Art imitates life... life imitates Snow Crash

It was the second half of the year 1997, another time, when the world was a lot less connected and the airwaves were still free of the clutches of cell phones, I was attending Universidad Panamericana (the Panamerican University) back then, my experience with science fiction was limited to a couple of Star Wars novels I'd managed to pick up right after college, that was about to change.

One of the most influential teachers I had back then, liked to diverge off topic every couple of classes, I guess to keep us from falling asleep and in some part to pass along more than mere facts and theoretical knowledge, in one such deviation he started talking about science fiction, cyberpunk in particular, a sub-genre of science fiction that deals with advanced technology in the near future basically ruining life as we know it, The Matrix is a good example of what cyberpunk is, fantastical futuristic technology but with a good degree of social commentary and dysfunction, all set in a very familiar to us.

Jerry, my teacher, recommended reading a novel by Neal Stephenson called Snow Crash, having a very healthy dose of curiosity and affection for books it took me no time to order it (the very first thing I ordered from Amazon) and read it. I could say that the rest is history, but it isn't, the rest is the present, life in the new century has been eerily bringing Snow Crash to life, from the printed page into the digital era.

I'll try to stir clear from the plot of the book and encourage you to read it, believe me, it's worth it, go read it after you are done here. What I'll like to talk about are the spooky "predictions" a book published in 1992 (almost 20 years ago) made about the way we are experiencing life every day.

- The plot revolves a round Hiro Protagonist a self styled hacker and swordsman, in the real world he's poor and a nobody, but inside the metaverse he's a legend, a founding member (and coder) of The Black Sun, one, if not the most exclusive online club, in there his avatar is powerful and respected, he even owns a big house with lots of space and rich decorations.

• Did you noticed? Stephenson coined the word metaverse (at one point the most widely used word for the internet) to refer to the online world, he envisioned online clubs with exclusive access, online celebrities and even gave us a word to name the pictures we use to identify ourselves on line. Snow Crash's metaverse served to inspire Second Life, a viable real business where people own pieces of virtual real state and real money exchanges hands.

- Hiro is man down on his luck, he lives inside a container unit near the airport, and thou he could work for a big corporation he hates the corporate life, not only that, but he shares he's dismal quarters with Vitaly, a musician trying to be the next big thing, he makes his life working menial jobs (extreme pizza delivery for the mafia) and uploading information to a central database (mostly about Vitaly), if someone decides to use this information, he'll get paid a commission for every use and maybe a big paycheck if the information turns out to be of use.

• I've just recently encountered an article detailing how in 2005 there was a storage space boom in Hawaii some years ago, it was so big that storage companies overreached, and when the inevitable downturn hit them the storage units started to get cheaper, and cheaper, until it made sense for some people to start a business, open a practice or have band rehearsals there. If you do a little research you'll find plenty of sites offering to pay you money to create content, write articles, take pictures, etc.  Now, criminal organizations managing legitimate business... that's just far fetched fiction, right?

The whole book is filled with interesting pieces of technology, and social behavior that sound eerily familiar, a full real-time view of the planet (google earth is heading there), automatic scanners that open gates if you have the right authorization (RFID codes), wearable computers to stay connected while traveling (Tablets and phones), access to digitized versions of all available information (eBooks, Project Gutenberg), etc, etc, etc.

Keep in mind that this book was published in 1992, the first widely used browser was released at the end of that year, mobile computing was the stuff of speculative far off science fiction. 

Go now, read it, look at the near future it proposes and wonder... 

Tales from Nan'dan - Elox

So, here it goes, the first attempt at a glimpse into that Fantasy / Mesoamerican / European setting I talked about, bear in mind that this will be a work in progress, some (or most) of the names of things are meant as placeholders, either in wait of approval or until I can come up with a better alternative. This vignettes are not meant to be parts of an overarching story line, they're just what they are, little windows into what I think a place like this could/should look like.

I chose "Nan'dan" as the name for the continent where my scenes will take place, the word is meant to translate into "Paradise" and comes from the old and forgotten language of it's first inhabitants, the Caanderi ("from the moon's navel" or "the last ones", scholars are still debating).

I'll also like to state that all of the X's should be read using a "sh" sound to them.

Elox

The sound and smells of the market woke her up, any other day under any other circumstances Elox would have slept for at least another couple of hours, excitement had kept her up late at night, she'd been traveling for nearly a week on her first trip to the big city, almost two days ago her provisions had run dry and though she left her home with enough xells to buy supplies and rent a room, the seashell shaped iron coins are hard to spend when there are no civilized buildings between your home and the city. Thankfully the rain forest had provided her with enough fruits an herbs to sustain her and complete her journey.

After getting dressed, Elox went to the window and contemplated the view. The immensity of the city was almost overwhelming, and the colors, shapes and aromas threatened to overcome her senses. The city landscape was dominated by the inverted V shaped arches preferred by the more classical architects, but the crown jewel definitively was the keep. 

Pakal (as the original builders named it) is composed of several structures, the biggest one rises 70 feet high shaped in the classical form of an eight-stepped pyramid and is crowned by an observation deck forming the 9th level. Inside, the chambers of the ruling house are lavishly decorated with precious stones and fabrics from all over the known world, on the outside, white stuco covers the walls and is decorated in radiant colors, depicting scenes of gods and mortal heroes, an ever changing mural updated year after year. Surrounding the whole keep, thick massive walls sprout from the ground protecting the stables, servant quarters and the great market itself.

As for the rest of the land, it is said that when High Lord Shenval Aztatlan first wrestled away his lands from the hands of the easterners, almost five hundred years ago, the land was a dessert, arid, devoid of life, a godless desolation as far as the eye could see. The arrival of the Aztatlans heralded a new beginning, with them came their gods, chief among them Chaac, whose domain extends over rain and lightning, prosperity followed the conquest, of that desolate terrain nothing remains.

The tropical rain forest that erupted with the help of the gods, has provided the city with all sorts of food and trade goods, cunning hunters can find white-tailed deer and rabbits for many leagues, the abundance of water also brought out he good qualities of the land, farms growing everything from white corn and wheat to sugarcane and all sorts of agave can be seen far and wide.  The exotic spices brought by the early commerce and the superior quality of the land defined the Aztatlan's city as one of the biggest trading centers in Nan'dan.

This was Elox's first solo trip, being of age to trade by herself she had taken a cart with part of the produce from her family's farm, agave skins used in the preparation of mixis -spiced deer (or rabbit) meat- and mezcal, the potent spirit preferred by the lower classes. After breaking her fast on a cup of hot chocolate milk and a couple of her favorite carapace shaped sweet breads, Elox took her cart towards the inner walls of the castle keep, inside the famed Pakal market awaited.

The entrance was guarded by 2 men on each side, and 4 more atop the wall, the guards wore boiled leather armor dyed a pale yellow and decorated with asymmetrical black spots, she was staring at real live Jaguar Guards, no weapons could be seen on them, but Elox knew better than that, the Jags, as they called themselves, had unnatural strength and resilience and could shapechange their hands, feet, eyes and mouths to approximate those of a jaguar, with only those tools they were deadly fast and proficient, old wives tales claim that 10 of them can do as much damage as a hundred regular troops.

The trading went a little less favorable than Elox expected, the agave skins only fetched half a dozen ambers, but those little spheres with a quetzal feather embedded in them grew to a couple of obsidians by the time the mezcal was finally sold. The ambers she used to buy white corn treated with lime water, several kinds of chiles, assorted spices and hardened molasses at a bargain, she even had some xells left from those purchases to treat herself to a whole rabitt and wash it down with pineapple cured octil, a milky fermented beverage made from the agave that she discovered while walking around the market.

One of the obsidians she used to buy dress clothes for her parents and 4 brothers, a steep price indeed, but she had never seen fabrics so soft and adorned with such elegance, Elox decided that the cacao shaped obsidian coin was well spent, even more so with the festivities commemorating the wedding of Lord Ikar Aztatlan to Lady Itzel, the eldest daughter of the builder's Guild Master.

The next morning Elox rode back to her farm, proud of herself and with the knowledge that her family had just opened a new trade destination for their goods, father would be very pleased.

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There it is, see you next time and hope you like it... Oh! and comment and share please!

Building Characters - Neeba the Half-Elf Psion

The following attempts to be a miniature background for a Psion, a player character for Dungeons and Dragons, the imposed restriction on physical prowess comes from the character stats, low numbers were rolled for  Strength and Constitution...


Castaway

I don’t remember much of my early childhood, just glimpses, feelings… Mostly feelings of disappointment, my own family was ashamed of me, my own people watched me with estranged eyes.

As time went by the strange things happening around me could not be ignored anymore, the town elders decided it was best for everyone to send me away, not far, just to the nearest wizards a couple of days down the road, there I could learn control. For a while my life improved, I learned to read and write, and just a couple of years later I began my studies to become a great wizard. Alas, failure was my constant companion, none of the books or the teaching from my master could help me, I could feel a connection with something bigger, powerful, but the arcane teachings eluded me.

Tired of me the wizard casted me out, and ashamed of my failure, rather than going back and face my people, I spent most of the next few years in the company of beggars, barely surviving, scraping and fighting for every peace of bread, until I found it, it was just laying there, inside a ruined monk temple where I was weathering a storm, in the middle of an untouched library, an ancient tome of knowledge; the cover had an emerald in the form of a leaf with green flames against a silver background and lined in fine gold.

I was hungry, and that piece of jewelry could have bought a lot of meals and decent nights in a nice Inn, with a proper bed and a big cozy heart to keep me warm and dry. Something possessed me to open the book, maybe it reminded me of all those years of hard study with the wizard, or maybe it was just fate pushing mi hand and eyes inside those pages.  

On the first page there was an inscription, “Tempered by Flame”… Over the next weeks I poured over the contents, I finally understood, the connection I had always felt was not with arcane, the power I could feel swirling about me didn’t come from without, but from within, discipline and the mind where the keys… 

Enfeeblement

As time went by my control grew stronger and so did my power, it required a lot of effort and discipline, but I wasn’t hungry anymore, my newfound control gave me the ability to hunt, the ruins gave me shelter, the book gave me hope, I was surely and steadily getting better, until I got greedy… I sought knowledge in every book of the library, I devoured every tome I could find, most only contained useless information, I was becoming desperate, I needed to know more about these power… 

Then I found it, in a secluded section of the library, a book filled with the knowledge I needed, the power I craved, a book filled with what I believed were shortcuts and “forbidden” rituals, the first page had a message: 

“True power comes from practice and knowledge, this pages have been collected with the express purpose to  serve as guidelines on were the forbidden path lies, never attempt this rituals to rise above your natural talent, always be true to you” 

But that wasn’t going to stop me. I needed to be better, to become powerful, only then could I return home and show them...

I’ve never felt such agony, as I finished the last concentration exercise required by the ritual, I was engulfed in green flames, I could feel the flames burning me from the inside out, I was dying, if I hadn’t been such a fool… I woke up many hours later, my body felt wrong, awkward, feeble, I knew then I would never be the same, I had been tempered by the flames of my foolishness… The exercises helped me attain a higher awareness of my mind’s true potential, at the cost of my physical strength and dexterity... I left the ruins shamed, never to come back.

For months I’ve wondered the land, alone, an outcast in my own mind, everywhere I go people fear my power, magic they can handle, but not what they see me do. The strange physical manifestations of my powers are too weird, too different, too foreign. 

I might be feeble of body, but my weapon is my mind, and it’s as sharp as any steel and as resistant as any blade, cross me and I will crush you, offer me friendship and a place on your table and I will be as true as anyone you’ve ever know, allow me to follow you on a worthy quest and you will not regret it, this I promise you for I am Nebba, and I have the psionic power in me!

He's a Half-elf and the tattoos
are permanent.

Fiction writing for games... a catch-22

Motivation? Who needs that?
Let's score points!

28 years ago my dad got home from on of his several trips to the U.S. (remember I live in Mexico City) with an Atari 2600 home console and some cartridges to play, among them the awful Pac-Man port (to me at the tender age of 6 it was fantastically good and addictive). My dad had no way to know it, but with that fateful purchase he was showing me the path that would shape my hobbies, friendships and even choice of career.

Let's try an compare, for just a second, those first home games to the ones we have today, setting aside the obvious differences in technology, theme an game type trends, the real big difference between those games and their modern descendants is the staggering amount of time and effort spent on creating a rich back story and a credible three dimensional world for the game.

Video games in their initial conception were little more than "digital ports" of the real world games of dexterity often seen at county fairs an amusement parks, the addictive component of Pac-Man didn't come from trying to achieve a lofty goal like rescuing a lost love or atoning for past sins, it came from the pure and unadulterated rush of competing with oneself (or maybe some friends and family), and beating the game.

You hat to read the
booklet to get the back story

And then, the first RPGs were released upon the unsuspecting gamers and were received with thunderous approval, the rich depth of the characters, the movie like score, the intertwining plots, side quests, witty dialog and sheer size of the game world changed the face of what we play forever, titles like Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger and The Legend of Zelda influenced much more that their own genre, those games (and many more) showed game developers that deep, rich worlds and relateable characters were a sure way into the hearts (and thus wallets) of gamers all over the world.

And as with everything that is successful, it evolved, everyone involved got better, stories became more intricate, worlds got bigger, non playing characters got a lot more lovable, technical advancement allowed for cleaner scores rivaling those of big Hollywood productions, better and faster consoles gave us voice acting, we got to hear not only the sounds of the places we were going through, but the dialogues, and in more recent days, we've come to the point were recognizable movie and TV stars are part of the ensemble of character of a given game.

Who the...??
They will pay!

Ever since the firs RPGs were successful, fiction writers for the game industry have been in hot demand, today every single game released, even most of the "low tech" apps for phones come imbued with some form of back story that justifies the game mechanics and goals (the evil green pigs have taken the eggs from the nests, now the birds are angry and they are getting even), some time it makes real life sense, some times it requires some amount of suspension of disbelief, and some times its completely out there, but I guarantee it, 99% of the games released today, no matter the platform, length or price range come with some form of "in-game" justification of what the hell is going on and why.

Modern life has seen to it that we need those intricate and long back stories to keep us focused on the game instead of on one the other hundred things demanding our attention, on the other hand having to spend that much effort on the creation of the game makes developers shy away from experimenting and going off in new directions, its just too expensive. So, in order for costumers to buy games, developers need to spend insane amounts of time and money developing this worlds, on the other hand, that expense is making the whole industry stall.

July 2011 has just been announced as one of the worst months in sales for the industry, and my take is that all the sequels and remakes of the same games is to blame, some one has to break out of the pattern, one way to go is to create content for established story lines that require little or no work on the part of the developer (Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Narnia, Star Trek, Naruto, etc.) but those come with an inherited licencing cost. Another viable way is for developers to use their own previously established time lines and use them for different games (Bungie with Halo, Blizzard with Warcraft or Diablo, etc) out of that option I think Valve has shown the most potential, having 2 very different games set in the same universe, Half-Life a Fist Person Shooter and Portal a puzzle type game.

I'm big on creative minds, and what has me interested right now is seeing who will come up with a solution that will help them sell content-rich games and at the same time gives them the freedom to experiment on new game mechanics, the technical tools are certainly out there, with the kinect, the ps-move and all the possible interaction with handheld devices, the money is out there too, micro-transactions seem to be the way of the future, now all we need is someone combining it all, I see interesting proposals in the near future, Star Wars: The Old Republic (a story driven MMO where your choices have influence?), Microsoft's Kinect Fun Labs (a place to get user created content for a proprietary piece of hardware?), etc.

It will be interesting to see who comes up with the next big thing.

On Myths and Legends

I like reading, a lot, it makes for a wonderful way to pass time, exercise the imagination, go exploring far away and fantastic locales, get a glimpse of simple or complicated lives, worlds, etc. By far the genre that I enjoy the most is fantasy in all of it’s flavors, epic, high or the more simple “sword and sorcery”.

Archetypal fantastic location

The one unifying theme throughout this novels, in any of their forms, is their origin, they all come in some way, from the myths and legends we've inherited from Europe (and more recently borrowing heavily from Asia), almost every single creature (dragons, goblins, werewolfs, gargoyles, vampires, etc) has been subject to revisions and retellings, every folktale has been tiwsted and turned in every shape and form, every part of them has been reimagined, retooled, refited and scrambled beyond recognition. 

But wait, this is a good thing, it gives us, the readers, the opportunity to look at the classic themes form a fresh perspective, to get exited by new characters either heroes or villains, in some cases they give us the chance to find nuggets of wisdom that allow for "real world" personal growth, and in others, the opportunity to be entertained by the otherworldly machinations of kings and sorcerers, the heroic deeds of peasants and nobles or the simple joy of fighting the dragon and rescuing the princess.

Thinking about that, got me wondering, wondering at the tales and legends from my own ancestry, could it be possible to take the same liberties with the mesoamerican cultures? Twist, turn, retell, revise, etc. all of the fantastic creatures, places and myths from a time before the European influence gave us the dragons, the trolls, the hobbits. Would it be possible to make it grow to a full fledged fantastic place, as alive as Middle Earth or Westeros?

I think we can do better
on a full armor

I don't style myself as a novelist, heck you'll have a hard time getting me to admit I like to write (and calling myself a writer is out of the question), but, this is one of the reasons I started this blog, to give me freedom to explore, freedom to try and answer those and many more questions. 

So, be forewarned, future posts will contain from time to time, scenes from what I believe this fantastic world looks like, a world where ancient mesoamerican myths are real and they were left alone on their own devices to grow and evolve, a place where the author has no respect for the correct historical purpose of things, creatures, rituals or deities, in essence, a world where anything goes, but that is solidly based on a mesoamerican perspective (of course salted with some of that rich European tradition).

Some people have told me that they're having trouble leaving comments, it should be fixed now, in any casa I added the option to allow anonymous comments, any input is always appreciated.

That's it for this update, see you soon!

The Obligatory 'Hello World'

Hi and welcome all who'll like to take some time to read whatever is in my mind when I post here.

First let me deal with 2 questions I know I'm going to get:

1.- Why a blog?... Well, why not? I like writing, I love sharing my opinions with others, I like discussing interesting topics, in here at least I can vent whatever is in my head at any given point and put it out there, someone might find it useful, some might find it interesting, some won't give it a second glance, such is life.

2.- Why in English?... First off, as a Spanish speaking person I welcome the practice, and second the subjects I'll be dealing with have a standard audience that can read in English (yes, I'm including in there people from all over the world).

If you are here from the beginning you'll get accompany me into figuring out what this space will look like, if it will coalesce into a concentrated effort to discuss certain topics or if it will remain as eclectic in it's tastes as the author, for the time being expect to see a wide variety of subjects, heck, I'll even take requests, if you want my take on anything ask and I'll find a way to write about it, I'm a very opinionated person... One thing thou, if you want to know about what's going on in my personal life, you will not find that here, there are other venues for that and I use them.

Oh! I should probably take a solemn vow to update this space every such and such, probably at a God forgotten hour, not gonna happen, I'll update as much as I can, or as much as I want, I'll do my best to have an update at least once a week and sometimes it will be more often than that, beyond that, I can't promise.

For the civilians out there who didn't get the "Hello World" reference, it's a long standing joke among us IT guys, because those were the firs lines of code you ever learn, how to make a computer print a message on the screen (yes I do realize that any decent cellphone can do it all by itself nowadays).

See you next time!