Art, in general, has become too personalized. We often only consider art to be the stuff that moves us. While that isn't always off the mark, that thought process can become destructive to music or drawings that can only be considered art.

For instance, consider Stravinsky's 'Rite of Spring' or 'Firebird Suite'. Those two songs (epic anthems of the 20th century), while both technically proficient, are not logical enough to be considered anything BUT art. If we say that we don't like the song, by the previous definition of the word 'art', we are shortchanging the work of the artist.

I suggest a definition much more broad, to include all skills and sets that reach beyond the realm of logic and technicallity, but are often achieved using the two:

Art is the application of romantic logic used to evoke certain emotions or thoughts, although those emotions or thoughts do not have to be part of the intention of the art, they do have to be present in the appreciation of it from one person or another.

Yes. That means that Fall Out Boy is, in fact, art. (I realize that my tone might offend someone. I assure you, I'm not trying to). That doesn't mean you have to consider it good art, but it is still art. Specifically speaking, the reason why I don't like Fall Out Boy has nothing to do with Fall Out Boy. I simply believe there is much better music out there worth searching for.

So, after butchering my own view of art onto a blog, I will throw out a couple of the most epic songs I've listened to recently. I am excluding 'Rite of Spring' and 'Firebird Suite' because I know none of you have the time to sit through that.

You Are the Blood bySufjan Stevens --I realize that evrydayblues will either fawn over the song, or has already fawned over the song. Seriously, sit down and start listening to it. I should warn you though, it's a long song. The original song was sung by a group called the Castanets.

Another Way to Die by Jack White and Alicia Keys --when I first heard the song, I didn't know what to think. Now, since I recently ran into it, I think it's an incredible song.

btw, I hear that the Flaming Lips new album "Embryonic" is very good. I've been listening to it on grooveshark. After writing all that out, I don't want to consider what makes art anymore. I'm just gonna enjoy it.

happy listening,

-nick

I've recently been indulging myself in 3 things: FF Tactics Advance, Golden Sun, and Toaster Strudels. The Toaster Strudels have been great by the way. And... for those of you who don't like them, consider using a toaster oven.

What I find lovely about both these games is the gameplay. FFTA is certainly one of the most polished tactical RPGs I've played in recent memory (it deserves at least an entire point more than Fire Emblem on Gamespot). FFTA is faster, more interesting, and also has different sprites for all the weapons.

You might not consider it such a big deal, but the difference between two really good games comes down to the amount of content in the game. My biggest beef with Fire Emblem has always been about its rather shallow level of content, mainly because they spend all their time animating each character frame by frame instead of trying to make a package that generally looks good all around. Enix has been good about that for the most part.

Don't get me wrong though, I used to love modifying the Fire Emblem sprites. They are very well animated, but highly unecessary for a good game.

Mommy, I don't like fantasy stories because they're so full of convention they make me cry!!

My biggest beef though is with these fantasy game's stories. I love fantasy stories, but there is a point in which your just telling us how a band of buddies is walking around dark caves because they were destined to do it, yet no one seems to know why a bunch of 16 year old brats is supposed to save the world when there are other, obviously better dudes to do it. It doesn't make sense. (Golden Sun)

Also consider the whole 'nation goes to war' thing. The beef I had with Fire Emblem was non-effective dialouge. Everyone was too friggin' nice. Each character is either really good and nice and kind, or really bad, and if they stand in the middle, they always lean to the good side after some wierd realization in which they become good and awesome and nice and beautiful and everythings peachy.

Of the three games, FFTA has the strongest story. This isn't because the story is anything phenomenol. Its explainable and non-laughable, but the dialouge is great. Each character has a strong persona (which is an english word for defineable character, not a videogame).

I was recently reading this article and was flabbergasted at how slobberish people were over Phantom Hourglass. Now, hear me out before I go off on a rant. I don't believe Ocarina of Time is the best game ever, but I did enjoy playing it because I had lots of great memories surrounding it. Windwaker, I believe is the greatest in the series. This is only because everything about the game is very different (except for the storyline).

I first got my hands on Phantom Hourglass sometime last year after all my other friends bought it in unison. We never really talked about the game while we played it and all of us got bored after 2 or 3 dungeons and stopped playing. To my knowledge, we've all sold our copies of PH for highly discounted prices on ebay (well, I did anyway).

This is why I feel the game was terrible:

--The 2D sprites don't translate well into the 3D world. When we see or think 3D, we think more realism and randomness. The problem is that the 3D version of zelda seemed less densly populated and was quite boring to look at (2D sprites are so much more interesting).

--Number 2: the story is bad and predictable. The old man in the game (aka Ocean King) tends to show up in rather unexplainable places in unexplainable ways even though he has "no powers". I've been trying to get over this giant gap in the storyline, but its useless. I'm bothered by it and I don't feel like trying to come up with anything that involves assorted themes such as time travel and teleportation. That's that star trek sh!t right there.

--the gameplay wasn't actually that interesting. The touch screen gameplay was kinda cool, but not enough to carry the game. Its the same case with the Conduit: they focus all their attention on controls and forget everything else that makes a game good. In fact, I found the touch screen to be more of a burden in this case. Trying to get Link to roll into a tree for that random 100 rupees was unecessarilly difficult.

--the puzzles were boring. I did actually find a couple of puzzles that were obtuse and hard. I sorta like those, but some of them were incredibly easy. For fear of losing the gamer, they often give away the puzzle from the very beginning. Sometimes though, the puzzles got so obtuse that they screamed castlevainian influence.

--the game is highly repetitive. Going back to the ocean temple to repeat all the crushingly easy puzzles was frustrating to the point of anger. I read through some reviews that said, "oh, its just a little bit repetitive, but if your willing to forgive the developers for it, you'll enjoy the game." WHAT!?! A little repetitive? NO! THUMB DOWN! THUMB DOWN! this is *not* helpful. Consider beating yourself with a hammer multiple times. Its not fun.

In any case, it's sequel: Spirit Tracks, despite it's obviously corny, desperate, and derivative concept looks to be just as bad. I can forgive a bad story, in the case of Golden Sun, but I can't forgive a generally bland and boring game. There are much better adventure games on the DS and many better adventure games in general. Consider 'A Link to the Past' or 'Link's Awakening'. Both are incredibly good games and have fairly satisfying adventure stories.

A friend of mine compared this game to Lost, not because of it's incredibly complex story, but because of it's very mysterious story (funny, they never actually said the word mysterious in the game).

As a note, I enjoy Link's Awakening for it's complete lack of story and general randomness. The fact of the matter is that each dungeon and area has more contrast than Golden Sun, FFTA, Fire Emblem and especially Phantom Hourglass combined.

In any case, I'm not buying Spirit Tracks and I don't find it ethical in any way to burn puppies.

peace,

-nick

First is Lump. Not incredibly good looking, but the concept looks incredibly fun!

Then you have Aftershock. It's a wipeout clone with some incredible artwork.

peace out,

-nick