RambleLog Archive
RambleLog was an attempt to keep followers informed of my progress with a monthly report of activities. I no longer update under this category.
Looking back into why I started RamblePak in the first place in order to figure out where to go from here
Despite the absence of the new video within November, it is within days of release. I had originally hoped to have it published on the morning of December 1st, but I find myself forced to catch up on everything else that fell by the wayside the past two weeks. After finally finishing the script I began devoting what time I could to audio and video work, but sadly there are other obligations I must tend to in that time.
I’ll have more particular thoughts about the video itself when I post it, but rest assured that I have not grown to hate it during the editing process. While a part of me is just glad to be getting it out of the door, I think in hindsight it might be a video I can enjoy returning to. Which, fortunately, I can say about the majority of the videos I’ve made, even though I often contemplate where I could have improved upon them.
Nevertheless, it was also a video created under much concern and worry over how others would respond. To that end I already feel regret at many of the things I could have done, which creates apprehension regarding its success.
Whaddaya mean yer not done yet?!
"Whaddaya mean yer not done yet?!"
So I’ve clearly not met my self-imposed deadline of releasing a video in October. As of this writing, I’ve not even finished the script for it.
I wish I could say with certainty that it will be out in November, but at this point I do not wish to make any further promises. As I’ve noted in the past, I do not make exclusively videos. I enjoy writing essays for this website, and I think without them I would actually go a bit nutty. This means a lot of my time spent on writing is spent on writing other things. What hasn’t particularly helped this month are the amount of games I’ve also been playing, as well as the erratic and unsteady state of my mental health.
I’ve certainly become sodden with guilt for this lengthy creation of the video. For many reasons I’ve focused my attention on playing a variety of games in October, not all of which were necessary to complete within the span of the month. In fact, there was no proper deadline for any of them. I am actually certain to have Game Log content until December at this rate. So why not focus on what’s more important?
September has finally seen me getting back to proper work on the YouTube channel... slow-going as it may be.
Slow though it may have been, my body had finally healed enough that I could resume progress on recording Rise of the Tomb Raider in September. Sadly, it took nearly half of the month to reach that point, and almost the entire remainder to complete the recording. As I knew it would be, the possibility of releasing the video in September was nil.
I’ll spare you further digressions into the slow progress of a herniated disc healing. I will only assure you that I am back to being capable of sitting more regularly. However, it is still something I need breaks from. I will always have my time set aside to get work done, but I do not wish for this to happen again. I must live a healthier lifestyle, which not only means more exercise and an improved diet, but also more time giving my back a chance to rest.
If only my mind could remain equally still.
A physical ailment kept me out of commission for most of August, but allowed time to work on other projects and think ahead.
So… about that month of August…
Those that had read the entry Fires Inside are already aware, but at the start of the month I suffered a herniated disc that pinched my sciatic nerve. In more common tongue: stuff came out of a disc towards the bottom of my spine that made my leg hurt like a son of a gun.
I used my remaining vacation time for the year in order to take time off from work and try to give my back some rest. Sitting for any length of time was uncomfortable and only caused more pain. After a week of rest I returned to work, forced to sit roughly eight hours a day with occasional breaks to try and ease up the pressure on the problem spot. The unfortunate impact of returning to work was that I could not stomach the thought of sitting any more than necessary, and so no progress was made on recording Rise of the Tomb Raider.
Physical therapy the past two weeks has been a major help, and I now feel more comfortable with the notion of resuming my recordings. Unfortunately, I can no longer promise a video in September. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to make October. This whole ordeal initially dealt a major blow to my motivation to create a Rise of the Tomb Raider video.
A productive month seeing some shaky mental ground.
When I had completed my Metroid Prime: Echoes video I had declared that if I cannot complete four videos by the end of 2018 then I would give up RamblePak64 for good. Right now, it’s looking like I’ll have four finished videos by December 31st, 2018.
As covered in Monday’s impromptu blog entry regarding depression, this is the time of year where I’m suddenly struck by infinite question of what it’s all for. It is just one of the reasons that Metroid Prime: Echoes video took so darn long to put together. My efforts to record multiple other games also met in failure, as none of the titles I had been working on have seen any sense of progress. In some ways this is better because it means my recording schedule is intertwined with my play schedule: I’m focusing on recording games I want to play rather than feel compelled to play.
Unfortunately, this plan is not foolproof. While I’m certainly happy to be recording footage of Tomb Raider and its sequel prefaced by Rise of the, the announcement of Darksiders III being an honest to God 2018 release has left me feeling a bit pressured. Part of the problem with game time is that I’d like to somehow schedule titles to play with Steve for the podcast, but our own busy lives often have us tackling games at drastically different times. Were it not for Lost Sphear and Octopath Traveler, my portable RPG experience would be playing Cosmic Star Heroine right alongside him.
The trials and joys of the month of June.
“Setbacks” seems to be the name of the game, and often I cannot help but wonder if “excuses” is a more appropriate term. At times I was too distracted to feel “down” or “depressed”, but that distraction made working on anything all the more trialsome.
At the same time, the distraction and setbacks were just what I needed. The final draft of the script has just been finished. It may seem ridiculous that I only now completed it after having scrawled out the first draft at the end of May, but there was so much in that original version that I was unhappy with. The script was confused, jumping between topics and diving too deep into elements that didn’t really say anything. I combed through bit by bit, applying both major and minor rewrites, growing ever more worried that this video was going to be an abysmal failure.
Then I found myself experiencing some pretty rough lower-back pain. Too much time sitting for my job throughout the week combined with long hours sitting in barely cushioned chairs at the coffee shop had done a number on me. An additional affliction guaranteed great discomfort for two weeks time. Little game playing had gotten done as I first spent my leisure watching E3 coverage and minimizing the discomfort of my body. I was barely able to concentrate on my job during the day, let alone spend what free time I had on the script.
A surprisingly productive month leaves me full of optimism for the future.
Well, what do you know? I actually completed a video this month.
It was not without issue. My rush to complete the script resulted in a number of erroneous claims, and my efforts to correct them generated further false declarations. The Internet itself was inconsistent as to how some of the game’s systems worked, and ultimately I had footage that poorly matched anything I wrote, said, or researched. For a brief period I found myself distraught and tempted to give up on the whole thing. Instead, I pushed onward and largely left the audio untouched.
I’m proud to have completed another video so swiftly after the previous, but rushing the video to completion also meant an inferior product. While I was never expecting a video on Fire Emblem: Warriors to draw a crowd, I largely haven’t promoted the new critique due to a lack of confidence in its depth.
A shifting of priorities.
There is a well-dressed man scowling inside of my mind. His frigid gaze scans across the works of the past thirty days and his lip curls into a snarl. With the quaking force of a crumbling building his accusations and judgment pins me to the ground. My fingers gouge into the dirt to try and pull free from the writer’s block I now find myself under. The well-dressed man adjusts his cufflinks before berating me further.
He says I got nothing done in April.
The entire month slipped by and still I failed to complete the script to Fire Emblem Warriors. In some ways this is a result of physical ailments seeming to strike one after the other. While I was not rendered perfectly incapable, my mind was compromised. Concentration was a fight, and I constantly found myself pinned or pushed out of the ring.
A report on the trials and progress of March and plans for April.
I managed to get the new video out within March, but a lot later than I had originally hoped and anticipated. While I am glad to finally have gotten it done – and quite frankly, am a lot happier with it than I expected to be – I am still disappointed in the amount of time it took.
Of course, there are a multitude of reasons, including the need to go back and rerecord some footage. I discovered later that I had somehow accidentally permanently deleted the entire first video file, which included all of Samus’ adventure up to the first save station in Agon Wastes. Video editing was delayed until I could record this footage and then convert the files.
A few setbacks mean no new video yet, but it's coming.
Talk about your setbacks.
If you’ve been following my Twitter saga then you’re aware I had run into some issues getting all the footage I’ve captured the past few months ready for editing. I discovered that the problem lies in Elgato’s capture software. At least, that’s the best I could conclude. Evidently some video editors have issue with the variable framerate that Elgato captures at, which can cause crashes or other errors.
No matter what video converter I ran this stuff through, I couldn’t get it to work. Not in Windows Movie Maker 6, at least.
Ah, yes. Windows Movie Maker 6. An ancient piece of software from the days of Windows XP, no longer supported after the shift to Windows Vista and the complete redesign to Windows Live Movie Maker. Oddly enough, Movie Maker 6 contains more features than the later iterations, and thus continues to have a surprising following to this day. It’s incredibly limited compared to what other video editing software can do, but it has one useful feature for me.
I've decided to keep monthly reports on my progress in working on RamblePak64 videos. Hopefully it will encourage me while keeping transparent with those who follow.
The latest experiment was a failure.
I don’t need to release a video to know the desire to stack up footage from a pile of separate games has been a disaster. In fact, that I haven’t released a video should be proof enough. Clips of partially-started games instead occupy my external hard drives, with only the Metroid games being fully completed. You’d think I’d be on my way to finishing that new episode. Distractions and indecision instead has pile up to delay my progress forward.
This revelation will not get me down. Figuring out why it was a failure would be much more productive, with the first step being an acknowledgement: I didn’t want to play any of the games I intended to do a video on as much as I wanted to play a Metroid game again.
