The early evening of the Friday attacks on Paris, France, I was waiting for Hank Green to upload his video, and a few minutes to 9pm EST I saw “Feeling about Paris”
And I thought “What’s going on in Paris?” And I watched his video and then googleged the news.
How tragically sad :(.
By coincidence, I had been playing a good amount of Assassin’s Creed Unity (a video game that takes place during the French Revolution, as well as bits in other historical parts of France) for the last couple weeks (finally finished it the other day!). And about a week before the attacks, I began listening to a number of songs by the beautiful French singer Edith Piaf. I had been wondering around with Spotify lists, and was scrolling down the songs for “Topsify Greatest Hits”. Most of the songs, like 99%, are rock songs, a smattering of country songs, but one song stuck out: “Le Vie En Rose” (Life in Pink) by an Edith Piaf, #126 in the list.
Sort of weird to see a song, not sung in English, from 1947, in with a bunch of rock songs.
That title sounded familiar, so I listened to it. I don’t know exactly where or when I had heard it before (a movie? A documentary?) but it certainly sounded familiar. And then I began listening to more of her songs and several of them also sounded familiar. So for the last several days, I’ve been listening to a lot of her stuff.
Here’s a YouTube video if you are not into using Spotify:
After listening to a number of her songs, I love this one the most. I have heard the translated version, but it still sounds better in French, even though I don’t know any French.
Another song she is known for is “Non, je ne regrette rien” (No regrets)
If you are interested in hearing more of her music, go ahead and listen to her on Spotify or YouTube
As I mentioned in my last post, I started my own gaming channel, Calvero Plays. And I chose to start with my favorite series, Assassin’s Creed.
From the very beginning.
I should say that the game is violent, though not in the way that there is horror or a lot of slashing(okay, a good amount of slashing). You only can kill who your target is (along with the target’s henchmen). There’s penalties when you kill innocent people (one of the reasons why I like this series better than Grand Theft Auto).
Below is the first part:
(My microphone level is low, I’m working on adjusting it.)
There also is a good dose of history throughout the series, which is one of the reasons why I love the series so much. This first installment of the series takes place during the Third Crusade in 1191 in such places as Damascus, Acre, and Jerusalem. The music is great (improves IMHO in AC II and Brotherhood), graphics are beautiful, and the game play is fairly good (there have been complaints about it being to repetitive, which is is, but it doesn’t bother me as much).
And this is combination “Let’s Play” and “Walkthrough” since I have played this before and show where things like flags are, easter eggs, and how to defeat people. It’s not thorough though. I never have found all the flags, and I’m sure there’s easter eggs that I do not know about, but there’s a bunch that I share.
How I got interested in the series
I do not fit the typical demographic for playing a game like this. I’m female, in my 40s, and a mom. So how did it happen?
First thing is the historical aspect. As I say in the video, I love history. Any era, it doesn’t matter. I may not understand Wall Street or wrap my head around various scientific theories, but I love learning about the history of anything. Always have (I have a BA degree in it). And when I was first reading an article about the game in a gaming magazine back in ’07, I thought “Wow! That’s amazing!” The pictures were great. I loved that is took place in a different era that was rarely tackled by game developers.
But I was put off by the title. *Assassin’s* Creed. That sounded…well…. violent. Too violent.
Then I got drawn into it. Both the historical part, and the mystery of “The Ones Who Came Before”, the First Civilization, which added a scifi element (where is Ubisoft taking that story anyway? Do they even know?) drew me in.
The first AC game I actually got to play (since Ubisoft didn’t make any AC games for the Nintendo Wii and it was before I got a XBox 360) was Altair’s Chronicles. It was a great game, though a side-scroller which is a different set-up than the 3D-ish POV of AC console games. The ending was a bit of a let down….
And so now I have completed the first installment through III (AC, AC II, AC Brotherhood, AC Revellations, and AC III, total of 5 console games. Yeah, Ubisoft numbered them weird), didn;t finish IV Black Flag. Have yet to start Rogue. At some point I’ll be getting a XBox One and play Unity. But for right now I’m replaying the first one again, this time recording it.
Come along, won’t you? See some beautiful cities, meet some historical figures, watch for glitches (for there are bound to be some)!
As I mentioned