Jekyll2020-01-06T12:47:28+00:00http://kyleshockey.info/feed.xmlKyle Shockey:ramen: Minimalist Jekyll TemplateGames Review Grand Prix 20042018-07-29T00:00:00+00:002018-07-29T00:00:00+00:00http://kyleshockey.info/games-review-2004<p>From the time when I was 16 until about the time I got out of graduate school, I did not pay close attention to games. I sold both my GameCube and my NES to have some gas and pocket money during my first month of graduate school and didn’t really think about it much<sup><a href="#note1">1</a></sup> until I got my first post-Indiana job and wanted to hang out with some people online. I then bought a PlayStation 4 and played more Destiny 1 than I would care to admit even among avid game players. In that time, writing about games has come into its own far more than I even know and various outlets now support excellent games criticism, even in the mainstream (e.g. <a href="https://waypoint.vice.com/en_us">Waypoint</a>). Even with events like GamerGate, my relationship was one of reading the summary articles in the aftermath and some occasional Twitter bad actor reporting whenever its arms crept into my small online reach.</p>
<p>Now, as part of research legwork for the <a href="../blog-is-back">Katamari project</a>, I am coding a corpus of every review I can find for the games (beginning from Metacritic), starting with the first title in 2004. For any notion I might have had regarding where “games writing” came from, the actual reality is as bad as any white woman/person of color in games could tell you many times over. Maybe more shocking to me is the amount of people now in high profile positions that show up in my review corpus. To be clear, I haven’t spent enough time with these texts to construct for you a cogent “how the hell do people keep hiring this person” hit piece or anything like that. I just find myself looking up these authors every other review or so to find that they are still regularly writing features in the industry as if they didn’t outright dismiss successful, award winning titles as girl games, or as if they aren’t using the word “bitch” exactly how you think in a small number review for peanuts (or likely for free with some of these outlets). I am thankful that the space for writing is large and professionalized enough that a lot of the worst stuff doesn’t quite fly anymore and that excellence is getting noticed and rewarded to a small degree (from my limited vantage point). But even within the last few weeks between <a href="https://kotaku.com/in-the-wake-of-arenanet-firings-game-studios-rethink-t-1827591298">a GG-like mob getting a feminist industry veteran fired</a> and <a href="https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2018-07-26-the-escapist-relaunches-with-no-politics-pledge">a professional outlet known to harbor GG relaunching with a “no politics” pledge</a>, folks have <a href="https://waypoint.vice.com/en_us/article/pawy3y/arenanet-fired-developers-twitter">rightfully noted</a> that a groundswell remarkably similar to the emboldening of white supremacist-led hate crimes under the current United States political administration is amassing in the games space again in a way that looks remarkably similar to the precursors of what we now call GamerGate.</p>
<p>Since I work in a cultural heritage institution and am trained in historiography, I wonder often about the kind of Swiss cheese, wet tissue paper-like environment now facing people that try and work with early digital and web materials. Even for studying documents from 2004 the Internet Archive is only somewhat reliable for the online arms of print publications, some of which still exist today. Many folks who work on both early web history and the history and current state of digital white supremacy could educate you much better than I could about the challenges of doing the necessary work to document and historicize this time in a meaningful way. I mention this just to say that the kind of short historical memory rewarded by the current political and media landscapes are only further entrenched because of the gaping hole staring at us from the digital architecture from that era–holes in large part protected in unwieldy ways by poorly modernized legal mechanisms.<a href="#note2">2</a> As excited as I am to see the Katamari project through, I am equally grateful to have the time to reflect on the history of a space that is new to me and to which I am an outsider–one which quite a few people I respect have lived emphatically and are still around to talk about it.</p>
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<h4 id="other-things">Other things</h4>
<p>I bought a Nintendo Switch with the money I was going to spend on a musical instrument I do not need. It is as good as advertised and then some. I just need the big titles to get out of the $60 dollar range before I can play them. I went ahead and bought Breath of the Wild anyway and of course Open World Link works. I find the controls a bit awkward, but I am coming off Skyrim/Dragon Age: Inquisition.</p>
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<p><a name="note1">1</a>: The notable exception, which plays a large part in my ever getting here intellectually in the first place, was a guest lecture by <a href="https://finearts.tcu.edu/faculty_staff/william-gibbons/">William Gibbons</a> about the game <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_(video_game)">Catherine</a> for IU’s musicology department. Coincidentally, I am currently playing through <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shin_Megami_Tensei_IV">Shin Megami Tensei IV</a> (the game in development right before Catherine) as I write this. Atlus is a trip. Also coincidentally, I played a fair amount of Katamari on my roommate’s PlayStation 2 while I was between schools working dead end foodservice jobs and part-time marching band instruction contracts.</p>
<p><a name="note2">2</a>: Just ask me some time about the challenges presented to historically-minded music institutions (especially libraries) by the DMCA and digital music. Actually, buy me a drink first.</p>From the time when I was 16 until about the time I got out of graduate school, I did not pay close attention to games. I sold both my GameCube and my NES to have some gas and pocket money during my first month of graduate school and didn’t really think about it much1 until I got my first post-Indiana job and wanted to hang out with some people online. I then bought a PlayStation 4 and played more Destiny 1 than I would care to admit even among avid game players. In that time, writing about games has come into its own far more than I even know and various outlets now support excellent games criticism, even in the mainstream (e.g. Waypoint). Even with events like GamerGate, my relationship was one of reading the summary articles in the aftermath and some occasional Twitter bad actor reporting whenever its arms crept into my small online reach.Blog is back, alright?2018-07-22T00:00:00+00:002018-07-22T00:00:00+00:00http://kyleshockey.info/blog-is-back<blockquote>
<p>and Harry doesn’t mind if he doesn’t make the scene<br />he’s got a daytime job; he’s doin’ alright</p>
<p>-<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fAQhSRLQnM">Sultans of Swing</a>, Dire Straits<sup><a href="#note1">1</a></sup></p>
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<p>While pondering how to return to writing this blog with a much different focus, I was scrolling through the twitter hashtag for <a href="http://ggw.orbytl.com/pitchjam-6-your-questions-answered/">#PitchJam</a> to catch up on what I missed in not having pitches ready for participation. It is encouraging to know that there are some people and some publications in the intermediary space between “one person on the periphery holding their web presence together with gum and paper clips” and “Professional Writer For A Publication” for someone like me to aspire to in the midst of a day job that grabs a lot of my spoons and other kinds of life-maneuvering work that grabs the rest. In particular I’ve been spending a lot of time with <a href="https://unwinnable.com/">Unwinnable</a> and the new podcast <a href="http://rangedtouch.com/category/gamestudiesstudybuddies/feed/">Game Studies Study Buddies</a> in addition to normal academic music reading. Unwinnable merits mentioning particularly because it is a direct subscription publication that hosts a range of writers (for pay!) on a range of popular culture topics with a dedicated editing crew who are pretty open and approachable (a fact that I have not yet engaged with like I want). On the other side, GSSB is a podcast where <a href="https://thiscageisworms.com/">Cameron Kunzelman</a> and <a href="http://correlatedcontents.com/">Michael Lutz</a> rehearse the arguments<sup><a href="#note2">2</a></sup> from books that fall within the purview of academic Game Studies with some discussion about the structure of the text and what readers might take away from those books should they need to engage with them more thoroughly in the future.<sup><a href="#note3">3</a></sup> Since Game Studies is only on the periphery of the kinds of things I am thinking about as a scholar of music whose potential focus is on the nebulous “video game music scene,” having a couple of hours of smart people to listen to when I do more rudimentary tasks at work is a godsend.</p>
<p>While on the topic: I’m currently doing the legwork for a project that I’m envisioning as a retrospective study of the American<sup><a href="#note4">4</a></sup> reception of the music from the Katamari series. In short: the award-winning soundtracks to the Katamari series<sup><a href="#note5">5</a></sup> attracted attention from our games media for what many thought was weird, quirky, and unique music to underscore the Cool Japan/Weird Japan reception that the game itself had in the Western mediasphere. Yet when reading about how Miyake went about envisioning the audience for the games’ music, no one seemed to zero in on the fact that he deliberately chose the genre and performers for each track to appeal to a wide variety of listeners from the history of Japanese pop music. I’m particularly interested in the games’ relationship to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shibuya-kei">Shibuya-kei</a>, a genre formation noted in Japan for “ostentatious internationalism,” even in the growing identity formation of J-pop. This partly has to do with Shibuya-kei’s distribution and reputation in the United States–that of indie pop, not video game music. Taking a cue from <a href="https://cup.columbia.edu/book/sayonara-amerika-sayonara-nippon/9780231158756">Michael Bourdaghs</a>, I hope to get more into Area Studies and the concept of asymmetrical listening/reception between <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_music_industry_market_share_data">the two largest music industries in the world</a> of the last few decades.</p>
<p>I’ve got a while to go until it is digestible, but I hope to whip it into shape sooner rather than later.</p>
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<h4 id="other-things">Other things</h4>
<p>I’m looking forward to the next installment of <a href="https://www.capsulecrit.com/">CapsuleCrit</a>. Their initial publication got me thinking about what can be conveyed in short form fiction and how I might be able to write like that in the future, on this blog or elsewhere. Check it out when you get a chance.</p>
<p>Recently I won a bundle of books from <a href="https://bossfightbooks.com/">Boss Fight Books</a>. Their e-books are a great way to support good writing (though I plan on ordering at least <a href="https://bossfightbooks.com/products/katamari-damacy-by-l-e-hall">one</a> in paperback).</p>
<p>Swimming laps is hard. Swimming laps is good. Bless DC parks & rec. Also bless my friends for planning a tubing trip in August.</p>
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<p><a name="note1">1</a>: I read a tweet from someone I don’t know the other day about how song lyrics in an epigraph are corny 100% of the time. Yes.</p>
<p><a name="note2">2</a>: Is that a quote? That might be a quote.</p>
<p><a name="note3">3</a>: I have a tweet bookmarked somewhere about another person in a far different discipline trying to sell the idea of a podcast that acts like an audiobook abstracts of sorts. This is a great idea if for no other reason than that modern scholarly communication is unwieldly and outrageously exploitative. I could have used something like that when I was studying musicology the first time.</p>
<p><a name="note4">4</a>: Western? English-language? Anglo-American? We’re at that early point in the project. It may depend on what I can find in the review corpus, given that the first game came out in 2004 and includes a lot of reviews in now-defunct publications that the Internet Archive might not necessarily have.</p>
<p><a name="note5">5</a>: At this point, I’m inclined to use only the games which came out on a console platform and for which Yuu Miyake was the primary sound director: Katamari Damacy, We Love Katamari, and Katamari Forever. I may also use Me & My Katamari, but I’m not sure how to treat major reprises and previous games’ cut tracks yet.</p>and Harry doesn’t mind if he doesn’t make the scenehe’s got a daytime job; he’s doin’ alright -Sultans of Swing, Dire Straits1Crawling to the Starting Line2015-10-13T00:00:00+00:002015-10-13T00:00:00+00:00http://kyleshockey.info/crawling-starting-line<p><em>The following is a lightly edited version of a post previously hosted on <a href="https://librarianburnout.com/">Librarian Burnout</a>, published in October 2015.</em></p>
<p>By most accounts, I was a very successful library school student. In 2015 alone I’ve had the opportunity to give 3 presentations to national and international conferences, won an award that resulted in the publication of one aforementioned paper, met some of my best friends and professional colleagues and mentors, and finished my MLS degree. Today I am unemployed, living on my parents’ couch, and ready to give up on a career I know I want and will succeed in just because I can’t seem to get someone to let me do it. What may seem like such a wild downturn in my lot actually speaks to a condition that librarians are reluctant to take on or revisit once they have embarked on careers: library school is abusive. Library school fosters a culture of massive burnout before students even make it to the job market. Each successive high point I mentioned above was obfuscated by professors who were not willing to negotiate attendance grades around conference travel, marred by the busy work of “homework every day ‘seminars,’” met at the airport with the impending anxiety attack associated with the thought of getting back to class the next day. There was never time to bask in achievement because there was just more school. Always school, only school. Plus the two jobs on top of that, the volunteer experience, and the free labor of scholarship outside of the classroom. Maybe some sleep on a good day.</p>
<p>But that was okay because I was going to move away and get a job, right?</p>
<p>Burnout is simultaneously a very personal journey and a real systemic problem. Living with the embodiment of one’s own emotional labor is hard enough before connecting the dots and empathizing with others who share your professional turmoil. That said, we need both in concert to speak truth to power. Though this blog has its roots in library instruction—-a special kind of burden—-burnout lives among the entire library profession. Ask any librarian who is engaged with the field and they will not give you unconditional support when you let on that you want to be a librarian too. We’re cornered. The funding cuts are no surprise. The median salary looks worse and worse against inflation every year (not to mention your entry salary, which could be hourly and lower than $30,000 without benefits for an MLS-requiring position<sup><a href="#note1">1</a></sup>). Raises don’t cover cost of living. Unions are rare. Salaried positions are being phased out or replaced with significantly cut hourly & part time positions. Resource-strapped public libraries rely on volunteer work to stay open. Inordinate amounts of MLS-havers leave the profession after unsuccessful job searches. Working professionals find more responsibility for less and less on the dollar. Popular media, some academia, and government officials all claim we’re obsolete. Oh yeah, student loan debt. No, that other degree. You went to library school without full funding?</p>
<p>This is 21st century American librarianship. The few, the proud, the neoliberal unicorns. We have a big problem. As long as the job market for incoming librarians is as bad as it is, just about every place can afford to hire a unicorn in lieu of other unicorns, not to mention the just “really great” applicants who might have gotten a phone interview.<sup><a href="#note2">2</a></sup> The first job search post-MLS is just brutal. Any time I get down, my friends are sure to share cold comfort horror stories of their first search. Yet for as much as we focus on the conditions of the working librarian and the constellation of employment practices and social factors that constitute the job climate of librarianship, we rarely focus on what it takes to get to the job search in the first place—-that pesky degree.</p>
<p>I’ve outlined only a small part of the anguish that was library school. As I talk to more and more peers who are currently students or recent graduates, this pre-employment burnout feeling resonates strongly in many. It’s not going away; it’s getting worse. Library schools tend not to advocate for their young—-GAs are being cut; student employment compensation is criminally low; financial aid is reserved for an extremely select few. Many other students have confided to me just how poor LIS faculties are at being master’s level advisors.</p>
<p>So what can you, working professional, do about this?</p>
<p>The number one thing you can do—-the number one thing I aspire to do for the rest of my career-—is advocate. Formally, informally, locally, nationally, personally. If you see the librarian struggling to get out of the starting gate, reach out and ask how they need help. It’s not a new librarian guarantee but it goes a long way towards keeping those who are really engaged around in times of trouble. This doesn’t mean you need to join any national mentorship program (although that’s a great option) or create your own mentorship network (which is a better option). Offer yourself as a career librarian that your alma matter can send questions to. Integrate students into your social media professional development.<sup><a href="#note3">3</a></sup> Let your office be a safe space for students of all kinds. Partner with a local library school, if possible.<sup><a href="#note4">4</a></sup> Support student-led programs and conferences. Just support students. I can’t say that enough.</p>
<p>I’m ready to quit and I haven’t even started. Talk about burnout.</p>
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<p><a name="#note1">1</a>: A midwest university offered me this position. They also offered it to other people simultaneously. It was not livable. Don’t do that.</p>
<p><a name="#note2">2</a>: I’m in month 9 of my job search and I’m nearly out of leads. I’ve struck out after reaching the in-person interview stage 4 out of a possible 5 times (with an inordinate amount of applications). In each and every one of those interviews, including the one where I did not even make it to campus, feedback has been some variation on “exceptionally strong application, get some more experience, someone is really gonna love you” without any constructive feedback. It’s great that you can have such a luxury choice for your position, but some of us have to pay rent and eat and get out of bad living situations. I can’t keep being passed on like this with the great expense of committing to interviews that require travel.</p>
<p><a name="#note3">3</a>: The constellation of people and practices surrounding the Twitter #critlib chats kept me from dropping out of library school early when I could not find my professional voice as a scholar or practitioner and felt the futility of what I was doing in the classroom. I wouldn’t have achieved any of the things I mentioned in the opening without that wonderful, welcoming, loving community of friends and colleagues.</p>
<p><a name="#note4">4</a>: Easier said than done. Library schools have trouble engaging their own university libraries in partnerships, much less outsiders.</p>The following is a lightly edited version of a post previously hosted on Librarian Burnout, published in October 2015.