Ponderance

(May 2003 - March 2007.) Tama's thoughts on the blogosphere, podcasting, popular culture, digital media and citizen journalism posted from a laptop computer somewhere in Perth's isolated, miniature, urban jungle ...

Strangerhood Episode 1: 'Why are you here?" (or: Queer Sims are here to stay!)

Wednesday, October 20, 2004
Okay, having talked up the machinimatic potential of using The Sims 2 moviemaker, I've been dying to see what the Rooster Teeth boys were going to do with their new series The Strangerhood. Yesterday the first full episode was posted (although checking today I couldn't get to the site, which suggests some pretty heavy traffic going their way!) Now, it might be unfair to compare this to the first episode of Red Vs Blue, but I can't help it: the Strangerhood's first ep just ain't all that funny. I suspect this is more a function of trying to introduce a much larger cast of characters (insomniac Sims who don't know that they're Sims!). However, politically, I thought The Strangerhood started fantastically...

After the debates about gay marriage in The Sims 2, I was delighted that the first two Sims we meet in The Strangerhood were two male Sims waking up in a bed together--with no memory to be sure--but one Sim saying that their lack of memory and waking up in bed together must be evidence "of a great party!". That's a text, my friend, not a subtext. So, kudos to Rooster Teeth for introducing queer Sims in their production. I suspect The Strangerhood will be more like a reality TV show: you take a while to warm to the characters, but get very invested toward the end of the show. Technically, though, the movies are far more advanced than other machinima which just uses the game engine, so I'm still very taken with the machinimatic uses of The Sims 2 and think The Stangerhood may develop into quite a little series (it just needs to get a lot funnier in the coming episodes!).

PS Season three of Red Vs Blue has just begun as well: check out Episode 39 of Red Vs Blue here.

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