded crooked, you were basically stuck with a bad sight that was already marginal at best.</li><li>The finish and quality took a nosedive. The wood and metal were not finished, lots of welding was used wherever possible, and this was not very fun to hold with ungloved hands.</li><li>The muzzle brake attachment was deleted and a much simpler integrated version was done by drilling a port hole or two into the barrel end.</li><li>The bayonet lug was replaced with a much simpler attachment point. The bipod attachment was deleted.</li><li>The stock was reverted to the non-paratrooper version, which was actually a good idea, the paratrooper version was less sturdy.</li><li>The complicated fire control mechanism was removed and the rate of fire increased to 800 RPM</li></ul><div><br /></div><div>Essentially, this late war version wasn't that much of a downgrade in overall performance aside from the sights and it did see some use in many of the latter campaigns. It's only real flaw aside from the inherently low powered ammunition is the limited number produced, as Japan did not have the ability to make these in numbers that would have made any real difference.</div><div><br /></div><div>That said, it was overall a weapon that "too little, too late", but that could be said of a lot of their war efforts, so this gun alone was not going to make or break the Japanese forces any worse than they were historically. Regardless, it was one of Kirijo Nambu's more competent designs despite it's flaws, and while I'd prefer something better, it was, at worst, acceptable for the mission assigned to it, just never produced in quantity that mattered.</div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div></div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-36888131702606065322023-11-03T14:25:00.002-07:002023-11-03T19:45:28.084-07:00Reviews of Jarlsberg, Appenzeller White, and Asiago D'Allevo Cheese <p> This month, I chose to go outside my usual selections for cheese and get some things outside my palate, just for variety.</p><p>To that end, I got three cheeses, all of wildly different flavor profiles, and below are my reviews of them all</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Jarlsberg</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Jarlsberg is Norwegian cheese, trademarked in 1972. It's a Swiss-type cheese made from cow's milk. Its origins date back to the 1850's. It has "gas holes", the traditional eyes of Swiss-type cheeses due to propionic bacteria, a harmless bacterium used to culture the cheese, and causes the eyes due to the buildup of CO2.</p><p>According to Murray's, it was sold as a mild, even mild fruity cheese, and in my and mother's taste testing, this is generally true, being very gentle and even slightly sweet for a Swiss-style cheese. It's a cheese I would easily recommend as a snack and cooking cheese, and I'm normally not a fan of Swiss cheese in general.</p><p>This, however, is something even I'm going to concede is pleasant to eat despite my own bias.</p><p><br /></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b>Appenzeller White</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Now, this cheese is really out of my comfort zone. It's a somewhat stinky (albeit mildly) cheese made in an herbal brine made with raw cow's milk in Switzerland. It is the 'White" brand of Appenzeller, as it has many other sister brands named after colors.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, for a cheese with a stinky smell, this one is not overpowering. My mother, who has an aversion to Limburger, was able to eat this one without feeling overly ill, and even I could do so, so while it does have an unmistakable herbal odor, it's not overly cloying. The taste is definitely creamy milk mixed with a definite hint of spices and various herbs. If that sort of thing floats your boat, then this is a good cheese to enjoy, particularly as part of a meal to play off the flavor with complementary food items. It's edible on its own but not my choice as a snack cheese.</p><p><br /></p><b>Asiago D'Allevo</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>This may be the first Italian cheese I did not overly enjoy. This is a hard cheese from the Veneto region of Italy. It's rather hard and I got cheese that was nearly a year old, more suitable for grating. As opposed to the milder Pecorino Romano and Grana Padano, both quite edible on their own even when aged, this is not the easiest to chew after it gets a certain age. It is less bland and certainly more piquant, someone wanting a grating cheese with more kick to it and less of a dry grainy or flaky and more fresh taste would enjoy it, but I found it wasn't to my palate.</div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-75963445180096638502023-10-19T11:17:00.001-07:002023-10-19T11:18:01.158-07:00I'd like to extend a warm thank you to Shirogane of Fundies Say the Darndest Things<p> I've arrived. For having the audacity to say, LE GASP, maybe the transgender lobby might need to moderate their approach and quit demanding all of humanity deny their own eyes, brain, and personal conscience to accommodate them, I have gotten an entry on the "hall of shame" (really not ashamed at all, I think I'll take a picture of it and frame it) that is <a href="https://fstdt.com/" target="_blank">Fundies Say the Darndest Things</a>. </p><p><br /></p><p>Original here: https://fstdt.com/@Shirogane</p><p>On top of editing out the rest of my post and selectively curating one section out of context for other like-minded people to seethe at (and Shirogane, you can be honest, you were the anon who left a comment calling me crazy in response and ran to FSTDT to post what made you mad as some childish revenge), they also seem to think I'm some horrible transphobic bigot because I refuse to be a mindless lickspittle for their every demand. I'm actually pretty moderate on that. Do your thing without harming me or anyone else and I don't care what you do with your life, it's your business, just don't shove it into mine, and don't demand I kiss your ring lest you try to publicly pillory me for refusal.</p><p>And with that noted, Shirogane, well, if you were hoping to make me feel bad when I discovered your attempt to cancel me, well, I'm just going to dig in my heels and laugh. I knew what I posted would be free for public consumption and comment, so being attacked for calling something I deemed wrong as me being the bad guy because I hurt feelings does not bother me. And Dunning-Kruger, really? I admit I could possibly be wrong, but instead of trying to reason with me, you instead did the cowardly move of talking about me behind my back. Protip: A civil attempt to change my mind would have worked a lot better.</p><p><br /></p><p>That said, I bear no grudges and take no offense. I forgive this because it's not worth getting upset over, and being an unshamed Christian, earning the scorn of the world is nothing to be surprised by. If anything, thanks. Glad to know someone actually reads this blog, I graciously thank you for the support.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-40909746526195891982023-10-19T10:44:00.002-07:002023-10-23T15:21:34.958-07:00On getting into AI art making and the ethics of it<p> I am writing this post due to my getting into making AI art after being interested in the possibilities and wanting to use it for game modding.</p><p>Now, before I continue, I want to make a few things clear. I deplore the use of AI creation of any sort for evil intent. I do not ever plan to sell anything created by AI, do not ever intend to claim it as my own work (as it's generated by a computer, not my own actual skill), and I only ever plan to do AI creations of any sort in compliance with all applicable laws and with all proper safeguards taken against it causing financial, legal, or moral harm to another person. If I was ever given a request to take it down by proper authority, I would comply immediately.</p><p>Now that I got that out of the way, let me first explain what AI art is for the people unaware, then go into why I wrote this post.</p><p>First off, AI art is artwork, soundtracks, animations, or other media done by a computer being fed examples of currently existing material, then using procedural generation to attempt to make its own artwork based on this data. In practice, it makes hardly anything one would call truly original. It's in fact derivative of existent art, often with the resultant creation being a chimeric fusion of actual effort.</p><p>Legally, it's not entirely clear yet if it's plagiarism, parody, or falls into something of a grey area. So far, there are no laws against my use of it I'm aware of, and I'm just a mere hobbyist at best.</p><p>I use Stable Diffusion, an open-source protocol. I originally got interested when I saw Bing's Image Creator, but these days it's so locked down, sanitized, and refuses to make any results of anything that could offend anyone (but given it's run by Microsoft, who lobotomized their AI Tay when the internet taught it to be an unironic Nazi, this is no surprise). Ergo, I decided to try making my own with open-source tools.</p><p>The art I do is still images. I favor a 2D anime-based art style, and Stable Diffusion, provided you have a proper checkpoint (base data for your chosen art style) and Loras (models and other data that serve as addons to Stable Diffusion), you can make some decent material, albeit with a lot of work.</p><p><br /></p><p>In fact, I'll be blunt. While there are many people who rage (with some degree of truth to their credit) AI art is theft, the overwhelming majority takes a LOT of tries before you get results that look even remotely good. I've lost count of how many terrible results and outright cosmic horrors I've produced before the generator spit out something passable.</p><p>Stable Diffusion works on a tag and weight system. It uses tags much like "Booru" style sites. For example "1guy", "car", "road" would be a basic prompt to specify you want to see a guy with a car on a road. Of course, you need to further specify if the car is in motion, if the window is down, and all the other details if you want more specific results, else the AI generator result can be super random. It also requires certain topics be given high or low weight, to give certain details emphasis or deemphasis, as the case may be.</p><p>Again, let me be absolutely blunt. This is a piss poor substitute for actual effort by actual artists. I have paid artists for work before, and I found it to have far more love, care, and charm than even my best AI creation. AI tends to hate and not understand subtle flaws that give real art its charms. It often makes horrible mistakes like deformed limbs, bad proportions, incompetence at drawing light and shadows, and many other botched-looking failures at making an image. I am going to admit I'm a cheap man with no art creation skills to my name (drawing straight lines is nigh impossible for me and I have no idea how I didn't totally flunk art class). I'm sure even the crudest stick figure artist makes stuff way better than I could. I bow in humbled awe of anyone with actual artistic talent.</p><p>Now, I want to cover the controversy over AI art. There is a lot of rage it's going to put real artists out of work, it's crap knockoffs, it's stealing what other made money off of, and how it can be used for all sorts of evil intentions and in fact has been done already. I do not deny any of this, people have been caught selling games with AI art without saying so, it can be considered plagiarism of material others have done since it's all based on preexisting data drawn from publicly accessible sources, and yes, it's very arguable even for parodic purposes it could be called plagiarism in many legitimate senses.</p><p>Conversely, I want to say the following. The genie is already out of the bottle, it's too late to put it back in. This is a tool like any other that can be used for good or evil, and I agree it should be governed and restrained by the firmest sense of ethics possible. Whether it's detractors like it or not, it's not going away, so I advise focusing on restraining it's potential for abuse instead of cursing its mere existence, too late for the latter now.</p><p>Finally, I just want to say my conscience on this subject is generally clear, given my the above. I again regret and deplore use of AI for evil. I greatly enjoy audio parodies on YouTube of AI versions of our presidents playing Mario Kart, meme videos of Dagoth Ur from Morrowind saying the most goofy dialogue people can dream up, and enjoy meme parodies done in AI that blend art styles and genres one does not usually see. This does NOT have to be a tool for evil, it can be a means for harmless fun.</p><p>It's merely my solemn hope and prayer it can remain that way, or at least the potential for evil use can be mitigated as much as possible.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-31693685783606382722023-10-19T09:51:00.005-07:002023-10-28T11:55:46.041-07:00Geth Reviews A Terrible Gun: Type 94 Nambu pistol<p> Now, when reviewing this gun, I had to separate a lot of fact from fiction. One of its most notorious features has a lot of contention, with some claiming it was more deadly to the user than the intended target, and others claiming this is overblown nonsense. On the whole, however, this is a pretty disappointing gun for many other reasons.</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/Type_94_Pistol.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="538" data-original-width="800" height="269" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d4/Type_94_Pistol.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Shown above is the Type 94 handgun (in the original Japanese, <small style="background-color: white; color: #202122; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 11.9px;"> </small>Kyūyon-Shiki Kenjū). Now, many respected military historians such as the late Ian V. Hogg have given this gun bad reviews. <a href="https://www.forgottenweapons.com/the-truth-about-the-type-94-nambu-surrender-pistol/" target="_blank">More contemporary military weapons aficionados generally agree though Ian McCollum of <i>Forgotten Weapons </i>contends it wasn't great, but not as bad as it's believed to be.</a></div><div><br /></div>The gun itself was designed by Kijirō Nambu, the Japanese version of John Moses Browning. The Type 94 was issued for service in 1934 (despite it being a commercial flop in non-military markets). Its designation comes from the Japanese historical tradition of their origins, meaning the gun was issued in the 2594 year of the Japanese system of dating. Oddly, it is not given a date based on the reign of the Japanese Emperor at the time. Earlier weapons designed by Nambu were considered quite good if expensive to manufacture, like the Type 14, a gun issued in the 14th year of the Taisho Era (aka 1926). So the Type 94 was made, based on Nambu (in cooperation with the Japanese military which he still sold weapons to even after his retirement) trying to make an easier-to-handle successor.<div><br /></div><div>It's worth noting it took several years before the Japanese military accepted it for service, and even then it was primarily issued to paratroopers and tank crews, and could be purchased by officers on their own dime. According to <i>The Encyclopedia of Weapons of World War II</i>, it was particularly favored by tank crews for its small size, a premium given the cramped confines of tanks.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, when discussing the design, before I get to the hotly contested point that neither side can agree on as being horrible, let's cover some of the generally agreed bad design flaws.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Like many weapons of its class, it used a rather low-powered 8x22mm pistol cartridge. It had about six rounds per magazine. Overall, this not exactly what most contemporary forces would consider ideal for military purposes in terms of power, and all other combatants in the war all had much better options available.</li><li>The grips are very small, obviously to accommodate the hands of the average Japanese user at the time, meaning this gun will feel dinky in the hands of larger handed person, The grips are either bakelite/plastic in the early models or "slab" grips made of wood in the later models. Either way, the grips are slightly rough to the touch, made worse by the sharp taper from top to bottom, meaning a firm grip could make it jump out of your hands if not held in place at the right angles. The frame finish is also pretty rough, so simply picking this up is going to be a bit uncomfortable.</li><li><a href="https://smallarmsreview.com/the-nambu-type-94/" target="_blank">The sights are marginal at the very best, terrible at worst</a>. The rear sight is a super small V style notch and the front sight has a small upraised blade that doesn't work well for precision aiming.</li><li>The safety is pretty miserable. It's a small pivot lever that was easy to break and considering its other flaws with the possibility of accidental discharge (more on that later), this is a pretty bad flaw that lends credibility to the fact the Japanese themselves likely never used this weapon all that often. In most pictures of people holding it, like tank officers, they come equipped with a sword at their side, as was the custom at the time, and likely got more use out of that.</li><li>The magazine well was not overly reliable. Not only did it require considerable force to get the magazine to load in place, but the magazine safety was prone to unlatching if it caught a hard surface or even when pulled out of a holster at certain angles. Removing magazines could also be tricky, forcing the user to hold open the slide with one hand while forcing the magazine to eject with the other. Due to the fact the magazine catch sticks out, this makes it dangerous to use unless you check to make sure the magazine is secure before firing.</li><li>The ejector port is actually not too bad, being based on Luger-esque straight-up ejection, though given the differing placement of the ejector and extraction mechanism, expelled cases could hit the user.</li><li>Despite using a locking bolt mechanism, it's really a blowback-style pistol like the earlier Type 14, and while recoil is generally not too severe given the low caliber of the cartridge, the firing pin is a bit weak and prone to breakage.</li><li>Maintenance and cleaning are very, very difficult. Not only does it have a lot of small parts that hands would have trouble with, putting it back together is not easy, with many internals prone to damage if handled improperly; not all that hard to to do given the poor internals to begin with.</li><li>Quality control early on was mediocre at best, this gun got even worse and was made of incredibly shoddy materials late in the war due to Japan's lack of access to raw materials and worsening war situation. By the end of the war, some models were just useless on arrival.</li></ul><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Now, all the above make this far below most of the other pistol options available to the user of a sideearm during the second World War. However, the most controversial demerit is the infamous "gun goes off without the trigger being pulled" problem.</div><div><br /></div><div>This has critics on both sides unable to agree. <a href="https://www.thearmorylife.com/japanese-type-94-nambu/" target="_blank">The main problem is that if the safety is off or broken, very slight manipulation of the trigger bar will cause a premature ejection</a>. </div><div><br /></div><div>Now, there are varying opinions on this: </div><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><a href="https://www.thearmorylife.com/japanese-type-94-nambu/" target="_blank">As mentioned, it had trigger bar prone to premature ejection. While American GIs likely were responsible for spreading the rumor the gun was designed that way on purpose as a suicide attack last resort, laziness in gun design may have also played a factor.</a></li><li><a href="https://www.historynet.com/japans-suicide-gun/" target="_blank">The few accounts of this gun that are reliable establish it was of bad manufacture, poor at stopping a target</a>, and generally considered a piece of crap according to the <a href="https://archive.org/details/TME30-480" target="_blank">1944 Handbook on the Japanese Armed Forces</a>. </li><li>In my own attempts at cross-referencing, the accounts of the Type 94 being considered a suicide weapon are generally considered apocryphal. There are no confirmed reports it was either used as for killing oneself to avoid capture nor was its notoriously shoddy safety and sear bar purposely manipulated to allow a discharge without pulling the trigger as a last-ditch attack. Both are entirely plausible, but none of the accounts I read can agree if these events did happen with any certainty.</li></ul><div><br /></div></div><div>Overall, even if you discount the last item, this was a pretty underwhelming handgun with low stopping power, was hard to maintain and clean, had bad design flaws and poor materials even in the better early models, and overall was a poor weapon for military use. When compared to all the other handguns available to the other Axis Powers and the Allies, this gun, hands down, is my pick for worst sidearm of World War II.</div><p></p></div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-58674882751249948162023-10-18T14:49:00.008-07:002023-10-18T15:32:45.540-07:00Geth Reviews A Terrible Gun: The Chauchat<p> As many who read this blog or who know my tastes may be aware I adore reading about history. Wars are particularly interesting to read about, but honestly, they suck because wars kill people. And people die when they are killed.</p><p>And, now that I made a lame Fate/Stay Night meme reference, bear with me (and for the gun nuts among you, get the antacids) as we take a trip down the snark-laden road that was the history of the Chauchat, long considered to be one of the worst weapons to ever be given to soldiers to kill people with.</p><p>First off, the name, being French, is pronounced "show-sha". Also, that's merely the informal name. The actual official military designation is <i>Fusil Mitrailleur Modele 1915 CSRG</i> (French for "Machine Rifle Model 1915 CSRG"). The more informal name comes from its chief designer contributor, Colonel Louis Chauchat.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Chauchat_M1915.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="720" height="95" src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f4/Chauchat_M1915.png" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p>Before we continue, some argue this gun is unfairly maligned, and while it was a piece of garbage that had better use as a paperweight or should have been used to club to death the guys who scammed the troops into accepting them, some argue it was not all <span>THAT bad. These people, frankly, I must disagree with, because this was a weapon issued for service in a war where bodies stacked daily, and weapons that helped you kill the other sides faster were obviously essentially.</span></p><p><a href="https://www.defensemedianetwork.com/stories/the-five-worst-light-machine-guns-lmg/5/" target="_blank">One of the arguments given by those who tried to defend this weapon was its innovations, which would be standard on many later weapons.</a> To be fair, I agree, a WWI light machine gun with a pistol grip, was easy to mass produce, and had an easy-to-change-out magazine (on par with a rifle or even a pistol for ease of swapping out) sounds like a dream weapon. At the same time, so does buying a car with TV and DVD player tossed in for free along with everything else that has a bum engine. I ultimately would be all "you just ONE job" to the car, which I would have purchased more to go from place to place via automotive movement. By the same token, just because the Chauchat had some fun bells and whistles still does not obviate the fact the most basic reason it was made was done very poorly on a good day.</p><p>To give an idea of how even in the planning stages this weapon was headed for trouble, it's worth noting it had FOUR designers, Specifically, <a href="https://www.historicalfirearms.info/post/165453584244/the-chauchat-the-fusil-mitrailleur-modele" target="_blank">Colonel Louis Chauchat, Charles Sutter, Paul Ribeyrolles and the factory Societe des Cycles Clement et Gladiator</a>. With four different pairs of eyes on the development, these guys could backstop any flaws. Instead, they proved that old saw about too many cooks screwing up the soup.</p><p>Now, the design phase dates back to 1903, when the French sensibly realized a man-portable LMG was a great idea. In defense of this weapon, weighing barely above 20 pounds made it one of the lightest and most feasibly man-portable guns of its class. Of course, while guns like the Lewis Gun were far heavier, they also worked a lot better, so while it gave the guys holding a workout to the point they could do arm crunches with them for toning, they paid off by actually not being so useless one wanted to trade them out for some magic beans. Another problem that cropped up in the design phase that would dog this weapon in all incarnations of practice was reliance on the 8mm Lebel round. Even at the time that this was chalk on a blackboard the Lebel round was a long-in-the-tooth grandpa that was laughably underpowered and needed to be retired. Unfortunately, the French were unwilling to throw out what they got used to, so the Chauchat and a lot of their other weapons went into WWI already fitter for museums than maneuvers.</p><p>The construction phase was beyond inexcusable. Typically, when you mass produce anything, you want the average finished product to at least be (or have a good chance of being) reasonably sound out of the box. Unfortunately, the quality control for this was nonexistent, using second-hand Lebel rifle parts that were no longer fit for normal service, sheet steel that was of cheap alloys, and milled parts (milling refers to the process of cutting parts out to exact specifications and fitting them together) had no standards for baseline quality. As a result, the sights were useless, the parts had trouble fitting together, and good luck getting spare parts. Even if you somehow had them, it was a coin toss if they'd work since even those were cursed by the cheapest bidder-level effort.</p><p>In practice, many aspects of this gun were laughably bad in practice:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The magazines were these bizarre, half-moon-shaped pieces of garbage that could deform easily and not even fit their magazine well. Even if they did work, some brainless idiot literally left the inside of the magazine exposed to the elements, meaning the ammo would be dead on arrival in a war where dirt, rain, mud, and all sorts of other disgusting things were omnipresent.</li><li>The much-touted pistol grip was a squared-off block that was about as much fun to hold as a dog turd and felt just as pleasant to steady the weapon. The foregrip was placed just slightly ahead of the pistol grip and was a cockeyed knob-like attachment that did not feel normal in combination with the blocky pistol grip.</li><li>LMG weapons were meant for long-range use and thus had a bipod. Unfortunately, some idiot gave it a super tall bipod that gave enemy troops a lovely profile of the user so anyone wanting to pop a skull would not have found it hard to do so.</li><li>The firing mechanism of the receiver was a baffling one. It used a long-recoil model, meaning all the moving parts of the gun, after the discharge of a round, had to slide back as far as they would go before it could fire another round. This meant the firing rate was bad, the recoil was absurd, and given how poorly these weapons were constructed, this did not allow them to avoid excessive wear and tear.</li><li>Just above the butt stock (which would be just below the eye of a sniper or cradled high against a shoulder) was the recoil tube. Combine really stiff recoil with a recoil tube that could dislocate your arm or bust your jaw if your face grazed the recoiling tube above the butt stock. I'll wait while you quit wincing from the imagined agony.</li><li>The sights were not aligned well at all with the gun even under ideal conditions. Some genius thought a cheek weld was a practical idea for a gun with nasty recoil and a squared-off block of a receiver and thus the sights were offset to the left, meaning your aim required adjusting for this idea that was never fully developed.</li><li>On top of the magazines jamming due to practically any matter getting in them, the gun itself was miserable at dissipating excess heat, meaning a few clips of ammo later it was a useless jammed fireball that had to cool off and often bashed against a solid object to free up any jammed gun parts due to heat distortion.</li></ul><div><br /></div><div>Now, all of the above bullet points apply to the original 1915 model of this weapon, which was, on a very good day, marginal at best. When the US joined the fight, the French convinced them to take these weapons in 1918, albeit with some requested modifications for a higher caliber, the .30.06 round.</div><div><br /></div><div>The 1918 version had its own embarrassing design failures:</div><div><br /></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>When modifying the gun for higher caliber rounds, some idiots didn't bother to check the difference between Imperial measurements and the metric system. As a result, the barrels often were too small for feeding the rounds. Rounds that did feed could literally have chunks of the case tear off inside the barrel, making the gun an instant paperweight.</li><li>The Americans were often forced to downgrade to the original 8mm version because the mass majority of the larger caliber versions would become useless after firing no more than a single round. As mentioned above, the 8mm Lebel round version was already an exercise in fail, and it really says something that it was a legit improvement over the 1918 revision.</li><li>Repair and maintenance were already a nightmare for the 1915 model, it was impossible for the 1918 version, as they came with no spares or manuals, meaning once it broke, it was dead.</li></ul><div><br /></div><div>Now, this gun, despite being one of the biggest mass-produced flops in the history of firearms, COULD be made into something valuable. The Belgians heavily modified it and replaced many of the worst features, upping it from laughably bad to decently useful. Most everyone else did not have that luxury, so the French and later the Americans were cursed with a gun has, in my own humble opinion, earned being spit on the judgment of history.</div><div><br /></div><div>In short, this was a dumpster fire in the history of firearms. Despite those who think it had a lot of great concepts and want to defend it on those grounds, I look at it from the "how practical was it for guys dealing with life and death situations" standpoint. From that standpoint, it was terrible.</div></div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-21100256224618199252023-10-12T12:09:00.003-07:002023-10-12T12:09:42.002-07:00On The Values of Talent and Effort<p> This post is going to be a combination of three things. Commentary about a game I played, some history of professional wrestling, and what the Bible says about proper effort. As strange a combination as it sounds, the first two will be relevant to the third.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>To start things off, when it comes to game series, I'v always been a longtime fan of the Dragon Quest series. It's a turn-based series that has always pleased me due to the fact it's remained charmingly old school even as technology and other games have done new and exciting things. The last game in the mainline series I enjoyed was the PC version of DQXI S, which was a port based on the added content from the Switch port. That game was super long and rewarding, and I rather warmly appreciated how the developers bent every effort to use their talent to make something amazing.</p><p><br /></p><p>More recently, I was intensely and bitterly disappointed when I played Infinity Strash Dragon Quest: The Adventures of Dai.</p><p><br /></p><p>Infinity Strash was a video game adaptation of a spinoff anime based on the Dragon Quest video game franchise that has always commanded fan respect, and I hoped it would be done justice in video game format. To my horror, despite the billing as an action RPG, it was an execrable waste of time that was a massive wall of badly summarized scenes from the anime interspersed at rare intervals with gameplay right out of an amateur first Unity or Unreal engine asset flip project. The developers demand over 60 USD for what amounted to a lazy visual novel in disguise with some terrible mobile game style arena battling tacked on. Neither the story or gameplay showed a genuine display of talent and effort, and I was quite grateful (since I got it through Steam) that they were gracious enough to refund my purchase.</p><p><br /></p><p>Before I continue, my disappointment was at the absolute inattention and contempt towards the use of the talent of the developers to show they wanted to invest their time and money into rewarding me for spending my own. What I got was worthy of contempt instead.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, let me shift gears and detail an instance in being entertained I got far more than my money's worth, even when the parties involved need not have tried too hard to gain my interest.</p><p><br /></p><p>I used to follow professional wrestling in the late 90s and early 2000s. It's not something I particularly care for these days, but there was a time I was an avid fan because the stuff the wrestlers did to entertain was just THAT good. When it comes to the 1998 World Wrestling Federation (now World Wrestling Entertainment after legal troubles with the World Wildlife Fund over the initials), I remember some of the most exciting wrestling ever, the crown jewel being the both famous and infamous "Hell in a Cell" (a type of wrestling match in which the parties wrestle on and in the steel chain-link cage over the ring, the winner being the one to pin the other and leave via the door on the inside of the ring usually) match with Mankind (IRL named Mick Foley) and the Undertaker (IRL named Mark William Calaway). Foley admitted in his first autobiography "Have a Nice Day: A Tale of Blood and Sweatsocks" that he was afraid the 1998 match was going to be horrible.</p><p><br /></p><p>In 1997's version of "Hell in a Cell", starred two men in their prime. Undertaker and the wrestler Shawn Micheals. That match was considered excellent because Michaels did everything he could sell the Undertaker (a 6-foot-tall wrestling veteran) as an unstoppable force of nature and the Undertaker was able to make the more agile Michaels look great in turn. Foley was afraid in 1998 he and Undertaker could not recreate that magic, mostly because the Undertaker had a broken ankle and Foley was nowhere near as athletic as Micheals was, not to mention over 250 pounds, at least 100 pounds heavier.</p><p><br /></p><p>So, in an effort to make sure the match would be considered good, Foley and Taker decided to take some risks, albeit with reluctance as it was later explained.</p><p><br /></p><p>When the match began, Foley's character made it into the arena, he climbed up the cage to meet him, tossing a steel chair atop the cage as well for use as a weapon, since the match had no rules against weaponized objects. Undertaker's character came out next and also climbed the cage to begin the match. Soon after he reached the top, the match started with a series of punches, deliberately moving Foley to the edge.</p><p><br /></p><p>The first immortal moment of the night came when Undertaker grabbed Foley and tossed him off the cage. sending a 250 lbs plus man over 22 feet from the top of the cage through the Spanish announcer's table, which broke on impact, leaving Foley taking a fall on solid concrete. This resulted in time stopping for everyone as Foley lay motionless to the point everyone legitimately assumed he died and nigh everyone broke character, terrified for his well-being. He managed to awaken while being moved out on a stretcher and miraculously made his way up the cage again, where Undertaker still was. The second nightmare of the night happened when a chokeslam by Taker after a brief scuffle on the second time on the top of the cage caused the steel cage to rupture (an event that was not planned, the first toss off the cage was), causing Foley to crash on his back into the ring. Worse, the steel chair he had tossed up earlier followed, smashing Foley in the face, which caused one of his teeth to dislodge.</p><p><br /></p><p>Amazingly, he managed to recover again, and after a brief incident in which an attempt to drop Undertaker onto thumbtacks backfired, Foley was pinned and the match ended.</p><p><br /></p><p>It's worth noting the risks taken to ensure people who paid to watch were entertained were considered far in excess. Vince McMahon, then owner (now retired) was grateful for the sheer amount of effort exerted but begged Foley to never go that far again. Everyone involved was worried the high bar of drama and violence in that match would inspire copycats and measures were implemented to prevent it. Regardless, at the time, it became an iconic moment of two men working against limitations to deliver quality entertainment, at the risk of their health and lives. In short, while later agreed it should not have gone that far, that was when all the parties involved took risks and exerted all sorts of effort to make sure their talents would be rewarded with something special.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Now that I've said the first two parts, let me get to the part the Bible comes into play. The credo of God to all Christians is that they should be proud of their work and use their talents to the utmost of their ability. Jesus explained this in the Parable of the Talents, and before I get to that, a bit of explanation on the origin of the word.</p><p><br /></p><p>A talent was then a dry measure of weight, about 800 pounds, and typically precious metal was issued in talents, such as gold, as in the parable. So talents were valuable as a result. It equaled about 20 years of wages for a common worker, so not a small monetary sum either. It's because of the parable they became a loanword for abilities and skills.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here is the parable in question:</p><p><br /></p><br /><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25:14-30&version=ESV">The Parable of the Talents</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25:14-30&version=ESV">14 “For it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants[a] and entrusted to them his property. 15 To one he gave five talents,[b] to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability. Then he went away. 16 He who had received the five talents went at once and traded with them, and he made five talents more. 17 So also he who had the two talents made two talents more. 18 But he who had received the one talent went and dug in the ground and hid his master's money. 19 Now after a long time the master of those servants came and settled accounts with them. 20 And he who had received the five talents came forward, bringing five talents more, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me five talents; here, I have made five talents more.’ 21 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.[c] You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 22 And he also who had the two talents came forward, saying, ‘Master, you delivered to me two talents; here, I have made two talents more.’ 23 His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ 24 He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, 25 so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’ 26 But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed? 27 Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest. 28 So take the talent from him and give it to him who has the ten talents. 29 For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. 30 And cast the worthless servant into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’</a><br /><br /><br /><br />As this parable clearly demonstrates, if you have talents (of the classical or modern kind), you really need to put them to work. If you have a lot, then shoot for even more. If you only have some, still try your best. The worst you can do is not even try to do anything thus producing a miserable result.<div><br /></div><div>In the game example I brought up, the developers did not even bother to try. The result was something worthy of contempt, a slap to the face of those who expected better, and worthless in both the short and long-term as anything of value.</div><div><br /></div><div>In the wrestling example I brought up, sure, they went far beyond what they had to make it entertaining, but many (and I agree) would agree it was too far. But it still shows moral integrity to one's craft that they still, despite limitations, tried to make some quality entertainment despite not having as much at their disposal, and you still have to applaud the effort as laudable.</div><div><br /></div><div>My point is basically, when it comes to one's talents, I and the Bible encourage people to do their best. Not only will you have done something you can be proud of, but other people can be proud of your efforts. Even if you are not Christian, the long-term benefit should still be obvious: you will have left a good example for others to follow so that others will likewise leave effort clearly marked by use of their talents, and in doing so leave a net positive on the world.</div><div><br /></div><div>For those who are Christian, well, you please not only yourself for having basic integrity, you please God, who wants to see you do the best with what He's given you.</div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-67223119194636603332023-10-04T15:02:00.003-07:002023-10-05T07:19:09.163-07:00Grana Padono Oro, Smoked Cheddar Brick, and Aged English Cheddar Taste Testing Review<p> For this month, Mom and I bring back another exciting episode of Dragon Ball- wait, wrong subject.</p><p>Seriously, this month, we tasted some more cheese, ordered from Murray's in New York. Like always, it shipped well packed with adequate ice and it was undamaged and in good quality.</p><p><br /></p><p>Here's how our taste testing went.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>Grana Padono Oro 20 Months</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>In my earlier post about Pecorino Romano, I mentioned that cheese is very gritty and grainy. Well, Grana Padono Oro, while a relative of that cheese, it goes through a different cooking process than Romano, resulting in a much less dry texture and it's more flaky than grainy. This is ironic, because "Grana" means "Grain".</p><p>Grana Padono Oro is an Italian cheese that has enjoyed Denominazione d’Origine Protetta (Protected Designation of Origin) status since 1996. It's produced using raw cow milk from two separate milkings. This milk is then partially skimmed, the curd is given two cooking periods, then it's bathed in a salt brine before pressing. It also includes egg whites, which help with its flakier texturing and buttery consistency.</p><p>The result is a taste similar to Parmigiano Reggiano, but it has a different texture with a flaky, buttery consistency. This makes it more pleasant and less gritty going down than Romano and Parmigiano and thus can be flaked or shredded finely over dishes for a gentler taste from those two cheeses. It also tastes fine eaten on its own as a snacking cheese.</p><p>A final interesting note is that Grana Padono, like many Italian cheeses that can be grated, is a lowlands cheese that combines techniques used in making alpine cheeses, which gave birth to the trademark taste one expects from many traditional Italian cheeses suited for grating and drying for long-term preservation.</p><p>The taste test we did basically confirms the above, and while I enjoyed snacking on Pecorino Romano on its own, I found the Grana Padono Oro takes less time to get used to the texture on one's palate.</p><p><br /></p><b>Aged English Cheddar</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Aged English Cheddar is a cheese that comes from Dorset, England, and its origins go back to the Middle Ages. It's something of a medley of contrasting notes mixed with the traditional cheddaring of the curd, resulting in a fine cheddar worthy of its laurels.</div><div><br /></div><div>Unlike the more sharp texture and taste of clothbound cheddars, this cheddar is gentler and sweet tasting, though still has a tangy aftertaste.</div><div><br /></div><div>Mom and I tried some slices of it. I was struck by its rich consistency yet sweet, caramel-like flavor, and Mom noted how the tangy aftertaste makes savoring the flavor on the way down a treat. We would both recommend it for a snack cheese or used in any cheese dish you might prefer.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Smoked Cheddar Brick</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Now, this is an American cheese from Wisconsin. Brick is a cheese with a basis in white cheddar, but it uses a different cooking time to achieve a different density of milk fat and texture. It also incorporates some concepts from the making of Mozzarella, leading to a cheese that is something of a hybrid of cheddar and mozzarella in texture.</div><div><br /></div><div>Our taste testing barely proceeded before the piquant and pleasant aroma of well smoked (with hickory wood chips) cheese hit our nostrils. Upon tasting the cheese, it melted delightfully and creamily on the tongue yet had a firm smoky cheddar flavor. It was quite pleasant to chew and would make an excellent melting cheese for dishes of that nature.</div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-43608354905278775592023-09-24T16:42:00.002-07:002023-10-01T21:52:22.733-07:00Dieting like the Israelites<p> Writing this little post in case you want to diet like it's Bronze Age era Israel. This isn't going to be a super strict recommendation post for Christians, they were explicitly freed from dietary restrictions courtesy of God as revealed to Peter in the Book of Acts. Regardless, a lot of their diet is a good idea and I'll provide an overview of the basics should you wish to diet like they were supposed to.</p><p><br /></p><p>First time God provides specific diet instructions is in Exodus Chapter 12, when discussing the Passover meal. I'll start here because a lot of this is repeated in later parts and it's best to get that out of the way first.</p><p><br /></p><p>First off, there Passover was meant to be eaten quickly, given it was the night before they could leave Egypt, and thus the meal was a quick and simple one. Unleavened bread (made without yeast), roasted lamb or goat, and some bitter herbs.</p><p>Unleavened bread was required for most sacrifices requiring prepared grain, and God demanded most sacrifices roasted on an open fire. For dietary reasons, yeast is good to avoid if you have an allergy to it (it is a form of fungus used to make bread dough rise, and also a brewing ingredient for alcoholic beverages). While most consumable forms of yeast are quite safe, there are types that cause infection, and spoiled food can develop the dangerous forms of yeast, so avoiding bread with yeast would be a prudent decision if you want to ensure your health, albeit it will be harder to softly chew since it's basically flat bread.</p><p>Roasted meat, as opposed eating it raw (doable but dangerous for health) or boiled takes much less time and generally does a pretty thorough job of cooking it. God said the Passover was to be in haste, so it was ideal for that purpose.</p><p>That said, unless you want to be ultra-traditional, roasting over an open fire is not strictly required, nor grilling. You can get mostly the same effect via baking more or less, just it will take longer. Note, strict observance of the Passover or Eucharist as Christians call it should be done via roasting to keep it like it was done originally.</p><p>Note in all cases God had a strict prohibition against eating animal blood. Basically, no rare meat, well done or bust. Me, I'm diagnosed autistic and I get really ill eating anything less, apparently because my palate cannot stand the taste of anything other than dry meat. If you are going to do this, no law against livening up the meat with some sauce or something to hydrate it, but it better be cooked well done by default.</p><p><br /></p><p>We will fast forward to Leviticus Chapters 11 and 17 next.</p><p><br /></p><p>Chapter 11 says all animals that were possessed of completely split hooves and chewed the cud (consume grass or grain) were suitable for consumption and offerings. Otherwise, no.</p><p>The pig, for example, will eat ANYTHING, it's not strictly herbivorous, so it was off the table. Pigs were also a common animal preferred by pagans, so the prohibition against eating pork prevented social gatherings between the two. Pigs are also highly prone to carrying parasites and very easily spoils unless cooked well, so it's just safe to avoid pigs on dietary concerns alone. If you really want bacon, you can always get it from other animals like turkey. Bacon refers simply to a cut of meat from a certain portion of the pig, healthy alternatives also made from real meat can be derived from turkey and lamb (i.e. -mutton). They also tend to be leaner and less salty.</p><p>Unclean aquatic life includes anything that does not have fins and scales. So yeah, no shellfish. If you are oyster, crab, lobster, squid, or anything of that nature fan, well, sorry.</p><p>As for unclean birds, here is the text on that from the NetFree Bible translation</p><p><br /></p><p><b> [13] "'These you are to detest from among the birds - they must not be eaten, because they are detestable: the griffon vulture, the bearded vulture, the black vulture, [14] the kite, the buzzard of any kind, [15] every kind of crow, [16] the eagle owl, the short-eared owl, the long-eared owl, the hawk of any kind, [17] the little owl, the cormorant, the screech owl, [18] the white owl, the scops owl, the osprey, [19] the stork, the heron of any kind, the hoopoe, and the bat. </b></p><p><b>(Leviticus 11:13-19 [NETfree])</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Given modern day IRL most of these are not considered fit for consumption, not hard to follow this.</p><p>Unclean insects, for those of you who are cool with eating those, well, if it doesn't have jointed legs for hopping around, such as grasshoppers, locusts, or katydids, then it's a no go. I'm not a fan of eating insects, mind you, but </p><p><br /></p><p>Chapter 17 is where God reiterates his prohibition against eating blood. This is established because God wanted to remind people even if you killed an animal you could eat, you did kill a living being, albeit for sanctioned purposes, so you had to drain it of it's blood before cooking it because you were not to eat it, and the meat had to be cooked well to remove the rest. To be fair, this does minimize the risk of blood borne pathogens in meat, so it's just a sane idea if that concerns for dietary purposes.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, just to cover some other foods not specifically mentioned.</p><p><br /></p><p>Milk is fine, but according to the laws on animals, the Jewish do not mix dairy or meat in any way at the same meal, so no cheeseburgers if you want to obey this strictly. The Bible specifically mentions you can't cook a goat in it's mother's milk, so no meat with a cream sauce. Cheese is also acceptable under the same rules.</p><p>All vegetables, fruits, and grains are acceptable, no particular rules on those not already mentioned.</p><p><br /></p><p>Alcohol, specifically wine, it's fit to drink, but with the caveat you watch your intake and drink in moderation. If you are getting to the point you can't drive or are acting stupidly, you need to stop. Not only is that perfectly good common sense advice to avoid injury or embarrassment due to intoxication, the long-term health of your liver will thank you.</p><p><br /></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-85746311021244486972023-09-09T18:24:00.001-07:002023-09-09T18:24:15.159-07:00On the joys of Halloumi<p> I ordered some Halloumi with the Pecorino Romano I ordered not too long ago, didn't cook it at the time I wrote the other review. Now that I've done that, time for the actual review.</p><p>First some history on this cheese.</p><p>Halloumi is a sheep's milk cheese of Middle Eastern origin, specifically from Cyprus. It's typically stored in a salt brine, flavored with some mint, and typically served in slices or cubes, either fried or grilled.</p><p>It's a cheese with a super low melting point, which is why you can put it on a skewer on the grill or pop slices into a pan to fry (no oil required) and cook it till it's browned, then eat. The stuff I bought was made with a non-animal based rennet, which is no problem for the flavor.</p><p>Another fun thing is that while it can be eaten raw, it's best when cooked, mostly because you cook out the excess salt brine and the texture is far more agreeable. Still tastes good either way, though be advised it will "squeak" as you chew it due to the texture. This is harmless and just adds a weird note on the way down is all.</p><p><br /></p><p>As for the actual taste test, Mom and I pan-fried a 0.5 lb block of this in a small pan and cut it into quarters (first chopped in half then the halves were chopped in half). After a couple minutes in a small non-stick pan where the excess brine cooked off and the sides got browned, we gave this stuff a taste.</p><p><br /></p><p>First off, for a cheese, the taste is very meatlike in texture, to the point if you are vegetarian and want a good meat substitute (and aren't vegan), this can make a good meat stand-in and provide high amounts of calcium and potassium.</p><p>It will still taste pretty salty, so I recommend eating it with other foods to blunt the salt taste a bit, fresh vegetables, lean meat, and noodles are all good in combination. Once you get past the salt, it's remarkably similar to mozzarella, with a gentle taste you can savor on the way down, this is a very approachable cheese that is quite soft to chew.</p><p>It's also going to be stored in a small sealed package to keep it fresh, and I recommend eating it all in one sitting once you remove the packaging and cook it, this does not store well under refrigeration, it's sill edible but will quickly taste rubbery when chilled. </p><p>If you need a cheese to liven up a grilled meat fest, want something to balance out part of balanced dinner with a dairy item, or just want a quick snack, Halloumi is highly recommended for all the above. Do be advised like all cheese, if you have cholesterol problems, remember to eat this in moderation.</p><p>Otherwise, enjoy. I know I sure did.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-70802221267609793652023-09-06T15:32:00.006-07:002023-09-06T18:22:39.087-07:00Pecorino Romano, my impressions<p> Recently ordered some 12-month-old Pecorino Romano from Murray's, and before I get on to the taste testing, I want to cover some interesting history. For the Christians and Jews in the audience, this will cover topics relevant to religious history as well.</p><p><br /></p><p>First off, Pecorino (from Pecor, the word for sheep) Romano is a very time-honored Roman and now Italian cheese. It goes back over two thousand years in tradition and was written about by various Roman authors, such as Marcus Tertulius Varro and Hippocrates. Virgil also mentioned this cheese, specifically noting it was part of the rations given to the average Roman legionaire, at a rate of 1 Roman ounce (27-28 grams) per man.</p><p>It was touted for it's keeping qualities, it's nutrients were considered ideal for health, and was favored both dry and fresh. Any Pecorino Romano over eight months old is considered suitable as a grating cheese and over five months as a fresh cheese.</p><p><br /></p><p>On the religious front, this cheese would have been one part of the Roman diet that you could have gotten Jews and Christians raised Jewish to agree on. Sheep are kosher animals, and the methods used would not have been prohibited under kosher tradition. When it came to Roman love of pork, they would not have seen eye to eye, but the cheese would have been in profusion around the time of Christ and widely enjoyed by all Romans and their subjects.</p><p><br /></p><p>Ironically, it is now mostly made in the Sardinia region of Italy as opposed to Rome proper (due in part to their high amount of sheep and due to earlier prohibitive food making regulations in Rome), though they still make it according to traditional Roman methods.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>The Taste Test</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Like before, I got my fellow cheese-loving mother to help with the taste test. First, though, I ordered a pound of cheese, which was shipped in two 0.5 lbs wedges. It had a slight yet not unpleasant odor, just enough to be detectable, and was undamaged from transport. It had been kept cool with icepacks and other packing material.</p><p>Both mom and I tried a wedge of it. I could definitely pick up that grain-like texture you usually associate with parmesan, and given Pecorino Romano is typically an alternative to it, this did not surprise me. It's a bit gritty going down but not to an uncomfortable degree. It's definitely a cheese even in its fresh, non-grated form that goes good with salads and pasta. Like the Manchego I ordered a while back, it also had the distinctive texture I usually associate with the sheep's milk cheese (which is less dense and slightly flaky as opposed to cow milk cheese) and was mildly sharp in intensity.</p><p>Mom noticed it also had a slight peppery taste, and I found that to be just enough to add a bit of zest to the umami, it was by no means too strong.</p><p>We decided to save the rest for our next pasta night.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-51468078452009165382023-09-05T15:18:00.004-07:002023-09-05T15:18:43.425-07:00Advice to pass down to children for my generation<p> I'm writing this because I just reflected recently on why I plan to die single. I have neither the means, ability, or emotional and mental maturity for having kids. I came to this conclusion long ago and have reconciled myself to never having a child of my own, whether via siring one myself or adoption.</p><p>That said if anyone out there is a parent. I'd like to pass on advice to give your kids if you are interested.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. Teach them how to survive without high technology</b></p><p><br /></p><p>As much as I love computers and the convenience of technology, there are far too many people who probably starve to death without modern tech. As much as preppers and people who shun tech for low tech from days gone by get stereotyped as Luddites, let's face it, if the power ever goes out, a computer is just a paperweight and a cell phone is meaningless. At the end of the day, people need to remember how to survive without them. Our ancestors had to do it, no reason why we shouldn't, and I advise you to teach your kids some basic survival skills if only so they don't wallow in despair during a power outage or natural disaster.</p><p><b><br /></b></p><p><b>2. Have them get an honest job</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>College is not a be-all and end-all these days. Someone will always need a plumber, not everyone needs a master's in sociology. In fact, the plumber often has a higher chance of not going without unemployment these days. College is fine if you get a useful degree and secure a good job, but anyone who learns an actual trade as well is always going to have a near bulletproof fallback.</p><p>It also builds character. The most basic hard labor is going to teach any child that life is not and will never be easy when they have no one to rely on but themselves. Life only seems easy in our society because there is so much outsourced to technology and other people. Strip that away, and having to survive on your own hard work will give you a firm base for times of hardship, and thus your children would be well advised to learn honest labor that reminds them of this truth.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>3. The Internet is not for everyone, especially social media</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>As much as the Internet has become a cornerstone of human interaction in my era, it's also given far more idiots, lunatics, and degenerates a microphone than ever before. Social media is just a distilled version of this concept in one of it's most direct forms. Parents, if you love your kids, please teach them to be careful in the following ways.</p><p>A. Email should always be approached with caution. Teach kids not to open everything without hovering over where the links go. If it seems suspicious, don't touch it. Spammers, phishers, and other scum will do anything to fleece people these days, teach your kids to double-check everything, even legit seeming emails that seem the slightest bit off.</p><p>B. Social media has its virtues but also the worst parts of a hugbox and insane asylum where the inmates are running the show. As much as you can build constructive friendships and associations there, it's also where some of the vilest cliques will form, and your kids need to be careful who and what they associate with. Parents, I especially urge you to keep tabs on what your kids interact with in these places, at least till they reach the age of adulthood legally. Your kids may resent it, but if you want your child to not fall into a bad crowd, get molested, be exposed to child porn, or otherwise fall into the rabbit hole of some other illegal or at least incredibly unsavory act, you need to monitor it like a hawk and impress on them the dangers that await.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>4. Grow a thick skin</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>As I learned through my own experience, humanity can be very cruel. While it is within our species to do some of the laudable and honorable acts we are capable of, far often we are more prone to some of the base, depraved, and debauched acts. It's far more often your child will be pounced on by wolves than they will run into fellow sheep, and if they don't watch for those in this world who seek to tear them down as people, they will be overcome.</p><p>With that in mind, teach your kids how accept the cruelty of this world as reality as soon as they are old enough to comprehend the lessons. If you help them accept not every lesson the trials of the world present will not be easy, the harder and harsher ones they can deal with more maturely.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>5. Teach them values</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Disclaimer, I'm a Christian, but even for the most hardened atheist, agnostic, or even the parent who desires to impress no particular religious or moral creed, this advice applies to you too.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some values should be taught your kids no matter what morals you personally subscribe to.</p><p>A. Have basic dignity. Don't do things you find immoral, degrading, or uncomfortable simply because of peer pressure.</p><p>B. Have standards. Don't be a mindless bigot, but don't be overly permissive of everything. Tolerance is a good idea, but it should only go so far. Sharing dirty needles is something no sane person should tolerate even if they aren't against recreational drug use, have some basic standards for your own health too. If you are religious or not, share your values on a voluntary basis, never try to force your values on others, whatever they may be.</p><p>C. Treat others equally. There a lot of people who demand special treatment. While some deserve respect above others for their responsibility and position in life, and such people, within reason, are entitled to basic minimum of courtesy, don't be a doormat. Respect is a two-way street. Much as military salutes are a courtesy a subordinate gives and superior returns, so should respect given when it is expected to be received in kind by the other party.</p><p>D. Be smart. Don't accept anything without an inquisitive mind and conscience. Lots of people will lie in this world, or at the very least tell a slanted version of the truth. Not everything written down is accurate, and not everyone can be trusted out of hand. Do your own digging. Make sure you shake the trees of the claims of others and see if any inconsistency falls out.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-35291123800074344582023-08-04T15:25:00.005-07:002023-08-04T15:32:43.993-07:00My latest sampling of specialty cheeses from Murray's, a review<p> I recently purchased some cheese from Murray's, a specialty place in New York. I reviewed some of their yellow cheddar awhile back, and I decided to splurge and ordered three more cheeses from them, this will be a breakdown of how the taste testing of the three went.</p><p><br /></p><b>NEW YORK STATE WHITE CHEDDAR 6 MONTHS</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>I bought this cheese per request of my mother, who volunteered to be my fellow cheese tester, as it's a beloved taste from her childhood.</div><div><br /></div><div>We both tried a sample of it neat (we did this for all three to get the most unbiased opinion), and I found it very tangy and creamy, but not so tangy it didn't have a nice counter note of sweetness to knock the edge off. My mother found it especially smooth in texture and we both enjoyed savoring the flavor on the way down.</div><div><br /></div><div>Since I bought extra for her to use for cooking, she definitely intends to make some macaroni and cheese with it (fun fact, Thomas Jefferson came up with mac and cheese), and I for one will be a willing eater at that table for sure.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><b>MAPLE LEAF SMOKED GOUDA</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><br /></div><div>Now, I must admit I prefer harder and more acidic cheese over "sweet milk" cheeses, but I'm not going to knock this, it was good.</div><div><br /></div><div>For those not aware, "sweet-milk" cheeses are not allowed to become nearly as enriched with lactic acid as cheeses like cheddar as they age. While giving them a milder taste and a creamy texture, this is not necessarily good for those with lactose intolerance (which my mother has, she had to take her lactose meds before taste testing to be sure), as it retains a higher degree of lactase, or un broken-down milk sugars.</div><div><br /></div><div>That all said, it's a very agreeable, very creamy cheese that will just melt on the tongue. The maple smoking (via cold-smoking to avoid cheese deformation) adds a nice hint of a bite to what is otherwise a mild cheese, and this is definitely a good cheese for a melted cheese dish for sure due to these qualities.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><b>MURRAY'S YOUNG MANCHEGO</b><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>I have saved the best for last. Unlike the other two cheeses, which are cow milk cheeses, Manchego is a cheese made of sheep's milk.</div><div><br /></div><div>A bit of background on sheep and goat milk. Unlike cow milk, they typically lack an enzyme called "cryoglobulin", which causes the milk fat layer to clump and congeal quickly. It's for this reason it's very hard to make sizable amounts of butter from these milks. However, this doesn't inhibit their ability to be refined into cheese very much.</div><div><br /></div><div>Queso Manchego is a cheese of very wide renown in her native Spain. As a Spanish friend confirmed to me, it is a cheese with a very high reputation, even mentioned in famous works such as Miguel de Cervantes' <i>Don Quijote.</i> It's been a fixture of Spanish agriculture since its Bronze Age origin, being made of the milk of Manchega ewes.</div><div><br /></div><div>The taste is distinct. It has a noticeable yet pleasant nuts and grain-like taste, though this is offset by a mix of creaminess and saltiness that will give the tastebuds a wonderful explosion of flavor that is worth savoring.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's worth noting this cheese has the Spanish Denominación de Origen (Designation of Origin), awarded in 1984, meaning this was actual Spanish cheese as approved and affirmed by their agricultural authorities. Only cheese made using milk from the Manchega ewes of the La Mancha region has any right to be called Manchego, and I was pleased and honored to sample some of the finest delicacies of Spain's sons and daughters, it was a very worthy purchase.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Notes</b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div><b><br /></b></div><div>Like the last time I ordered cheese from Murray's, it was shipped well-packed with ice packs and packing material that kept the cheese both cool and snug while being shipped. I found the cheese to be fresh, undamaged, and as noted above, I noted no off-flavors or any other disagreeable notes about any of the items purchased. I would certainly buy more cheese from them, albeit after my pocket book recovers from how much this set me back, quality does have a price, but given how well it tasted, worth said price.</div>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-56287653904489792302023-06-07T20:22:00.004-07:002023-06-08T00:40:12.201-07:00A few warnings to conservatives and the transgender lobby<p> Since both conservatives and the LGBT lobby (really just the T the first three letters are an afterthought, more on that below) have some really idiot assumptions about each other, I want to thump noses on both sides and clear the air since I've had feet in both camps to hear their side of the story and have both things I concur on and disagree with myself.</p><p>Regardless, I have striven to keep my personal takes to myself and this post will simply be about objective facts. I warn both sides, I will certainly offend you, and if the mere thought of having your world view challenged, criticized, or denounced bothers you, then leave now, you will reject what I have to say out of hand, call me a bigot or a shill for deviance, and your mind is made up.</p><p>If you are still here, let me clear the air on a few things.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. Conservatives: You have the right idea what to oppose, but some of your strategies are totally backward.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Conservatives, I really need to level with you, some of your backlash to the transgender lobby is very stupid. I do believe their movement does ask a lot of unreasonable things of society, agree children should not be exposed to their ideology or sexually explicit topics in general until they reach the age of majority, and I do believe, on biological grounds, your argument makes a lot of sense.</p><p><br /></p><p>Regardless, some dos and don't for going forward.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>A. BOYCOTTS WORK. </b></p><p><br /></p><p>Back when the American colonies were mad at the British over imposing taxes on imported goods, they decided to make the British suffer by refusing to import and thus killing not only their tax revenue but the profit from trade.</p><p>It worked beautifully and they were forced to capitulate badly as their merchants and wholesalers (today's corporations) went broke because people told them no to buying their crap because they did not want to subsidize their deviance (taxes then).</p><p>What happened to Bud Light should be the model. Do that to every corporation you hate for supporting a movement you oppose. It's a completely legal and quite effective way to force them to make a bitter choice: profits or promoting ideology.</p><p>As crude and insensitive as this statement is, someone once said, and I concur "You can stay retarded longer than they can stay solvent"</p><p>The best part about boycotts is they are completely legal. No one can force you to buy something, and frankly, the power of the purse is going to be one of the best ways to force corporations who back the alphabet agenda to decide if they want to be rich with the majority or poor for the minority. This will also have a knock-on effect politically, as it will show politicians' majority support your position.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>B. BANNING BOOKS IS STUPID</b></p><p><br /></p><p>I don't have a problem with keeping kids from seeing drag shows. That's sensible, as drag, despite all the apologists who want to excuse it, is inherently a sexual act. It's a farce of sexuality done for comedy in a sexual way, only a liar would dare claim otherwise.</p><p>Where you've gone full moron is trying to ban books from libraries. This is just stupid and treading into being unconstitutional.</p><p>Freedom of thought is one of the most vital things you can give a child, it helps them become adults who can make their own decisions by carefully weighing evidence with all viewpoints considered. Trying to shield them from things you consider undesirable is not only denying them freedom of intellectual endeavor, you are fighting a losing battle. We live in a world where information is everywhere, and you are fighting a tidal wave with a post office blotter.</p><p>Yes, you should have every say in making sure schools are not trying to indoctrinate your children, I concur, you should have parental rights to tell schools they are not to turn your children against you, you are parents for a reason. That said, the mere presence of an objectionable book in a library, school, or public, is not a reason alone to try to ban it. I went to school in the Deep South and my school library had all sorts of books, from Stephen King to biographies, to instructional manuals on botany to the Qu'ran. And that's good. By all means, instruct your kids what you prefer them to learn in a moral sense, but don't be stupid enough to pretend you can make sure they never see the material you object to. They will find a way to get it, and if you make it a forbidden fruit, you just give the other side a wedge to tempt them further and politically accuse you of violating freedom of expression.</p><p>So stop that, leave the libraries alone, so long as the choice of what to read is not forced on your child. Step in then, not before.</p><p><br /></p><p>Caveat: I do, however, believe while a high school or college library wouldn't be inappropriate for learning about they gay lifestyle, STDs, or other mature sexual topics, it has no place in something like any elementary school, where children are not even at the stage of their lives where puberty is a concern. In that sense, restricting books is sensible protection for children. On a related note, school reading lists should have the general consensus of educators and parents. Having a fifth grader be assigned to read the works of Charles Dickens is unarguably good, as that is the work of a writer whose prose is a good example of quality and insight into the period his writing was written for and thus quite educational. A book about having a child question if they are a boy or girl before they have even started dating or even seriously considered sexual topics of any sort is unwise and indoctrination into beliefs that they are not physically and mentally capable of understanding, either in the short or long-term at that point.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>C. QUIT INFIGHTING</b></p><p><br /></p><p>If there is one thing conservatives have a problem with, it's not being able to stand united despite making a lot of noise about it. Quit caring so much about WHO you rally behind to get things done, just so long as you all agree on WHAT needs to be done. Swallow your pride and bile and quit fighting each other lest you waste your chances to turn back the excesses of society that offended you because you pissed away so much time infighting.</p><p>You have elections coming up in 2024. Settle who will be your candidate and drum up a united front or you will lose again.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Now, to cover the other side.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>2. Transgender lobby, let me break some bad news to you.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>YOU ARE NOT OPPRESSED.</p><p><br /></p><p>I know you'll scream I'm wrong, people want to genocide you, that you are persecuted, and that I hate you. None of the above is true, and if you haven't already stopped reading, here's why you are wrong.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>A. No one wants to "Genocide" you</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Let's be clear, I have extensively researched actual genocides, and nothing your lobby complains about is remotely close. To this point, no one is trying to shove you into ovens, no one is forcing you into death marches and starving you to death, and no one is murdering you all in mass droves with the sanction and approval of the government.</p><p>So no offense, but shut up until those are actually happening. Do not dare try to put yourself in the same category as Cambodians under the Khmer Rouge, Armenians under the Turks, or Jews under Hitler. It's not true and you know it.</p><p><br /></p><p>As for actual conservatives, I know them, and you know how they really feel about you all?</p><p><br /></p><p>Some contempt, sure, for your choices, which they believe immoral, unrealistic, and deviant. Some pity, because they believe you're deluded fools slicing yourselves under surgeons and taking horse urine-derived pharmaceuticals in a vain attempt to be something you biologically can never become because humanity has no natural gender-changing functions. And yes, even some hate you because you are trying to corrupt their children and expose them to topics they believe are unfit and trying to subvert and pervert the organs of society and the state to aid you.</p><p><br /></p><p>But no, they do not want to kill you, at least, not to the extent you expressed wanting to kill them for saying you need limits. In fact, your side has murdered them more than once, need I bring up murderess Audrey Hale?</p><p>Your side does have absolute perverts with no respect for the law, need I bring up compulsive clothing kleptomaniac, and "non-binary" criminal Sam Brinton?</p><p>And no, don't you dare try to disavow these people, your movement claims to not shame anyone, so accept your criminals and murderers just like anyone else. If the conservative side has moral hypocrites, criminals, and absolute wastes of human flesh, so do you, we both belong to the same overarching category called humanity.</p><p><br /></p><p>But as for actual genocides, aside from some off-color "41%" jokes (a reference to the alleged high rate the transgender kill themselves) and some nasty comments mocking the transgender for being skinwalkers and Ed Gein in modern day, there is, to my knowledge, no Adolf Hitler in the wings with a clear plan to kill you all and stack your bodies.</p><p><br /></p><p>That said, Hitler only got the ability to pull off his pogroms because he had society so ready for anyone like him they willingly went along with his Jew murders. But to my knowledge, no one wants to actually kill you, so quit the Chicken Little crap till you have an actual Mein Kampf for the transgender to point to.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>B. YOUR OPPRESSION NARRATIVE IS A CROCK</b></p><p><br /></p><p>For a group of people who claim to be oppressed, you have a very bizarre definition of it. You have the support of politicians, various segments of law enforcement, political lobby groups, and more corporations than I can name. Blacks during the height of Jim Crow didn't have the advantages you have, so take your comparisons to them and shove them. <span> </span></p><p>What is happening to the transgender lobby is that the majority (which, by your own admission, you claim to be the minority) have become well aware of what your side wants and how your demands that society contorts itself for your desires have encroached on their lives. It is no great sacrifice to give gays, lesbians, and bisexuals equal rights because what they ask does not require I disregard my own to generally accommodate them. By contrast, transgender demand I lie to their face so they can live their truth, regardless of my personal conscience.</p><p>You want to police language so no one can hurt your feelings. You want to suborn law enforcement to let you do as you please without consequence. You want political bodies to give you the right to do what you want at will. You want to wish away the unarguable fact humanity is sexually dimorphic mammals because, by your own admission, your heads don't match your bodies, and thus there is a mental disconnect between the two.</p><p>And if you had your way, the difference between male and female would disappear into the morning mist whenever you feel like it, everyone would have to accept whatever chimeric identity you adopt every other day as valid no matter how irrational and unreasonable it may be to accommodate you, and you want your enemies harassed, shamed, and destroyed for having the temerity to complain.</p><p>And to my horror, in defiance of logic, reason, and various laws guaranteeing equality before the law, you've been unbelievably successful, and to the extent your opposition believes you are getting away with far too much, I'm forced to agree with them.</p><p>That is not oppression, that is you being told NO, and firm limits being placed so that your rights do not encroach on that of others.</p><p>Which, under a just society, is as it should be.</p><p><br /></p><p>Now, to both sides, I want to say this</p><p><br /></p><p><b>SOCIETY IS SIMMERING WITH RESENTMENT RIGHT NOW</b></p><p><br /></p><p>I am the last person who wants to see blood spill. Insofar as conservatives and the transgender lobby are concerned, whatever you do privately is your personal business, and so long as all parties can lawfully consent, then your rights should be safeguarded insofar as they do not encroach on anyone else.</p><p>It's that last part you both need to watch.</p><p>The key point of contention is the conservative side believes the transgender lobby has gone too far, has demanded unreasonable sacrifices of society, the law, and common sense, and is determined to force everyone to cater to their own wishes.</p><p>The transgender lobby is utterly convinced they are under attack and any legal restrictions, no matter how mild or severe, are the harbinger to their eventual Holocaust.</p><p>The way I see it, there is building rage on both sides, and blood has already been spilled. Much less than I feared would be spilled at this point, but one drop is too much, and if both sides want to hammer out some firm boundaries that will keep society from descending into madness, I support those people wholeheartedly, regardless of which side.</p><p>As for the rest, I belong to a group that neither hates the pro or anti-transgender side, I just don't want to see any more of your nonsense spill over into my life. I'm happy to tolerate your private lives being as you see fit, but even I will lose sympathy for both of you if you insist on destroying my happiness because neither of you can find a happy medium.</p><p>And people like me are the glue that holds society together. You'd do well to not destroy it. Because when you disgust the sane people in the middle, then if either of you is right about the worst intentions of the other side, then there will be no pity as we watch the extremes destroy each other while we curse how you despoiled our own lives in the process.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-33620747829624938092023-06-06T22:26:00.001-07:002023-06-06T22:28:49.469-07:00Critical Centrism: The Case for the Need of Political Centrists To Call Out Both Sides<p> Modern-day politics has become the refuge of the fanatic. Agreeing to disagree is nigh extinct. Coming together and admitting while you don't always agree, you should at least hear each other out is now completely unheard of.</p><p><br /></p><p>And as a political moderate, that galls me.</p><p><br /></p><p>I prefer that title to "centrist", because, like most people, I too see centrism as a refusal to take a stand for something or instead I did, until I came to the conclusion I thought both sides kinda suck and that means I'm a centrist by virtue of contempt for both.</p><p><br /></p><p>For example, I think the LGBT lobby trying to argue kids should be exposed to sexual cosplay (drag) is twenty different kinds of depraved, but I do think their enemies are just as depraved for attempting unironic book banning. I think reparations to black people is a cynical, venal, stupid, and dishonest ploy by liberals to keep black "on the plantation" by waving the bloody shirt about slavery, though conservatives who are total crime eradication zealots are fools for not realizing you can't solve crime by jailing all the criminals as harshly as possible. I thought Hilary Clinton was a shady and dishonest scumbag who should have never gotten near the Oval Office, but to be fair Trump already was an admitted scumbag, so our options blew either way. And the prospective 2024 is going to offer yet another round of choices from both sides that amount to a pick your poison than an honest choice based on people who you can trust to have morals and principles even if their politics gall you.</p><p><br /></p><p>In short, the two-party system has too many lunatics, degenerates, and outright losers for me to like or respect either side. The politician who actually does their job instead of grandstanding for cameras is long dead, replaced by both sides putting a bunch of people onstage who do the least damage when they aren't doing anything at all.</p><p><br /></p><p>That said, I'm sure I'm not alone. I think the fed-up members of the two sides of the aisle should form their own team to basically call out the two main teams. If politics is a game between two opposing teams, we need a third team of dedicated umpires to call them out on their violations of ethics, breaches of public trust, and outright stupidity at the expense of the voter, the person who should actually matter.</p><p><br /></p><p>I'm not sure that's feasible in this day and age. I've had feet in both camps, still do, and it's hard to find anyone who is sane in either because while the left shuns those who cannot be made pliable tools, the right shuns those who point out their hypocrisy. The actual camps of both sides are thus filled with lickspittles and jellyfish who bend with the wind.</p><p><br /></p><p>Unfortunately, as this world continues to get further mad, I sometimes feel I'm a lone voice telling both sides their Emperors are naked fools, but even more unfortunately I remain doubtful saying as much does me a lot of good because both sides have madmen who have banished anything less than the most simpering of yesmen and butt kissers.</p><p><br /></p><p>Regardless, I do think that if enough voices banded together to call out both sides, they could be a powerful moderating influence politics sorely needs. Unfortunately, that requires even more courage than taking a stand for either side, as the way of the centrist is to oppose everyone else.</p><p><br /></p><p>At the same time, I still think it's worth doing because the only other alternative is to pretend both sides' Emperors aren't naked. And I'm done pretending either sides' pants aren't on their heads instead of their waistlines instead.</p><p><br /></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-67814194551080221432023-06-03T09:23:00.002-07:002023-06-03T09:39:33.374-07:00Why I oppose special holidays simply for being a minority<p> Fair warning, this was written by a white guy who is Christian and straight, so if you are gay, trans, black, or anything else I'm not and think I should shut up, you might as well stop reading now and spare yourself further offense. If, however, you don't mind a potentially offensive alternative point of view from a politically moderate person who thinks everyone should be equal regardless of their differences, then allow me to explain why I bring this up.</p><p><br /></p><p>I recently offended a certain group of LGBT people (I shall respect their privacy by going no further than that) by saying I found it sad a minority group needs a specific period of time like "Pride Month" to feel dignity when I believed that was something that should be innate, no one should take it away from you, and those that tried could go to hell for all I cared.</p><p>Not my exact words, but close enough.</p><p>For my audacity to suggest this, I was inundated with various comments that the LGBT are on the verge of extinction and deserve Pride Month since they are robbed of everything else these days, had it implied I was racist when asked if I felt the same about Black History Month, and was soon after booted out of the community in question despite apologizing for my statement offending others.</p><p>For the record, so be it, I accept my exile like an adult. I shall not beg for a return and I wish that community the best despite my absence, I am not one to hold grudges, especially not after something like this.</p><p><br /></p><p>However, since this is where I can elaborate on my opinion without having doors slammed in my face, let me explain why I think minority holidays, while noble in their intents, have become wedges to drive society apart instead of together.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>They've Failed At Making Diversity Acceptable</b></p><p>Things like Pride Month and Black History Month started with the noble intention of bringing to light a minority group and celebrating their part in human society. I do not dispute this.</p><p>Unfortunately, the line between "here is a spotlight shown on a minority group for a brief period to show they too have contributed to the human race" and "putting them on a pedestal and flaunting them as somehow better than mere mortals" has become disturbing common these days.</p><p>For the most part, I lay the blame at the feel of corporations, lobby groups, and social media. While I do not oppose the basic concept of minority celebration, the parties I've mentioned have commercialized, politicized, and otherwise turned these celebrations into less "these groups exist and we should remember that" and more "these people are special. Disagree and you're a bigot"</p><p>To that, I'm not a bigot, but I don't think being a minority makes you "special". Different, but not special. Everyone is a human being, capable of free will, sapient intelligence, and the potential to shape their own destiny. Being white, black, gay, trans, or covered in polka dots does not make you a god amongst mortals.</p><p>I do not believe the mere act of being different means you deserve special treatment. You deserve to be treated the same as I would, insofar as is reasonable.</p><p><br /></p><p>For example, if a black or white person runs a red light, they should pay the same fine and receive the same legal citation. If there is a job position available, they deserve the same CHANCE at the job based on their qualification for the job, not their skin color.</p><p>Regarding being gay or trans, my take is that your sexuality or whatever you define your body as is your personal business. No one except those you are intimate with is entitled to know more unless you are willing to share, and by the same token, others have a right to the same level of discretion and privacy. Whatever you do, provided you do not violate the rights of others nor trammel the protections of lawful consent, should be protected. Moral and ethical considerations should have no preferred preference over the law.</p><p><br /></p><p>With this said, it galls me how polarized society has become. While it's inevitable groups will clash, the profound lack of "agree to disagree" disgusts me. I hate bible beaters and LGBT zealots with the same level of contempt, much like the racist (whether they be a black person saying whites are evil or a white saying blacks are evil) disgust me.</p><p>At the end of the day, your differences mean nothing to me. You are all human. You were born and you will die. You are no more above your own humanity than anyone else, so quit having the presumption your differences elevate you above anyone else.</p><p>All your difference means is that you are DIFFERENT, not special.</p><p><br /></p><p>Getting back to my main point, minority holidays have just become flashpoints. Pride Month is one in recent days that has drawn both anti and pro-LGBT groups to scream at each other. The pro-LGBT consider even the slightest amount of differing opinion or insinuation they are as mortal as the rest of humanity (and thus as equal before the law as anyone else) as tantamount to genocide. The anti-LGBT are as blind and stupid as the fools who thought Prohibition would end the consumption of alcoholic beverages forever, trying to legislate morality despite behaviors like alcohol consumption and homosexuality having existed as far back as we have recorded history.</p><p>Therefore, if these minority holidays are just going to be flashpoints of further societal discord, then yes, I think we'd be better off without them.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Being a Part of a Group Has Become Entire Identity</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>I have been a member of intensely pro-Christian and LGBT groups. In both, I'm the moderate, and I admit, while I try to get along with these groups, I cannot stand either when it gets to the point it goes beyond "this is who I am" and it gets to the point "and I'll remind you every five seconds".</p><p>When I joined said groups, your stance was already known to me. I do NOT need to be reminded, and if you must remind me what you are constantly, then I must ask, why are trying to remind ME so hard, I already know. </p><p>To this, you either get told to shut up and let others speak (how ironic, I must muzzle my tongue but you are above the same restriction) or that you are a bigot trying to silence them (despite the fact they've more than made their position clear)</p><p>Again, if you cannot go five minutes without reminding me what you stand for and daring to punish me for getting tired of being reminded, you are the problem. Whatever you stand for, if your position cannot survive without terrifying others into silence while you keep talking lest you punish them for daring to say anything that might offend you, you're the intolerant one. You create your own bigots by stirring resentment against you.</p><p>So, if this is already causing resentment, then special holidays for minorities, with this in mind, are just grinding glass in the wounds of societal discord, and we'd be better if they didn't exist.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>Conclusion</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>I am white, male, Christian, and straight. That said, I rarely tell people any of the above unless I'm asked directly. My reason is simple: </p><p>I am secure in this knowledge and do not need to hammer it into the heads of anyone else.</p><p>Diversity is the strength of the human race. Without it, we'd be boring and sterile in terms of creativity and endeavour, and I in fact celebrate our diversity. I do not, however, enjoy being forced to simper before any group and keep my mouth shut while they demand special treatment simply for being different. There is no faster way to create a bigot than by demanding special treatment of others, and while I have tried to resist falling into the trap of hatred over this, a lot more actual bigots have been created by this forced love of diversity breeding resentment against forced tolerance and faked acceptance under pain of retribution.</p><p>With that in mind, I do not reject the differences of my species, but I'd rather not have them rubbed in my face and be told I'm the intolerant one for daring to say "Who cares what you are, you're human, that's all that matters."</p><p>And with that said, minority holidays have become pedestals to elevate certain groups above humanity and trying to force me to revere them as gods. And I will not do that. No one man is god over another, no matter what difference you have from myself.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-57083627621914805712023-05-14T15:21:00.006-07:002023-05-14T15:26:18.009-07:00 Why Megaman Battle Network 4 Is Still The Worst Of The Series Part 3<p> In the first two parts, we analyzed the story and constraints of the developers. In this final part, we shall examine the other technical aspects and see how they did or did not contribute to the Battle Network series' fall from grace.</p><p><br /></p><p>In absolute fairness, Battle Network 4 did do a lot that was sound technically, despite the limitations, and for that they receive credit. Regardless, what they did poorly just hammered more nails in the coffin. We shall examine these things below.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. Boktai Crossover</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Battle Network 4 was the first game to include a "guest" series crossover. The Boktai series by Capcom was lent to the developers for an in-universe crossover. Overall, it was mostly good, with one major flaw.</p><p>We got some new battle chips out of this, which were well-balanced and would be returning elements in the later games. The overall theming did not feel out of place either.</p><p>The thing that was glaring weakness is that this crossover highlighted a glaring lack of original story in BN4. The theme park arc is essentially a huge series of Boktai shoutouts but otherwise is just an excuse to give us a reason to fight Shademan, who is vampire themed and fits the Boktai canon by extension. Unfortunately, while this section was well written, if you removed the Boktai elements, it had almost no original writing to work with, and in a game where the story was already so thin it was appalling, this was just further proof that without extensive padding, this was a game largely without point or meaning.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>2. Graphical Changes</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>This game heralded a major shift in the graphical direction of the series. Ever since the first Battle Network, they used a rough style that harkens back to the earliest days of the GBA being released. The first game in particular had a lot of rough edges.</p><p>Lan and his mother looked like they had a congenital liver defect. Higsby looked like a constipated Carrot Top. There was a huge lack of gradients and a horrible amount of overly poppy colors. The internet "overworld" was the worst of all, having no delineation between areas, meaning you could wind up in the Undernet not long after the second boss without realizing it. The unusual isometric 2.5D coupled with the rounded corners and samey texturing made it a nightmare to navigate without a guide.</p><p>The dungeons weren't much better, with some being tedious like the Waterworks and the Power Plant area was one that almost all first-timers would need a guide for.</p><p>The second and third games massively upgraded the worst of it and overall showed a lot of lessons learned. Areas were clearly defined in all places in the game. Character art massively improved across the board. The bizarre rounded corners and samey textures of the first game were exchanged for a squares and grids style layout in most areas that fit the intended aesthetic of a futuristic world.</p><p>This still had some problems. Some perspective issues were still common, with Megaman and other characters appearing incredibly elongated in some areas. Character animations like Lan running still looked pretty rough (with Lan having some odd frames that made his knees look like broken hinges)</p><p>Battle Network 4 is when they switched wholesale over to the art style favored by the then-running Battle Network anime. This proved a great decision.</p><p>All character art was standardized everywhere. Face and character animations were finally competent in all regards. The resized dimensions allowed for more to be shown onscreen without the weird perspective issues and camera angles that plagued the first three games.</p><p>The fourth game attempted a partial return to the rounded corners of the first game internet overworld, and unfortunately, the lack of dungeons and a lot of corner-cutting resulted in a lot of areas, both old and new, being oddly small and cut down if you removed the extraneous eye candy elements.</p><p>The fifth and sixth game returned to the squares and gridded patterns and restored the detail work the fourth game missed. It's also worth noting the fourth game was the last one with a tedious "gimmick" like the C-Slider, similar to compression pathways in MMBN3.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>3. Sound and Music</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Overall, this remained high quality. In fact, they even cleaned up the sound font in some ways since MMBN3. Not as many memorable tunes, but what we heard was quite good considering they were using the GBA's sound engine.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>4. New Game Plus</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Battle Network 4 was a game that finally had a proper "NG+" for the first time. All BN games are typical "one save file" affairs where you can save before the final boss, beat the game, then be sent back to before then with the ability to unlock new content before beating the game again.</p><p>Battle Network 4 had an actual "NG+", in which beating the game resulted in unlocking actual new content for each story run, up to a total of three times. While a good idea in theory, in practice, this was clearly a way to disguise the sheer amount of padding.</p><p>The tournaments were semi-randomized per playthrough, meaning you could only unlock up to two of a total of six Double Soul abilities per run, requiring three NG+ to acquire them all. While chip folders and upgrades for Megaman carried over between game runs, certain very tedious things like the C-Slider had to be acquired from scratch each run, which was quite annoying. Worse, since a lot of the tournament arcs were plotless filler, most runs could be rather dull.</p><p>Finally, they controversially made each run harder by unlocking harder and harder enemies to fight each completed game run. On top of this making so it was impossible to get all battle chips in one game run, it also further padded out one's playtime. Honestly, it was a chore to want to play more than once because of this for me and thus I opted to not do so after realizing this back in my younger years, and even now I'm loath to do this again.</p><p>Battle Network 5 modified this so it did NOT require NG+ and went back to the one save file with post-game unlocks after the final boss was beaten once. Battle Network 6 went further and removed the progressive difficulty of the fourth and fifth games and returned to the model used by the second and third games for enemy and difficulty progression.</p><p>While Battle Network 5 had a less tedious progressive difficulty, having it gated to the Liberation Missions and post-game content so I could complete my chip folder was still tedious. Battle Network 6 thankfully excised these elements entirely.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>5. Stability</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>In this area, the ball was dropped hard. Given the short dev time and the fact they were having to make an entire game from scratch in a year with less help than before, it was inevitable we'd get stability issues.</p><p>Both Red Sun and Blue Moon had several typos, glitches, and some bugs so bad both emulators and real hardware had certain section be unplayable. It was so bad the game had to be reissued in a new revision to paper over the worst of this for the original Nintendo DS model.</p><p>While the Legacy Collection thankfully includes all these fixes and runs on optimized and refactored code that makes these games run well technically, it still makes going back to the originals via emulation or original hardware about as much fun as getting your hands smashed with hammers.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>6. Conclusion</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Technically, the horrid New Game Plus and abysmal stability issues did MMBN4 no favors, despite all the other things it did surprisingly well.</p><p>Overall, MMBN4 was a game doomed by unrealistic expectations forced on the developers, too short a developer time limit despite the issues they faced, and the fact corporate greed made it impossible to provide the care and polish such a game would deserve before it put a bullet in the skull of the series continuing much further.</p><p>Again, more is the pity if you ask me.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-2011996260490297142023-05-11T20:21:00.013-07:002023-05-26T22:38:11.172-07:00Why Megaman Battle Network 4 Is Still The Worst Of The Series Part 2<p> In this second of what is planned to be three posts, we will analyze the narrative structure of Megaman Battle Network 4 and why it failed to be as good as the other games. For this reason, let's review a few things. This will have story spoilers, which are essential to examine the plot structure of Battle Network 4 as compared to other BN games and the Megaman series in general.</p><p>Megaman Battle Network is an alternate universe to the original "Classic" series born from humanity deciding to specialize in internet networking technology instead of robotics. Robotics, while not entirely ignored, remains much more niche and marginalized. As a result, virtually everything in the world is not connected to the Internet, which has become its own dimension that can be traversed by digital beings called Net Navis. The Navis are the equivalent to many of the "Robot Masters" of the classic Mega Man games. As digital beings, their names all have ".EXE" at the end, and the classic platformer structure, a spinoff game or two aside, is instead switched for a semi-turn-based grid-bound strategy RPG. The various minor enemies of the classic games are now viruses that must be defeated. True to the original series' conceit of gaining powers from defeated foes, viruses can drop battle chips, allowing Navis to use virus skills as their own.</p><p>The overarching narrative of the first trilogy branches off this what-if world. Dr. Albert Wily, while he did help shepherd the early internet into being with Tadashi Hikari (aka Dr. Thomas Light of the original platformer games alternate universe equivalent), was hoping his efforts would be rewarded by humanity helping back his own efforts to focus on robotics as the technology of the future. Unfortunately, aside from some minor usage in some niche areas, mankind largely rejected this in favor of further internet-based technology.</p><p>As a result, the first three games focus on Wily's rage against a world he believes spurned his true calling and tries to destroy the net-based society. Lan Hikari (called Netto in Japan as a pun on the term "Net" for the internet, his localized name is instead a play on LAN, for "local area network") is the grandson of Tadashi Hikari and the son of Yuuichiro Hikari. While Lan's father continues the work of his own father, Lan is still going through school at this time.</p><p>The narrative structure of the first three games had an "A" story, the overarching villain narrative of Wily's efforts, and the "B" story, focusing on Lan and Megaman.EXE, his personal net navi, who is actually a digital recreation of his brother Hub Hikari (Hub referring to where LANs are plugged into, his Japanese name is Saito for "site") who died in childbirth due to a rare heart defect. While the story strongly favors the "B" narrative, the "A" winds up interfering with it and becoming intertwined. By the end of each game, the "A" narrative and "B" narrative unify and the "A" narrative aspect must be fully resolved so Lan and Megaman can resume their daily lives as before.</p><p>Battle Network 4 is completely different. It has a very large and largely pointless "B" narrative", which is a huge amount of "<a href="https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Padding" target="_blank">Padding</a>" to very poorly disguise the three separate "A" plots, which are all supposed to be connected but are very poorly fleshed out and none of the three carry the game on their own. For this reason, the story of Battle Network 4 is considered the weakest of all the games, and the four story arcs can be termed the "Tournament Arc", "Asteroid Arc", "Nebula Arc" and "Regal Arc". We shall examine them at length below.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. The Tournament Arc</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>This is the biggest and frankly most pointless part of the game. Given it comprises nearly 90% of the entire story, it's nigh all filler that is never brought up again. In fairness to the developers, given Capcom unreasonably gave them 12 months to shove an entire game out the door with no preexisting assets to work with, this absolutely shameless excuse for padding out what is otherwise a largely plotless game was the only way they were going to meet that deadline.</p><p>Given they had already done a tournament arc twice (once in Battle Network 3 and several in the plotless gaiden game Battle Chip Challenge), they at least tried to mix it up a bit by having its latter arcs take place outside of Electopia (i.e. - Japan) and tried to slip in as much worldbuilding as their time limit allowed. Unfortunately, since they had little time to make a lot of this content actually interesting, we get a lot of filler material that relies on cliches and simplistic padded-out sidequests.</p><p>It's worth noting only a select few aspects of this arc refer to prior established characters or are even referenced in later works, so instead of covering the stuff that is generally never brought up again or even before, let's cover what was and see what BN4 did with it.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>A. Tamako Ura/MetalMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Tamako Ura (first met in Megaman Battle Network 3, where she was a required meeting at one point during the N1 Grand Prix tournament as a contestant, is reintroduced in Megaman Battle Network 4's Blue Moon Edition. While a potential contestant in the tournaments, Tamako curiously acts as if BN4 is the first time they met Lan, despite her being canonically met in 3, and in fact such was required for them to have met at one point of 3.</p><p>Given how it is possible to never encounter her due to the semi-random nature of the tournament selections and its direct inconsistency with BN3, the entire scenario must be discarded as non-canon.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>5/15/2023 UPDATE: </b><a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BattleNetwork/comments/13i6t1v/a_series_of_blog_posts_i_wrote_to_analyze_why/jkaco35/" target="_blank">As pointed out on Reddit, I forgot to include mention of Raoul/ThunderMan.EXE.</a></p><p>Like Tamako, they act like it's the first time they met, and that is even more cringe than what they did with Tamako, who that could feasibly work with if Lan went out of his way to avoid meeting her except briefly during the N1 and they both just forgot about it next time they met. Pretty weak even then, but a plausible excuse.</p><p>Raoul though, they have no excuse at all. He was key to the story of MMBN2 and present at the N1 in MMBN3. Botching his BN4 appearance to neglect this is beyond being excusable, it's just utter laziness that should not have gone unnoticed.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>B. Eugene Chaud/ProtoMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>It's worth noting it IS canon he does play a role in the story, namely, he's investigating Nebula as a criminal organization given his status as a member of the internet police force. We do see this in the Shademan meetings and his prior knowledge is remarked on in BN5 Team Protoman.</p><p>His actual Blue Moon tournament arc, however, is essentially a blatant recycling of his BN3 tournament arc, right down to the appearance of his estranged father. Given this arc adds basically nothing that wasn't already established and it's entirely possible to never actually encounter him in said tournament, and it is also non-canon. Only his actual story role outside of it is referenced in any later appearances.</p><p>(<a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/BattleNetwork/comments/13i6t1v/a_series_of_blog_posts_i_wrote_to_analyze_why/jkbckar/" target="_blank">above error which listed Red Sun instead of Blue Moon in this section fixed as of this comment read on 5/15/2023</a>)</p><p><br /></p><p><b>C. Higsby/NumberMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Higsby, like Chaud, does play a minor canonical role in both editions of BN4, specifically warning you away from the use of Dark Chips. His actual tournament arc, however, is basically noncanonical. Not only does it not mesh with BN5 Team Colonel, which acts as if it's the first time you ever learn the Number Cross Double Soul, but it also adds no story that is later referenced again.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>D. Mr. Match/FireMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Of the six tournament arcs that have any story reference either before or after BN4, the Red Sun tournament arc is the only one that appears to be canonical alongside one other.</p><p>In BN3, Match (Kenichi Hinoken in Japan) faked having reformed his past as a criminal in BN1 (he was seen as a neutral civilian in BN2), and even secured a position working for Scilab. He had secretly rejoined the criminal organization he had claimed to cut ties with and nearly tricked Lan into successfully helping him commit a terrorist act that would have killed all the scientists in SciLab, including Lan's own father. He was last seen left for dead in a sinking island base strapped to a chair he had uploaded his consciousness into.</p><p>Having somehow survived the events of BN3, he claims to have been cured of his criminal past for good when met again, though Lan holds him under the darkest of suspicion regardless. To some extent, the suspicions remain valid, as Match still had some lingering connections to the criminal world that he cut ties with at the last minute when someone he didn't intend would be hurt by proxy.</p><p>The end of the scenario prompted Match to further divorce himself from his old ways, which would match his later meeting in BN6 Cybeast Gregar.</p><p>When met in BN6 Cybeast Gregar, Lan is still a bit suspicious, but no longer as severely as he was in BN4, and Match does indeed serve as an entirely law-abiding citizen who plays a heroic role in BN6 Cybeast Gregar.</p><p>This seems to logically follow from the BN4 Red Sun events and the only tournament arc that appears to not violate any canon.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>E. Raika/SearchMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Raika is a citizen of Sharo (i.e. - Battle Network's version of Russia) and has a military background, hence his military-themed navi, SearchMan.EXE. While the Japan-only anime greatly expanded his relevance, his scenario in BN4 is likely non-canon. Not only does he act like he and Lan met for the first time BN5 Team Protoman, it is also regarded as the first time you gain usage of the Search Soul Double Soul power.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>F. Shuuko/AquaMan.EXE</b></p><p><br /></p><p>BN6 NOTE: AquaMan.EXE was briefly renamed Spoutman.EXE in the original English versions due to potential legal trouble from DC Comics, a change that was reverted to the original name in the Legacy Collection.</p><p><br /></p><p>Shuuko and her navi are exclusive to the Blue Moon Edition of BN4 and the Cybeast Falazar Edition of BN6. BN6 directly references their first meeting from BN4 Blue Moon in the Falzar Edition, so this tournament arc is also canonical.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>2. Asteroid Arc</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The Asteroid Arc is supposed to be the "global threat" from the previous three games. The first game had a threat confined to Electopia with global implications, the second game a truly global threat, and the third a threat of such severity the world was legitimately staring an apocalypse in the face and every nation had declared martial law due to scale of the disaster that was barely averted.</p><p>In BN4, an asteroid is discovered, first detected just outside our solar system, and its trajectory is a collision course with Earth. It's described as being of sufficient size, mass, and scale as being a legitimate threat to the survival of humanity, meaning it at least has to be of the same type of asteroid that caused the end of the dinosaurs if not larger. At any rate, NAXA (a play on NASA and the name of its Japanese equivalent) immediately gets all the leading scientific minds together from around the world to come up with a solution to stave off the worst case.</p><p>Very early on, one of the scientists called in to work on the problem is, curiously enough, Yuuichiro Hikari. While Lan's father is indeed one of Electopia's brightest minds, his established discipline is in networking technology. Why he was picked for solutions to dealing with the threat of the heavenly body impacting the Earth is unclear. It may be he was shorthand for leading the Electopian delegation to this multinational effort, but this remains speculation. What is clear is that he proposes a laser be used to knock the asteroid off course with Earth given the level of tech available to Earth, and Dr. Regal of Nation X (more on that in the Regal section) concurs along with everyone else.</p><p>The asteroid threat mostly disappears from the plot until the very end of the Red Sun/Blue Moon Tournament (depending on the version of BN4 the player has). It turns out, late in the study of the asteroid threat, they determined it has an artificial intelligence and computer network that is compatible with Earth net tech that they intended the best net battler in the world to be sent to navigate and stop the asteroid threat should the laser plan fail.</p><p>Since Dr. Regal purposely sabotages the laser plan, and Lan is the winner of the last tournament, Lan and Megaman.EXE are sent to deal with the problem.</p><p>The Asteroid arc "villain" turns out to be Duo, a being who is the digital counterpart to the alien robot intelligence Duo from Mega Man 8. Duo believes humanity is unregenerate and that we have proven worthy of destruction for failing its standards of a just and upright civilization capable of resisting its darker impulses, and to that end, engages Lan and Megaman in battle but is defeated. They then, oddly enough with the people of Earth sending them power in a totally hackneyed cliche, are able to direct the asteroid away from Earth.</p><p>Duo, for his part, impressed the people of Earth could put aside their wicked ways and combine their power for their own mutual survival, decides he could have been wrong, and leaves humanity to decide its own future. This entire scenario is so filled with implausible nonsense that the next succeeding game goes out of its way to pretend nothing about it ever happened save retaining Dr. Regal and what few bits of writing that didn't break established canon they could, they otherwise blot this from the series memory, as no one ever recalls Lan was the guy who saved Earth in the remaining games, even the people who should logically do so like his dad and Dr. Regal.</p><p>Now, this was a story aimed at a Kids to Adults crowd, but even with that in mind, all the things based on real science the series has usually tried to either stick to reality or do reasonable extrapolation into the future Jules Verne style, the obvious internet tech conceit aside. However, I see grave problems with plausibility, both with Plan A and Plan B, let me go over them:</p><p><br /></p><p><b>A. Plan A Issues</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Plan A, or hit the asteroid with a laser to change its course, it's not entirely unreasonable if you don't think about it too hard. If you apply critical thinking, lots of things go wrong.</p><p>First off, if this is an object of sufficient size, scale, and mass to be a global threat to humanity, it would be traveling at thousands if not million miles a second given the sheer distance involved, even if we assume the most generous time for "a few months" before it hits Earth. Battle Network 4 assumes it remains the same size, mass, and scale, and at the same velocity from where it was first detected to when it hits Earth.</p><p>Even if it were a simple asteroid and not something more as Plan B covers, this makes no sense. The laws of physics mean that the object should lose SOME mass on the way to Earth. The sheer stress of how fast it's traveling should cause some loss of structure due to the sheer force involved, it's why warp speed in fiction has objects travel in a bubble that is slipstreaming objects to their destination as opposed to putting all the velocity of above light speed travel on the object, it would fly apart unless it was constructed out of materials that are solid enough to restrict warp speed friction and momentum causing them external and or internal damage.</p><p>Since there is no indication the laws of physics were set aside in this universe, this is just bad sci-fi writing.</p><p>Also, let's assume they have a powerful enough laser to affect the course of said object. Even if this is a workable plan, all sorts of things can go wrong even if it hits, like it breaking into pieces that hit the planet, they lack the force to change their course enough, or worse, miss entirely.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>B. Plan B Issues</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Plan B, if the laser plans fail (and it does, via sabotage, so we never know if it would have worked), is that they detected signals from the asteroid indicating a networked system similar enough in structure to Earth's own networking technology they plan to send a Net Navi operating by the best Net Battler they can find to change the course of the asteroid by finding the appropriate controls in the network.</p><p>I have two problems with this, one minor and one major.</p><p>The minor problem is that they don't have a clue how extensive this network is, or even if it includes the theoretical controls for the asteroid in question. It's basically a desperate shot in the dark, but whatever, I can let this slide because it's a minor quibble compared to the major problem.</p><p>The BIG problem with this plan is that if they are going to send a Net Navi via wireless broadcast to the asteroid and back from Earth's surface, they would have to do so long before the object is so close it's going to get caught in Earth's gravity well, meaning it would have to be sent to the asteroid before it enters Earth's gravity field.</p><p>Even if they pull this off, canonically, it's established their signal tech is about as advanced as ours, meaning they can barely do more than send signals globally. Somewhat faster than our world, but far shorter than they'd need to pull off something of this scale between an object that would be thousands if not millions of miles away.</p><p>They would have to keep up a continuous, uninterrupted signal between Earth and the asteroid at speeds approaching light speed and back (176,000 meters a second) to even approach making this workable. They obviously can't do this.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>C. Duo Himself</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Duo violates a core series tenet by his mere existence. The core conceit of the series is that the people of Earth doubled down on network tech instead of robotics, and everything else from that point is a logical outgrowth connected to Earth itself. Sure, the AU version of Earth has different geography, history, and technological progression, but it's still Earth's people taking a different path as the starting point.</p><p>Duo in Mega Man 8 was an alien ROBOT. Not a Net Navi. It makes no sense everything outside of Earth was affected by this alternate history, and Duo himself offers no explanation for who or what he is, but given every Net Navi with a classic counterpart has been explicitly cribbed from the canonical Mega Man games, Duo is the odd man out and makes no logical sense.</p><p>For Duo to be the same Duo from MM8 in a different form, this would have to be "<a href="https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Cosmic_Retcon">Cosmic Retcon</a>", a rewrite of the entire universe, not a mere alternate timeline of Earth's own history as was established since the very first game.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>3. Nebula Arc.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The Nebula Arc has even less going for it than the Tournament and Asteroid arcs. At least those have a proper beginning and end, even if one is chock full of noncanonical and plotless filler and the other rests on a foundation of bad sci-fi. The Nebula Arc is more a teaser for what the next game would do far better than any form of a proper story, and that's being generous.</p><p>The basic structure of the arc is as follows. Nebula is an internet crime syndicate that now fills the void left by the WWW (World Three), Gospel, and the Neo WWW from the first three games. On top of alleged international reach, they also peddle "Dark Chips", which are generally highly illegal and have aspects of both illegal substances (like steroids, but for Net Navis) and soul-selling (like a literal deal with the devil) attached to their use.</p><p>Lan encounters them during a run-in with an agent of theirs named ShadeMan.EXE, a bat-themed Navi who plays out the classic Dracula cliches in the internet world. While ShadeMan is driven off by Chaud and ProtoMan.EXE initially, he drops a Dark Chip Lan picks up with no idea of its meaning.</p><p>Later, he asks the local chip shop owner and former WWW member Higsby (Yamitarou Higure in Japan) about it, and Higsby nearly freaks out hard as he explains Dark Chips are bad news, not to be used unless you want to corrupt your Navi and yourself and wind up going to a kid-friendly stand-in for Hell.</p><p>Lan wisely defers the use of the chip on this advice but is later forced to use it during his rematch with ShadeMan later since nothing else does any damage. It works but succeeds in awakening a dark side that is later brought to life as an enemy you must defeat and the player is given random dark chips out of nowhere at times in battle to further tempt you into their use, with dire gameplay consequences like permanent HP reduction in exchange for insane levels of power.</p><p>The arc ends near the end of the tournament arc after defeating your dark side, just in time for the Asteroid and Regal arcs to reach their own conclusions.</p><p>My problem with the writing of Nebula is that they are little more than an ill-defined boogeyman that the next game would properly do something with, and what they do isn't very impressive during what time they get onscreen.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>A. Nebula just doesn't have very good street cred for their supposed threat.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Nebula in BN4, some minor attempts at making them seem scary aside, come off pretty lame. The WWW in both incarnations and Gospel were very capable of damage on a global scale, we saw them commit horrible acts of mass terrorism, and the very last game had society facing the literal apocalypse if they succeeded in their evil plan.</p><p>Nebula's worst apparent crime is the peddling of Dark Chips, which is bizarre since they magically can appear to those who have them in extra copies, making their selling in bulk rather silly. Worse, it's shown not using them, the one time the plot forces you to aside, is actually wiser long-term since they make the end game a lot harder and shunt off things like Full Syncro use, which you'd have to be an idiot to pass up using constantly.</p><p>With this in mind, the steroid and soul-selling metaphors come off as weird instead of compelling.</p><p>True, they at one point briefly kidnap and bind/gag Lan's mom to intimidate him, but that's literally all they do, just to scare him. Match in his arc planned to set off literal bombs and some of the other non-Nebula affiliated contestants do a lot more damage, like ColdMan.EXE and his operator, who hack weather satellites to cause regional blizzards. Nebula comes off as pretty sad by contrast, merely doing non-permanent damage to a theme park at most.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>B. Dark Chips make no sense.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Dark Chips are stupidly powerful battle chips for Net Navis that grant awesome power in exchange for a loss of -1 permanent HP per use and some other gameplay-related drawbacks. That's fine, but while the series has flirted with some mild supernatural elements at times, Dark Chips just break the willing suspense of disbelief over their knee.</p><p>The very first dark chip you get is by sheer accident, when supposedly these things are peddled in the less honorable corners of the internet, which you cannot find a legit seller for at any point in BN4. Battle Network 5 actually did have legit sellers of these chips, and they were hard to find and appropriately rare, and quite illegal.</p><p>Second, their magical appearance after your only story-mandated use makes no sense. Battlechips are a finite resource with a physical form in-universe. More can be made based on viral data, but still, they don't just magically appear out of thin air like Dark Chips do in BN4. Battle Network 5 wisely walked back most of the supernatural implications of this because this strains plausibility even for the Battle Network series to its limits and beyond.</p><p>Second, even as a metaphor for illegal substances, how does the usage of these things send the Navi and their user to actual Hell (or Murkland, as they call it)? In the game, the worst penalties can be ignored until the very end, and while they make the final boss battle harder since they can't be used there (thus crippling the player severely if they leaned on them for most of the game), it's still not impossible to beat the game, just far harder.</p><p>And this has no implications for the next game even if you went all in on Dark Chip abuse in BN4.</p><p>Battle Network 5 walked back a lot of this nonsense because even it realized these issues. We see Dark Chips are clearly produced in factories. They are appropriately rare and illegal to acquire physical items. And the "moral" implications of their use were severely downplayed in BN5 to something that doesn't break prior canon over its knee.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>4. Regal Arc</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Dr. Regal is an "<a href="https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Original_Generation" target="_blank">Original Generation</a>" villain created specifically for the Battle Network series. While not a bad character, Battle Network 5 showed what they could really do with him if given good writing and a much more awesome makeover that included a sweet <a href="https://allthetropes.org/wiki/Beard_of_Evil" target="_blank">Beard of Evil</a>, he just has the misfortune of debuting in a game that gives him almost no screentime to actually be a credible villain.</p><p>He is first introduced during the eggheads' meeting up at NAXA to figure out how to stop the asteroid. He is from Nation X, a generic military state with a bad reputation whose exact real-world counterpart is left vague on purpose, they just want you to know it's not a nice place. Regal himself does have a sinister monocle but otherwise doesn't look overly evil like Wily did on purpose.</p><p>In fact, when we first meet him, aside from Dr. Hikari noting everyone's reservations about his sponsor nation, they are all willing to work together in the name of humanity's survival, and Dr. Hikari privately concedes he could have the best knowledge of them all to make a counter plan work. Dr. Regal is even quite appropriately grateful for the opportunity and quite sincere in working with everyone, immediately asking to take over the analysis of the asteroid as his skills are best used for that area.</p><p>Slightly later, they all are debating the merits of Dr. Hikari's proposition to hit the asteroid with a laser to knock it off course. Regal is a gracious advocate of Hikari's plan, and the story then quits focusing on the Asteroid Arc until towards the very end.</p><p>A TON of revelations are thrown at the player in quick succession.</p><p>First, Regal is the founding leader of Nebula. Second, he sabotages the laser plan. Third, he plans to hijack Plan B, jack into the asteroid network, and stop it himself, getting sole credit for saving the Earth. Finally, after his Navi is defeated and the Earth is saved, he yeets himself off a roof as opposed to being captured for his crimes. Battle Network 5 reveals he faked his death so he can be used again in a better game.</p><p>Now, he was a decent villain cursed to be put in a debut game that used him poorly, let's examine why.</p><p>Nebula being his creation is something that is not even remotely hinted at besides the fact he wears some clothing items with a purple color scheme similar to Nebula agents like ShadeMan.EXE. That's it. He otherwise has to outright admit it while telling Lan to get bent while he saves the Earth for the player to connect him to Nebula. He could have kept quiet about being connected to Nebula in any way and that was only revealed in the intro of Battle Network 5 and the story would not suffer in the slightest for not mentioning it. In fact, some very mild changes to the plot of BN4 could keep the connection at a complete remove until the next game, that's how badly this was tacked on to his character.</p><p>Second, aside from coming from a military state with a bad reputation, our only hint of his ill intentions comes from Dr. Hikari's suspicions, and he stays so long off-camera is very easy to forget this. He otherwise betrays not a hint he's going to do his own thing until the story says he should. His Navi, LaserMan.EXE, does explain in hindsight his advocacy of the laser plan and his sabotage of it, but even here we have problems.</p><p>He could have allowed the laser plan to work and gained the praise of the world if it worked, which could have been later used in any number of interesting ways to further his actual villainous goals. Given he apparently has a poor view of the morality of man, his desire for the praise of humanity seems bizarre, especially given his very black-hearted take on humanity's moral potential in Battle Network 5, which ties into the Dark Chips and his goals in 5 a lot better.</p><p>The Battle Network anime was never dubbed past its second season in English, but even that used him far better than the games did, even during his BN4 appearance look.</p><p>Basically, Regal just had barely anything to work with from the get-go and had to wait for Battle Network 5 before the games used him properly.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>5. Conclusion</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Battle Network 4 was doomed to fail. Given a year to whistle up an entire game, game engine (even if they did reuse some earlier game code from 3), and assets, there was no way we were going to get a decent game with a story that was remotely decent. In 18 months, possibly, but just 12, not at all. Capcom forced Battle Network 4 to exist by sheer desire for profit, and they killed the series continuing past a sixth game after fans discovered the absolute tire fire they were sold.</p><p>And more is the pity if you ask me.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-14357770441168553072023-05-09T18:13:00.001-07:002023-05-09T18:28:28.324-07:00Why Megaman Battle Network 4 Is Still The Worst Of The Series<p> Having recently purchased and had a blast with the Megaman Battle Network Legacy Collection games, I was immediately reminded why the fourth of the series (Red Sun and Blue Moon Editions) were horrible.</p><p>Even back during their original print run, they were some of the lamest games of their series and could even cause real hardware issues due to utterly horrific coding. To my knowledge, the versions that ship with the Legacy Collection are patched to not have these issues even on the Switch, but all their original flaws remain.</p><p><br /></p><p>This will be a multi-part post, so I first want to cover some background and explain why this trainwreck, while having redeeming features, was going to be a trainwreck given the sum of its parts.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. This was never originally intended to be made.</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Battle Network 3 Blue and White Editions (Blue and Black in Japan) were clearly intended to end the series, and do so on a high note. The way they were written tied a nice bow on the story as written from the beginning, gave all the characters a nice sendoff and didn't leave too many dangling plot threads.</p><p>Sure, they had Megaman Battle Chip Challenge, but that was something of a non-canon "Gaiden Game" that gave them an excuse to reuse the assets of the first three games for a once-off title that was okay but nothing amazing.</p><p>That said, the series was meant, canonically, to end at 3.</p><p>However, Capcom saw dollar signs in printing more, so the series director, who outright admitted 3 ended the story he wanted to tell, had to throw something at the wall and devise a way to continue the story.</p><p>He admitted to struggling with how to keep the story going, and Battle Network 4 is a testament to why Capcom zombifying this series was a bad idea.</p><p>In fairness, Battle Network 5 wound up being competent and basically was about as decent as Battle Network 2 in terms of competence. Still, the damage to the fanbase's trust was already done, so Capcom wisely made the sixth game the last one, and the sixth game managed to reach the levels of 3 (though not entirely in some ways, but close enough) in once again ending the series on a high note and tying off the plot threads with some dignity.</p><p>Overall, had Battle Network 4 been merely average, Capcom probably could have gotten away with more games after 6, but 4 hammered a huge nail in the fanbase wanting to trust Capcom after 4 bombed so hard it wasn't funny.</p><p>I further want to clarify, before we move on, this series of posts is going to bash the resultant quality of Battle Network 4, but the majority of the blame falls mostly on Capcom for their unreasonable expectation the devs of the prior games could whistle up an entirely new game from scratch with no planning for doing so prior and gave them less than a year to whistle up an entirely new game. Worse, the Japanese version of BN3 White (Black there) was still in development and thus BN4 was made with less technical assistance for some time, thus less beta testing was able to be done in the mere year they had to work on it.</p><p>Frankly, the fact it wasn't worse what we finally got is somewhere to the left of a miracle. BN4's versions were technically complete in many areas, but still horribly underdone due to demands of the Capcom executives when they released.</p><p><b>2. The things Battle Network 4 did well.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>It's worth noting Battle Network 4 had some good ideas despite all the garbage it wound up being in total. Many of these better ideas would be expanded on and further polished in 5 and 6 and still hold up as competent. Unfortunately, they alone could not save 4 from what it did wrong.</p><p>First off, the art style shifted to match the then-running Battle Network anime. Compared to the rougher style of the first three games, colors were more vibrant, animations much more detailed, and character designs more visually distinct. Overall, this looked great and 5 and 6 would just polish this concept further.</p><p>Second, they retooled the "Full Syncro" idea, formerly a plot device, into a viable regular battle mechanic, and honestly, it made more logical sense and made for less cutscene weirdness where you could be stupid powerful in a cutscene and get wasted in gameplay.</p><p>The battle chips received a further balance that was generally well done, and they introduced "Double Soul", where you could temporarily use the abilities of another Navi besides Megaman.EXE.</p><p>Double Soul was a good concept albeit a bit half-baked and unbalanced, but since all the concept really needed was to make it more fun for the player, Capcom made it even MORE unbalanced in the player's favor and tweaked it to not require sacrificing a battle chip to activate by BN6.</p><p>Finally, the idea of two games with exclusive content was fully realized in Battle Network 4 for the first time. Both versions of 3 are pretty minorly different and largely identical except for very few differences that are ultimately rather marginal. This was apparently because the decision to make two editions was made rather late in development and the developers didn't have time to make the editions of 3 more unique.</p><p>All this said Battle Network 4 turned out to be a horrible game in both editions despite all these good things because what they did badly was so severe it killed player enjoyment dead.</p><p><br /></p><p>Some warnings for the eventual followup post. It will spoil plot details and it will cover both earlier games in the series and other Megaman games, which will be necessary to understand why BN4 fell so short in terms of narrative.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-32868712353293611192023-05-04T17:59:00.003-07:002023-05-04T18:51:16.674-07:00Why Star Ocean 4 Is A Terrible Game Part 5<p> I admit. I really just wanted to leave this to rot because the game was so bad doing one more post on it was something I dreaded, but I figured I might as well close off with one last post giving an itemized list of the remaing stupid mistakes SO4 made that follows up on my prior posts.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. The Grigori were a total fail as a faction and their defeat was a blatant copout.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The Grigori had a decent start and initially made logical sense in the context of the series as a villain. Around the Roak Arc, they picked up a bizarre death cult fetish and since they just degenerate into further incoherence.</p><p>It gets really bad by the time of the EN II (Star Ocean 2 nostalgia arc, that's short for Energy Nede) arc, where they establish the "leader" of the Grigori is less a being and more a non-Euclidean entity right out of Lovecraft from another dimension that is essentially unkillable by any conventional means. Instead, all we can do is kill off its spawn point and hope it never comes back.</p><p>Bear in mind SO3 made clear the SO universe the characters exists in is a constructed world by another dimension, and thus the Grigori would destroy that creation and logically, given SO3 established said beings in SO3 did not want their created world going off the rails, the Grigori should not even EXIST, they obviously would have shut down the Grigori from day one as a rogue element.</p><p>Even if we ignore this, the way the Grigori are stopped in the finale is a copout. Supposedly, killing their "avatar" means they just go away. Literally. Despite the fact they very well could return because this is not a permanent solution.</p><p>All other SO threats were either organic to the SO universe, the SO3 villains excepted, and even then they obeyed consistent logic. The Grigori did not and thus they got yeeted from the canon after SO4 and no future game ever visits them again because they break the canon by simply existing at all.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>2. The aborted "Earth accused of genocide" arc and why it was a fizzled out joke</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The Grigori manage to make fake clones of Earth troops and vessels and mass use them to screw over our space elf bros, accelerating the decay of their sun and nuking their solar system, more or less. Initially, they think we did and Shimada, the fat coward introduced at the beginning, he wants to have all of Earth's expeditionary forces mothballed so he can pretend we had nothing to do with it.</p><p>They even send out Stephen Kenny to try and make this work, but he let your team go because as a force that "doesn't exist", he can't give you orders anyway, because even he and the writers knew this angle was going nowhere.</p><p>Sure enough, it craps out in no time flat and the space elves (Eldarians) show up in the grand finale to help us out because it's obvious post-WW3 Earth never had the combat power or feasible ability or motive to screw anyone over, and the whole angle is forgotten.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>3. Shimada's death and the logical flaws in it.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>Around the time of the final, the Grigori manage to show up on Earth's doorstep. We barely manage to stop them before they waste Earth, but they do manage to kill Shimada and the lunar base. Shimada was a fat moron who no one will ever weep for, but his death raises two huge logic holes that do not mesh with the rest of the series.</p><p>He's shown eating a huge meal as he ignorantly ignores the looming threat until he gets blown to space atoms, which raises the question of how he can eat so well when it's established fact Post WW3 Earth was a wasteland with very little arable land left.</p><p>Sure, I get the writers wanted to make him as unsympathetic as they could before killing him, but CONSISTENCY WITH PRIOR ESTABLISHED CANON WAS VIOLATED WHEN THEY DID THIS.</p><p>The second flaw this scene established is that the grease spot leftover left a VERY considerable divot in the Moon. You get to revisit this area in SO3, I should have seen this sizable gash in the lunar surface in SO3.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>4. The final battle is full of dramatic cliches and set up something totally asinine.</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The writers really liked Crowe and basically slobbered his knob (pardon the crude expression) whenever they could. It gets so bad despite him getting a chance to die a perfectly sensible hero's death, there is an unlockable stinger that reveals he somehow wound up on Roak, married Elyane Farrence, and would be Roddick's ancestor.</p><p>He could have died a hero to Earth and they could have left it at that. Making him the ancestor of Roddick is pointless, it added NOTHING to the canon except a chance to add a super weak explanation for why Roddick can have a lightsaber as one of his best weapons (hinted to be Crowe's by implication). There was no need to do this. SO1 showed advanced tech that was out of place due to the involuntary migration of the Mu would have set up a perfectly logical reason to find a lightsaber on Roak somewhere, but NOOOOOO, the writers just had to turn Crowe into a Gary Stu they want to cram down our throats.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>5. EN II was a wasted plot point.</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>EN II (Energy Nede II) merely exists to pad out a plot that would have otherwise stalled without somewhere else to resume the story. That's it. Literally, it yeets itself from the lore after this game and never shows up again, despite them being known to Earth in the finale, a fact that is never followed up again.</p><p>At least Roak tried, however badly, to feel relevant, even if it was forced, but the writers obviously knew EN II would never get referenced again and thus wrote it in a way it can drop off into a black hole without anyone noticing. For a series that is fond of recalling its own lore, that's just sad.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>6. The ending makes my head hurt</b></p><p><br /></p><p>The ending established two things make my head hurt.</p><p><br /></p><p>First, the Eldarians migrate to the planet Lemuris and decide to go anarcho-primitive and start over from Square One on the tech tree and be written out of the canon. They try to use the excuse they don't want to pollute the natives with advanced tech like the Grigori as an excuse, but the problem was not the tech, it was the irresponsible handing it out without good judgment that was the problem. The writers just wanted to make sure they could shove the Eldarians into a black hole and it was badly obvious this was the best way they could think to do it.</p><p>Second, the big twist is that SO4's entire plot was the reason the Underdeveloped Planet Preservation Pact (UP3) is a series element.</p><p>This was a twist any fool saw coming a mile away and I don't have a problem with that in and of itself. My problem with it is that it was established for reasons that are backward.</p><p>True, the basic intent of the UP3 is to avoid doing to underdeveloped worlds what the Grigori did, which is fair enough, but somehow this means that Earth has to cut off all contact with the tech they got outside of what they already have, and learn it all themselves again?</p><p>Why? You can't unring the bell, all you can do is be more mindful to use that tech, regardless of the source, with good judgment and moral boundaries. SO4 is the only game where the good guys decide to punish themselves for getting advanced tech beyond their own tech tree. No other game does this because they wisely realized you can't just pretend it never happened, all you can do is to make sure future generations are more responsible.</p><p>Star Ocean 6 did something similar, but in a more reasonable way, where a medieval society had the option to make full use of the knowledge of advanced tech, and they did keep some of it that they couldn't obviously undo (like the knowledge of firearms), but wisely refused the temptation to leapfrog the tech tree and figure out the rest on their own with their own skill and wisdom.</p><p>The hacks who wrote SO4 just said everyone should get brain damage and forget they ever learned anything instead.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><b>Finale: Conclusion</b></p><p><br /></p><p>STAR OCEAN 4 WAS A TERRIBLY WRITTEN GAME, THE END.</p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3696900205506171051.post-80912459690156139532023-01-09T11:52:00.002-08:002023-01-09T15:27:11.660-08:00Why Star Ocean 4 Is A Terrible Game Part 4<p> We will resume this part with the Roak arc, which is one massive parade of terrible writing, canon defilement, and otherwise stupid writing trying to coast off nostalgia for a much better game, albeit it did introduce a clever predestination paradox and a character who deserved a much better game to be in)</p><p><br /></p><p>First, let's start off with the good stuff.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. Elayne Farrence and the GOOD predestination paradox</b></p><p>Elayne Farrence is the distant ancestor of the SO1 hero Roddick, which I could buy. She even has sequences foreshadowing the events of SO1, which I can also buy. Even the SO4-specific stuff she foreshadows would work in a game with much better writing, and I regret she was wasted on this one.</p><p>She's a fun character who takes crap off no one, tells Edge to get over himself, had good voice acting, and overall just deserved a better game.</p><p>Of course, they had to ruin this in one of the secret unlockable endings by pairing her off with someone who by all rights should be dead just so they can come with a lame reason for why the SO1 character wields a sword that is basically a lightsaber.</p><p>No, really, that's why.</p><p><br /></p><p>That idiocy aside, the other half of the good writing was that Meracle knows a crap ton about her via a book about her, but when she meets the IRL version of Elayne, is initially disappointed the book did not appear to match reality. As what turns out to be clever writing shows when you piece together the evidence, the book and Meracle were from a future timeline (one of the good uses of time travel in a game that otherwise made a hash of it) after Elayne provided the material for it, and Meracle winds up with her as an adoptee in one of the endings, where the events of the book become reality as a result.</p><p><br /></p><p>This showed actually clever writing, and considering the terrible writing this game had otherwise, I regret they did not get a better game for it.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>Now, let's cover the cringe.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>1. The entire Roak arc is unnecessary and just done to flog SO1 nostalgia.</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>Before I go on, let me just get out of the way this follows up on the alternate Earth arc, and<b> </b>the entire reason you are exploring Roak is completely unneeded from a narrative perspective. It winds up being used to advance the plot anyway, but only because the writers were miserable hacks who hastily inserted plot-forwarding scenes into Roak at certain points in a terrible attempt to disguise how much this arc was just to flog SO1 nostalgia.</p><p>The reason this was pointless is due to what triggers the events.</p><p>After getting back to your universe, that hasty repair of your engines with the magical antimatter phlebotinium from nowhere screwed up the ship engines (the warp drive portion to be exact), and thus you need to kill the engine for awhile so it can unscramble the circuits and adjust to the new engine gear. Bacchus is the one who recommends landing on Roak to do the repairs.</p><p>First off, why do I have to land on a planet when I could just idle in space? All that needs to be worked on is the warp drive, after all. Just idle somewhere, have the impulse to do minute course corrections to keep my position steady until the warp drive unscrambles itself, then I can move onward. There is no explanation for why this is not a viable option.</p><p>Alternatively, let's say the repairs DO require idling the ship on solid ground on a planet with the engines completely off. Bacchus helpfully reveals he equipped our ship with CLOAKING TECH. Since the characters (Edge especially) are understandably fearful of another "introduce advanced tech to primitive imbeciles who will cause a disaster" incident, the ship could be parked in a remote area (which is done), cloaked until we finish repairs (which is also done), and we could just cool our heels there until we need to leave again (which we could do but the game never explains why this is not a valid option).</p><p>Instead, your team decides to go out and explore for no clearly defined reason that makes narrative sense (Bacchus too, albeit under a cloak), with the weak compromise of keeping their mouths shut about their origins. You otherwise have no reason to explore Roak than the writers demanded it be done.</p><p>And the events of the arc, minus the plot essential ones they shoved in to retroactively try to cover this up, wind up having ZERO impact on the overall story. Roak (mostly the Astral continent in truncated form really) just winds up being an excuse to do some sidequests, deal with a boss who is vaguely implied to be a Grigori but has no real connection to them otherwise, throw a ton of SO1 references at the wall one after another to prove the writers are aware of something that was written better than their hackjob efforts, and has all the extra content like the obligatory colosseum and minigames, essentially making it a scaled-down version of what we got in Fun City in SO2 and Gemity in SO3.</p><p><br /></p><p><b>2. The plot essential stuff that they did include could have been done elsewhere.</b></p><p><b><br /></b></p><p>The writers were clearly not total fools. They did realize Roak had a weak place in their story and so strove to shove in some plot-centric stuff to make it "relevant". The fact Roak's connection to the plot was initially none kneecaps the effort, but to be fair, since it was clearly done for SO1 nostalgia flogging in the first place, I must concede it's fair enough they didn't want to look totally lame by having to straight up admit that.</p><p>However, here is the plot-relevant stuff they added, and why it was done poorly and could and should have been done elsewhere.</p><p><br /></p><p>A. The Muah connection first comes up in this arc. Reimi has to take over as leader since Edge is still in mope mode over the alt Earth arc and thus useless in command, at least until she winds up falling over from a disease that turns out to be 'stone sickness". Yes, the same thing from SO1.</p><p>During this arc, we find out about how Reimi and Edge got marked with Muah symbology at birth and Reimi got the mixed blessing of total disease immunity, which also made her nigh immune to radiation degeneration (which is admittedly plausible, as radiation's effects on cells would have degenerative effects much like a disease), but also got her cursed by parents whose kids died in the radiation horror world of post-WW3 while she didn't.</p><p>The problem is that this part exists to explain this badly shoehorned retro canon that defiles prior canon, but we already covered that before. Worse, this also triggers a brief part where Edge finally starts to get over himself and hunts down the cure for her condition, which the King of Astral has. This just raises more questions about how this jibes with SO1 at all since there was no mention there was a cure for this disease in SO1 until after we took the blood of the guy whose DNA was used to make the original contagion. Also, if she has was amounts to medical immortality (though not total immortality, she still does age), why wasn't her body laughing off stone sickness before it could do any damage?</p><p>If she was practically immune to nigh every conventional disease and was exposed to high radiation without mutation damage, she should be laughing off a blood-based pathogen with neurological degenerative effects too.</p><p>The answer for this is simple: SO1 plot nostalgia flogging, whether it made a mess of canon was not important.</p><p><br /></p><p>B. Faize becomes the villain. </p><p><br /></p><p>I'll be blunt, this was really shoddy writing. They obviously wanted the final boss to be Faize after turning "evil", the foreshadowing is really unsubtle, and the writing is cringe. I already explained why most of it was poorly done, so I'll just cover the Roak-specific parts and explain the idiocy.</p><p>Faize meets a cute bunny-riding nomad girl and gets a sweet cloak from her. Knows her all five minutes really. She later turns up dead thanks to some nutty cult. Faize appears to have gone totally insane from this and was trying to suppress it.</p><p>Granted, if you hunt through the in-game encyclopedia and pay attention to various scenes throughout the game prior, it's a bit more complicated than that, but the writers due to their inability to tell a story well, they basically just made it look like Faize immediately jumped off the sanity cliff due to this scene alone. </p><p>Basically, Love makes you Evil/Crazy, as written by horrible writers.</p><p><br /></p><p>C. Tamiel and the whole Asmodeus cult.</p><p><br /></p><p>This whole thing was obviously crammed into the Roak arc so the writers could claim it wasn't just an SO1 nostalgia fest, but it has glaring problems that still make it pointless.</p><p>Tamiel has a very Grigori-ish name and even has one of their signature crystals embedded in his head. That said, he does nothing else to hint he is anything other than a nutbar death cult leader. His entire cult isn't a totally bad idea in theory, makes sense on a primitive planet that had been dealing with demonic invasions some crazed retards might start worshiping the invaders, but the execution is rather silly, has no greater bearing on anything, and makes it hard to tell just when Asmodeus showed up. In SO1, he explicitly stuck around his little pocket dimension and only sent his goons out to start trouble every so often, you had to go to him via a very specific portal. Somehow, this death cult wants to end run around this and yeet him right onto our reality on Roak, via means that make no logical sense aside from wearing out tired "virgin sacrifice" cliches.</p><p>How this would have worked is anyone's guess, and the writers just didn't bother trying to insert logic into it. Given the SO games usually try to give a sci-fi technobabble explanation a la Star Trek at absolute worst, this was just garbage writing all around.</p><p>What makes things even worse is that they are defeated in the Purgatorium, a place that in no way resembles its SO1 incarnation and Tamiel's defeat melts a MASSIVE HOLE into the bottom floor, which you think would still be there 300 years later. Worse, where are the beings you met in the said temple that did not want to be disturbed from SO1? How is there not a front and rear entrance to the Purgatorium? Why is the cult never heard from again after you off Tamiel?</p><p>The writers do not bother to address this because they just shoved this half-baked arc out the door to give you a reason to be on Roak other than "just because" and they did it poorly.</p><p><br /></p><p>D. Myuria joins you on Roak.</p><p><br /></p><p>Myuria is that woman with the abbreviated outfit who showed up on the Cardinaon vessel and somehow got off despite them never shoving her means of transport (and how she got to Roak is never clearly explained either). They have her finally join you on Roak and stick with you till the end of the game, and frankly, given the overall pointlessness of the Roak arc, they obviously included her here when she could have joined you in a far more plot-relevant location WITH Bacchus just to pad out the poor Roak arc.</p><p><br /></p><p>E. The SO1 flogging and why it's so badly done</p><p>The SO1 nostalgia flogging shows off the following thing.</p><p>1a. Most of the locations from the Astral Continent from SO1.</p><p>1b. A younger Lias Warren and Ashlay Bernbelt (the latter is a fight in the Collesseum as a bonus boss of sorts.</p><p>1c. The King of Astral (who is depicted light-skinned here, his older self in SO1 is nigh entirely black)</p><p>1d. More Muah foreshadowing in the Purgatorium, despite the fact what they show does not match what is found in the same location in SO1.</p><p>1e. Stone Sickness (the Bacculus from Lemuris is a red herring, but even the real version breaks canon for several reasons explained above) and the cure (which should not exist in any form YET)</p><p>1f. Lots of other minor winks and nods to SO1.</p><p>I could go on, but generally, Roak is just here for reminding you that you could be playing a game that is much better while SO4 defecated all over its much better legacy.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>GethN7http://www.blogger.com/profile/00367352075223924769noreply@blogger.com2