Now, open your eyes, relax your focus, widen your perception to include your peripheral vision. Look around. Take in every detail. Every color. Every texture. Every reflection. Notice how you feel and your relationship to the space around you.

Relish this feeling and try to memorize as much as you can. This is important. You have now seen the world as it really is and must become a receptacle for this reality. You are temporarily free from the influence of Reality Enforcement.

Reality Enforcement wants you to be: afraid, vain, greedy, self-centered, narcissistic, insensitive, competitive and hateful. Their messages are all around you, trying to exhaust you into submission. When you watch television, when you read a billboard, even when you use Facebook.

But, in the real world that you are experiencing now, humans are naturally cooperative, vulnerable, collaborative, compassionate, sharing and loving.

The longer you can hold the memory and focus on it’s details, the more the efforts of Reality Enforcement to suppress human nature will be thwarted, the more humanity will become truly free.

You are now part of the resistance.

So I went walking this morning, as I do when I want to smell the countless hints of human and non-human life wafting in the moist Sunday morning Spring breeze.  My mind was spinning with thoughts: things I need to do today, this week, for the rest of my life.  But walking has a way of burning down stress hormones, opening the heart and mind, awakening new perceptions.

That’s when I noticed him, reclining comfortably in his little gazebo in front of a Viet Namese Buddhist church I’d never seen before.  I’ve passed this way hundreds, thousands of times. But I’ve never seen this little gazebo before.  From the look of the wood, it’s been there for some time.

Am I fooled by appearances?  Is this a new addition to the neighborhood?

Has he been here all along, waiting for me to notice him, to cross the street as if drawn by some invisible force, to bow to him with respect, respect for what he represents and for myself?

Or — and this is the sort of radical thought that quickens my pulse with the excitement of a possibly unsolvable mystery that must nonetheless be explored — was his “revealing” the result of recent changes in my own consciousness, in my own perception, that have allowed me to slip into another nearby reality where this Buddha exists, leaving my previous reality where he did not?

I was so taken aback, I spent the next few days struggling with what my sister calls “stair step wit,” namely that you think of perfect things to say when you’ve already left the building, when you’re standing on the step outside metaphorically and, sometimes, literally. Too late for the satisfaction of actually saying it.

How can I answer that?

I could say that computer games develop hand-eye coordination and reasoning skills as well as memory and a host of other abilities. Then again, so do more “non-geeky” activities like athletics, memorizing sports statistics and thinking about game strategies.

Science fiction and fantasy stories encourage an open mind about ideas, people and cultures that are different from our own.  But so can things like listening to the BBC world service or reading a newspaper.

Roleplaying games force you to imagine yourself as someone else, in another time and place, doing things that are usually impossible in your real life.  However, any kind of story, whether it be a movie or a book or a television show, can do that.  Even the most mundane crime dramas ask you to imagine yourself as someone else, a cop or a criminal, in another time or place, doing things that might be impossible for you, such as being a serial killer or capturing one.

I think what really sets “geeky” activities apart from what the majority of people would describe as “normal” activities isn’t about what they develop within us.  They’re about something external to us, something that allow us to explore that’s special, something I call Possibility Space.

What makes activities like fantasy role playing games, reading science fiction or fantasy and exploring fringe ideas online unique isn’t that they allow us to explore things that are not possible for us in our real lives.  It’s that they allow us to explore infinitely large Possibility Spaces of things that may or may not be possible at all, for anyone, in any time or place, without boundaries.

If the Possibility Space of baseball games is vast and it is — the number of permutations of events through the course of a game is huge — how much larger is the Possibility Space of baseball-like games that can be imagined but may or may not be possible?  For example, imagine an alien race that plays a baseball-like game where the field is a solar system, the ball is an autonomous probe and the bats and gloves are electromagnetic nets that catch or repel the probe.  How would the game differ from twenty first century American baseball?  What rules would have to be added?  How would the game change if you removed or changed rules?  What if an explosive charge was added to the probe that would literally knock a runner out of the game, ending his, her or it’s life?  What would constitute a foul ball and how would it be retrieved?

Such speculations might be silly or wasteful here and now but expanding our Possibility Space is not about here and now.  It’s about there and then, even if we can’t imagine how or if we might get there.

Solar system baseball might not be relevant today but, in 500 years, when we’ve colonized the solar system, it might be startlingly relevant when corporations are trying to figure out how to divert natural human aggressions and frustrations into something more constructive when every spacecraft, of which there might be thousands or millions, possesses the ability to destroy the Earth or whichever other planets we’ve claimed as homes

Or thinking about those questions might permit them to find more efficient ways of ferrying resources, asteroids for example, around the solar system and safely to their destinations.

Of course, all of this might seem far-fetched.  But what about the geeky kid in the 70s imagining space battles in three or even four dimensions in entertainment such as Star Trek or Star Wars?  Was she wasting her time?  Or is she working for Space-X, Nasa or the military imagining how to knock down an enemy spacecraft, a satellite or missile, before it does untold harm to millions?

What about the kid in the 80s reading about the adventures of Conan the Barbarian or playing Dungeons and Dragons?  What possible relevance could that have?  Does it allow him to be a better member of a team in work or education, willing to work with others more effectively because he’s played out countless scenarios where his imaginary characters could not survive on their own, could not prosper without cooperating with other players beyond just asking, “What’s in it for me?”

What about the teenager in the 90s reading books like Snow Crash?  Wasn’t virtual reality a no-starter, an idea we left behind as being beyond the needs and technology of real people in the real world?  Maybe she’s writing new science fiction about augmented reality glasses that allow us to overlay data and images in ways that enhance our ability to interact with the world around us, inspiring a new generation of technologists to ask how this could be done.  Or maybe she’s working at Google on the Google Glass research team, realizing that current technology is more than adequate to do something that will change culture and computing in profound and fundamental ways.

Would any of those things be possible if those people “wasting” their time on fantastic games and stories hadn’t opened their mind to infinitely larger Possibility Spaces, many of which seemingly have no relevance to our normal daily lives?

I don’t think so.

Inside I am Noda-Chan and this is how I feel pretty much every day, like I’m trying to create something beautiful to enjoy and share with others but someone has to come and thoughtlessly wipe it away.

When I’m most myself, I’m creative, emotional, imaginative, open, intuitive, adventurous, enthusiastic, ready to enjoy the world. These are natural to me and, when I get to be this way, I’m effective, productive and able to solve problems.

But then it seems  there are always people insisting I be quiet, keep to myself, avoid painting outside the lines and suppress my enthusiasm because it’s unseemly or annoying. Or they demand that I be frightened, feel threatened by a “dangerous” world full of criminals and evil-doers and the menacing “other.” Or they just ignore me or dismiss me because “everyone knows” happy, creative, intuitive people can’t possibly consider every outcome, don’t strive for impossible-to-achieve perfection, don’t subsume themselves under a smothering blanket of “professionalism.”  Therefore, they can’t be serious enough to be taken seriously.  Right?

Trying to live like that, however, is literally hurting me. I’ve developed nerve compression in my back and shoulders from tension. My hands and feet tingle disturbingly even though there’s nothing medically wrong with me.  My concentration suffers. Everything takes longer and loses its luster. Life becomes a death march. Every day seems an exercise in waiting to fail, to disappoint people, to fall short of expectations, to step on a land mine.

So I’m not doing it anymore.  I would rather be punished for being myself, for sharing myself in a way that honors who I really am, than to be rewarded for faking it, for going with the flow, for trying not to rock the boat, for living a cliched life where I do and say (and write O.o ) cliched, worn out things.

Who says that I can’t sing a silly song while doing serious things?  Who says I can’t be sad and mad and glad, in measures appropriate to how I actually feel?  Who says I can’t achieve amazing things in my quirky, random, cobble-it-together-from-scraps way of doing?  Who says I have to patiently wait my turn when I’m bursting with ideas, approaches, insights?  Who says I have to sit still?  Who says I can’t think up wonderful solutions when I’m running around, jumping around, dancing?

Who says that being some other way than how I really am would be better for me, for them, for the people in my personal and professional life?

I’ve done some of the most cool stuff in my life being myself and I’ve made some of my worst mistakes trying to be the way other people think is “appropriate.”

So I’ll do things my way, explore without fear, experiment without expectation, create with abandon, surrender to intuition and vulnerability, dance and sing and be silly, open my emotions and be who and what I choose to be when I want.  I know it’ll be better for me and everyone around me.  I have something valuable to share by being myself.

If it means that some people might reject me, dismiss me or laugh at me, then there will be others who will value me, want to be around me and seek me out.  If it means that I might lose some opportunities, then others will open. If it means that I’ll make mistakes, miss some little detail or be messy, then I’ll also have happy accidents, have the enthusiasm and creativity to seek out new solutions and allow chaos to generate for me new approaches and directions.  If it means that people might get mad at me, be annoyed by me or dislike me, then others will be uplifted by me, encouraged to be enthusiastic and will like me.

Whatever it means, in the words of Jean Luc Picard, “If we’re to be damned, let’s be damned for what we really are.”

Somehow, I have a feeling things will work out just fine.

(I bolded “seem” because I think it’s important not to co-opt the Occupy movement’s agenda or speak for it.  This is just my sense, from collected comments, of what it’s platform might be.)

1) CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM

2) OVERTURN CITIZENS UNITED

3) PUT WALL STREET CRIMINALS IN JAIL

4) Close GITMO

5) ensure that the Internet remains open and free

6) HEALTHCARE HEALTHCARE HEALTHCARE

7) Resurrect Habeas Corpus

8) Repeal the Patriot Act

9) Make insider trading by members of our Congress illegal!

10) Stop “entitlements” for wealthy corporations!

11) Bring our Troops home – now – all of them!

12) Tax Wall Street transactions.

13) remove most of the perks that politicians enjoy

It was, for all intents and purposes, my first complete script intended for production.  Although I can see a hundred ways it could be improved, I was pretty happy with it.  I felt it had a nice inciting incident, a reasonable climax and represented a more or less complete story.

Of course, then I happened upon a comment where someone referred to the dialogue as “utter shit.” Now I feel compelled to write more scripts to prove I can do better.

In either case, this is the script that I locked and printed at 5:32am on Saturday, July 30, 2011:  The Door Script in PDF format.

And here is the film that was produced from it:

Because I take the commitment seriously, I’ve been reading The Hollywood Standard and learning Celtx, free scriptwriting software. It also does novels, storyboards and so on.

This is my first scriptwriting effort… ever. It’s an experiment. So please be gentle.  I think Celtx did a very nice job, however, and made it much easier to adhere to the complex rules of script formatting.

Save the Zoo

This time, I’ll talk a bit about some other foundational tables that I’ve constructed, mostly the Characters table.

The Players table isn’t really that interesting right now, mostly just a record of usernames, passwords and PINs that players will eventually be able to use to log in from the game client to the game server.  A copy of this table will also be used on the eventual web site for the game to allow players to purchase in game money, sign up for discussion forums and so on.  At some point, we’ll have to build a login screen on the game client so we’ll revisit this table later on.  The only reason to build it now is because the Characters table will have a foreign key that will connect one or more characters to a given player.

The Characters table is where we’ll get to wallow in some actual game mechanics for the first time.

+------------------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| Field            | Type             | Null | Key | Default | Extra          |
+------------------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| character_id     | int(10) unsigned | NO   | PRI | NULL    | auto_increment |
| player_id        | int(10) unsigned | NO   | MUL | NULL    |                |
| character_name   | varchar(255)     | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| character_class  | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_thought     | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_imagination | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_matter      | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_energy      | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| character_level  | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_health      | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_power       | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_armorclass  | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_tohit       | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| stat_plurfulness | int(10) unsigned | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
+------------------+------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+

Again, we’ll keep things very simple, leaving optimization and any encryption of data fields for another time.

When you inspect the table, you might notice that there’s been a change from when I did the Character_Classes table.  I’ve changed the base stats, largely as a result of a conversation with my friend Jeremy who possesses an absolute wealth of knowledge about building RPGs.

We were discussing the way that elemental forces such as earth, air, fire and water are naturally opposed to each other and how this leads naturally to skills in RPGs being associated, either naturally or through ‘buffs,’ with certain elements.  When these skills are used against opponents who are associated with a certain element, they are made either stronger or weaker depending on the nature of the opposing elements.  For instance, a water attack will be weak against a water based creature but strong against a creature associated with fire.

Similarly, certain base stats are naturally opposed to one another.  In classic RPGs, a fast, agile character (with high agility) can get in close to a large, strong character (high strength) and do lots of damage.  However, if the larger opponent gets in a hit, they are going to do a lot of damage to the smaller, agile character.

I knew that I wanted a novel stats system for CEW, one that would accurately represent the nature of reality in the CEW universe, a reality in which the outcome of conflict is determined more by the manipulation of reality itself rather than whether a character has certain objective attributes.

What we came up with is a system of 4 base stats in 2 pairs of 2 opposing stats.

Thought (Left Brain Logical) opposes Imagination (Right Brain Holistic).

Matter (Physical Mass) opposes Energy (Non-Physical Potential or Action).

Because all skills in CEW are essentially “magickal,” even those normally considered non-magickal such as hand to hand combat or used a ranged weapon, these 4 stats represent the 4 spheres in which skills can be used.  Skills can affect matter or energy or some combination of both.  They can also use logical thought or holistic imagination or some combination of both.

If you go back to the character classes defined earlier, it’s not to difficult to determine which will be the primary and secondary stat for each.

A Maker’s primary stat will be Thought because a Maker must be able to think logically and understand the working and structure of physical objects.  Her secondary stat will be Matter because she is dealing largely with inanimate physical objects.

A Healer’s primary stat will be Imagination because, as a class that works largely with living beings, the complexity of trying to understand them in a reductionist fashion would simply be overwhelming.  Consequently, she must be able to imagine the objects of her work in a holistic fashion, not as an assemblage of units but as a system of cycles.  Because she is primarily concerned with animate beings, her secondary stat will be Energy.

A (Peace)Keeper’s primary stat will be Matter because she uses her skills to affect the abilities of her physical body.  Her secondary stat is Imagination because, like the warrior who uses Zen to enter a state of no-mind so as to perform “Right Action” without having to think about it logically, she must use her skills in a holistic, in-the-moment manner.

Finally, a Traveler’s primary stat will be Energy because she opens portals to other subrealities and manipulates energy so as to appear invisible, to move with great speed and so on.  Her secondary state will be Thought because she must use her logical, problem solving mind to defeat traps and locks, detect dangers and use her cleverness to move stealthily.

The Characters table contains 4 fields that will contain the current values for these stats:  stat_thought, stat_imagination, stat_matter and stat_energy.  Right now these are absurdly large integer fields which I’ll pare down later.

Although these stats can be changed, either permanently or temporarily, they are base stats because they are relatively stable and because the other stats are calculated, at least in part, from them.

Except for character_level and stat_plurfulness (which I’ll explain later), the other stats are all calculated and can change substantially during a single session of play.  There are a few stats missing from the table right now but I’ll add those, such as a field to keep track of experience points and another to keep track of current maximum values for certain stats.

For now, let’s focus on stat_health and stat_power.  These two are extremely important because they indicate whether you’re able not only to perform actions but, indeed, whether you’re even able to stand.