by Chris Billowsin Business Beller, Hobby Heedings0 commentstags: Awareness / Understanding, Blogging, Business Development
Happy New Year for 2022! Here is a quick review about what I’ve been up to for the past year and where I’m headed in 2022. As I’ve already impelemented in 2021: Promaginy is now my vintage web game website. Cybersideline added a couple of projects with Fandomnaut and Yertunes. Gamenigma was originally going to be my new coding project but then I was able to figure out a way to incorporate lots of my ideas into Heropath. In fact, I experienced a huge synthesis of ideas back in October 2021 which was really exciting and fun. Heropath will be the cumulation of ideas found in Playstates, Tales of Strange Cyberworlds, my passion for crossovers, and many other things. After writing and thinking for many years, a path forward has revealed itself! This is exciting for me because I’ll be moving away from writing and attempt to travel this new pathway through coding. While I will still be updating this blog infrequently, most of my writing on play and games will be moving over to the Heropath’s blog. I’ll be linking to that blog as patterns emerge. So you can expect infrequent coding updates via Heropath and other web projects. […]
by Chris Billowsin Business Beller, Hobby Heedings1 commentstags: Business Development, Change of Mind, Personal Resolve, Self Analysis
I’m a conceptual thinker and because of such I can get caught up into ideas and concepts and believe that understanding something is the same thing as doing something. Such ignorance is typical of thinking types. So I’ve made a resolution to start taking up coding to 1) fix/build my own websites, 2) build my own video games I’ve avoided developing these skills because I’ve always felt I didn’t have the time, but I’ve matured enough in my self-awareness that I need to stop with the self-limiting thinking – the scarcity mentality that plagues so many of us – and just be open to possibilities. The self-limiting thinking that I don’t have enough time to fit it all in is poisonous to getting started. I’m now okay if I don’t finish or accomplish anything since I am going to approach this skill learning with a beginner mind and just enjoy the journey. I’m going to track my skill development, not put any pressure on myself to learn a certain amount of skill by an arbitrary date, and try to find the way of combining intention with spontaneity. Starting today I am going to make a resolution to practice this. Today […]
by Chris Billowsin Republic of Bloggers0 commentstags: Defining Life, Human Condition, Meaning of Life
An open letter to Chris Bateman responding to his blog-letter Every Cause of Death Matters at Only A Game as part of the Republic of Bloggers. Feel welcome to provide your own input via the Comments. Dear Chris, I want to commend you for taking on a topic that is wholly lacking in our sensationalism-driven, hyper-sensitive COVID-19 fixation thanks to our modern media. You elaborated eloquently about how we don’t have a rational relationship with reporting on the causes of death and this leaves us poorer and more vulnerable to false information. I could not agree more. I’m believe you exaggerated your position to in order to make your point and in doing so lost some of the nuance that I feel compelled to address. You alluded to it in your statement: This principle does not mean that we are wrong to care about some causes of death more than others – on the contrary, it would be reckless to replace it with a principle that ‘every cause of death matters equally‘. I’ve known you long enough to recognize you are pitching a position with the hope that somebody will engage with it and so I will happily […]
by Chris Billowsin Playstates Theory1 commentstags: Game Philosophy, Games Analysis, Playstates
I am re-calibrating my definitions as I evolve in my understanding of Play and Video Games. I am introducing the definition of Play Motifs as a replacement for the Playstates term. For the past four plus years I’ve worked on elaborating on my Playstates theory and as it evolved out of Gamestories I have found the need to evolve out of Playstates. Because it is really a continuation and renaming, I am carrying on the Version Numbering to Version 3.0 from previous Versions 2.0 and 1.0. I was originally going to produce a number of free guides called Playstates and analyze the different aspects of making a video game. My plan is still do that but do it in a new project that I plan to launch next year. I will be writing down my thoughts in a diary-themed analysis that will look at Video Game graphics, animation, music, and alchemy (the changeable nature of video games). It was during this rethinking that I realized that Playstates is too narrow when it comes to discussing video games. So Playstates will be redefined to be all aspects about video game development while the five specific Playstates that I’ve identified will now […]
by Chris Billowsin Playstates Theory0 commentstags: Playstates
In a previous blog post Playful Work & Serious Leisure I shared a matrix of Work-Leisure that outlined eight different states of being when it came to Work & Leisure. Being a theoretical person, I thought it would be enjoyable to combine that matrix with my concept of Playstates, particularly how it should be possible to find each of the five Playstates in the realm of Recreation. This would also further validate my Playstates theory, being able to find it in other concepts. Recreation is the socially sanctioned use of leisure time. It is those activities that society wants us to do when we are not working and tends to entail some kind of personal development or challenge. But as I do this thought experiment I saw that playful activities such as Puzzles, Playgrounds, and Games can be taken very seriously and can become high-stakes. Here is my Matrix with the emphasis being placed on Recreation. Recreation is a range of activities that combine Leisure and Seriousness. *Recreation* Leisure Fun | Serious —- + —- Playful | Grind Work Inspired It is conceptually easy to link up Seriousness […]
by Chris Billowsin Republic of Bloggers0 commentstags: Components of Human Nature, Human Condition, Human Mystery, Virtuous Discourse
A response to Chris Bateman responding to his blog post The Power of No at Only A Game as part of the Republic of Bloggers. Feel welcome to provide your own input via the Comments. I made a quick on-blog comment to Chris’ post but felt there was more to share. The idea of three different responses, each with their own power was something I wanted to delve a little more into. Chris eloquently explains that The Power of No as represented by four women philosophers give us a powerful beacon to see the importance for a small number of people to raise their voices in opposition to absolutism. It is necessary for there to be principled opposition to majority because majorities are not without fault or ignorance. Human nature being as it is, is well served by a conscience and the Power of No is this practice. Yet human nature is a multifaceted thing for the Power of ‘no’ is challenged by the power of ‘yes’ and the power of ‘maybe’. ‘Yes’ is the desire to belong to certainty in a world full of uncertainty or horror. It is a powerful magnet and it does not matter if the […]
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