Nick - The Best Game Ever

We've all heard the arguments about which video game is the best game ever: they say that Super Mario changed the tides of gaming; they say that The Legend Of Zelda: Ocarina Of Time was the most innovative game ever.

But of course, we all know which game is really the best ever.

Final Fantasy X - 2 has everything a good video game needs. It has interesting characters, a meaningful plot line, and you can play dress-up.

Just looking at the cover, we can see out three main characters. Rikku is sassy and fun. Yuna is smart and relatable. And Paine is strong and don't take sass from nobody.

Unfortunately, the rest of the Final Fantasy series is sorely disappointing; it's filled with confusing plot lines and repetitive gameplay. But hey, I won't complain since it gave us one of the greatest games of all time in the form of X - 2.

-Nick.

Conor - This Post Actually Happened

Nicholas Dietrich I am a man of my word, eventually.

Everyone's seen Inception, right? Even if you haven't, listen to this. This is the ending theme to Christopher Nolan's Inception, and it's a powerful, powerful theme. Without giving away the details to the plot of the movie (the summary would probably get pretty longwinded and hard to follow anyway), the ending is emotional. It's triumphant, but there's a sadness underneath it all. There's ambiguity there, and the pain all of the characters have gone through is evident through this song. Hans Zimmer is incredible and I love this song, but movies are terribly finite things. The song starts, and 3 or 4 minutes later it's gone. It comes, it goes, and that's all we get. It captures the moment perfectly, but the moment is much too short. 

That's the beauty of Nobou Uematsu's work. He is the man who is responsible for probably like 99.9% of the music in the first ten Final Fantasy's. Nobou Uematsu's primary line of work does not involve capturing a scene, although when asked he does that quite skillfully. No. Nobou captures characters, towns, and entire worlds through his songs, and I love him for it.

Take Aerith's theme, for example. Or maybe her name is Aeris. Squaresoft sortof fucked up on that one. Aerith is the light of hope in Final Fantasy VII. She's a tragic character, but she never falls or breaks down to the sadness around her. She's unrelentingly positive, and not in an annoying way. Despite her outlook she can't prevent her death at the hands of Sephiroth, a girly looking badass, but she dies smiling. She's stabbed through the chest with a giant katana and she's like, smiling. This song perfectly communicates all of this. At least to me it does. Aerith's death scene is iconic, but I think it's the events immediately following that really blew me away the second time I played through the game. After Aerith totally dies and stuff the play her theme, and even as you fight this huge mutated beast, her theme continues to play, reminding us of why we're fighting and what we've lost. Ask Brian and Eliot, I didn't shut up about how cool I found that shit. 

Combat in Final Fantasy takes on 2 different forms. 1) Battles that are relevant to the story, i.e., fights with central antagonists, confrontational battles that push the plot forward. 2) Random fights that are irrelevant and extraneous, but necessary, because, well, it's a video game. Random fights comprise the vast, vaaaast majority and there's such variety in these battles that Nobou has to make upbeat, energetic, dramatic music that won't become obnoxious when listened to for the 300th time. He's damn good at it, too. FF VII and X have particularly good ones. But it's in the specific, story related fights that the epicness truly kicks it into high gear. With these specific tunes Nobou gets to personalize his themes. The final boss of FF VII is classic. Basically, the aforementioned pretty boy Sephiroth has turned into a shirtless angel 6 wings making up his lower body and a huge dark halo surrounding him. He has become a god, and his first new law as God is that he's going to destroy everything. A bold move that I think politicians should mimic. The music is apocalyptic and chaotic, the chorus sings "SEPHIROTH" and the world feels like it's falling apart. Awesome. Awesome.

I'm worried that I'm asking too much of you guys, so one last song. Check it out, Ami, from Final Fantasy VIII. This is the theme of the one place the main characters call home in the game. It's the only place they really belong, and as the game goes on they're forced to consider their home in a critical light and question it, but they never truly forsake it. While walking through the place, this is the song that plays, and by the end of the game you've probably heard this music dozens of times, for literally hours, but it never becomes grating. It always feels welcoming, familiar and warm. Whenever I walk back into Balamb Garden it's there. It's infinite.

The length of Final Fantasy games contributes to the music. Games take 40+ hours to beat. If it's one of the better Final Fantasy's, by the end you know the world and characters pretty damn well. Imagine if someone you were really attached to had a theme song. Imagine that your house, or some other place you truly love, had a song that embodied everything you liked about it. That's what Nobou gives to us. That's what he deals in. 

I TAKE MY FINAL FANTASY MUSIC PRETTY SERIOUSLY. 

Conor - Over and Over

I'm currently at the Duffy House, listening to the song "Over and Over" by Hot Chip, a band I could've seen live this summer, had I not decided to instead stand in front of a stage that would soon house the Strokes, pouting childishly because Brian Malone had jinxed me. It's a really cool song, but admittedly, it's very repetitive. It's not like Hot Chip would deny this, either. The chorus of the song acknowledges this perceived flaw and embraces.

"Over and over and over and over and over, like a monkey with a miniature cymbal, the joy of repetition really is in you."

"The joy of repetition," it says. The word repetition makes me think of school, or the bulk of Pokemon games, or work. It's not a positive word. It's boring, tiring. It's a family dinner you can't get away from. Hot Chip makes a case for it here. Maybe sarcastically, they deliver that line in a really monotone voice, but hey. If they're not making that case, I am.

Case in point, here I am at the duffy house where 5 of the frisbee guys live. A house 2 blocks away from campus, 15 minutes away from my dorm, and approximately 5 minutes away via my new bicycle. The front door is always unlocked. When you get here, you walk in, you do not knock. They mock you if you knock. From where I'm sitting I can see 11 frisbees, 2 wide screen tv's (both of which are currently being used), 4 speakers for their stereo system, and 2 identical Halo: Reach posters. The walls are a dirty beige color, and they have a bumpy texture. So... It's like a filthy, bumpy layer of eggnog. Over the walls and the ceiling. Ideal. I come here probably 3 or 4 times a week. Coming here means one of three things. Either A) I am sitting building my impressive-yet-utterly-futile-in-the-face of-the-godlike-Robert-Langellier Mario Kart skills, B) playing Black Out with varying degrees success, or C) picking up the tuxedo I consistently leave at their house before I go to a choir concert.

Going over to the duffy house isn't the most exciting thing in the world, but it's full of people that I like, and it's comfortable, familiar. By this point it's become a tradition for me to head over there. It's something that happens all the time, but I want it to happen. It's practically unimaginable that one could live a life devoid of repetition. How many new experiences do you have, daily? I didn't do anything completely new today, that's for sure. But I had a good time. I controlled my repetitions. I repeated the events I wanted to experience again, like going over to the duffy house, or laughing at someones misfortunes. (today: the janitors at the school of music when I put 20 empty cardboard boxes in/around the same trash can, shifting my burden to them. Yesterday: Someone not gifted with my looks, talent, or talent.)

For a week when I was 9 or 10, Peter Eck and Nick Dietrich and I watched Kung Pow: Enter The Fist! every damn day. There was a week when we did pretty much nothing but that. I would like to act like that wasn't true, but fellas you know I'm not fronting no fuckin' lie.

Starting in middle school, every half day a bunch of my friends and I would meet at D&J's cafe, a diner near my house. We would go there, overtip the waitress because we hadn't learned the value of money yet, head back to my place, and play Guitar Hero and a variation on 4 square called Cobra-Ball. I was predictably unstoppable at Cobra-ball, one of the many instances of life foreshadowing my eventual evolution into the ultimate athlete.*

FFFF.

Creating chaos and anarchy for several of my high school teachers with my eternal side-kick/love interest? Mada Larson. We got into a fight in which I swept the feet out from underneath her in order to get a nickel that I craved, that I needed. We chased eachother out of her room, down from her 4th floor tower to the 2nd floor when we policed ourselves, deciding we should head back up. She shrugged when we walked back in.

Improv sleepovers, and the inevitable temper tantrum I throw around 4 or 5 A.M. GET READY FOR THAT, FUTURE WIVES.

The 4 - 5 hour practice Band Practice always has before a gig because we didn't have time and we didn't have time and we didn't time until shiiiit we're playing a show tonight, guys.

Steak n' Shake. Dear god, Steak n' Shake. SOMEONE IN ILLINOIS GO EAT STEAK N' SHAKE ASAP. DO IT FOR ME.

Being irresistible.*

There are traditions here, too. They have traditions in Oklahoma, I shit you not. Every Tuesday, Thursday** and Sunday I have ultimate practice. Tuesdays and Thursdays after practice upperclassmen bully me and push me into lockers until I take them to the legendary cafeteria. Every week or so we have (lowercase) band practice. After every band practice we play racquetball which is good and fun, especially when you make up rules that would, if discovered, undoubtedly get your equipment privileges taken away. This burrito place here, Freebirds, has this cute little tradition of telling me that it will soon be ending it's half-off student discount, but then it sees the fire in my eyes and walks its cute, submissive ass straight to the cash register, where they give me the half-off student discount.

All of these things I love. All of these things I value. All of these things I'm glad to see come and go, if not daily, then weekly, or monthly, or whenever we have time. Sometimes I don't have the time, or sometimes I'm just forgetful, and sortof a bad friend. Too often a tradition has died, or I've missed a regular lunch date with a friend because I just didn't put enough effort into making sure it would survive/I'd be awake. I'm sorry, I'm perpetually sorry.

This break, I will play Final Fantasy with two of my bestest friends. Mada and I will eventually return to SHS and burn it down or something unspeakably cool like that. Freebirds will continue to give me my goddamn discount. Soon, a D&J's will occur. I'll make sure of it.

Peter and Nick though, we uh probably shouldn't watch Kung Pow ever again. I'm afraid of realizing how much time we wasted.




*As determined in a recent game of Likewise

**Who gives a fuck about an Oxford Comma?