Videos
Due to the fact that I am a creative individual who grew up with access to the internet, I watched a lot of material found on the video-sharing platform "YouTube" as a child, and still manage to spend a good amount of time on it to this day. I was, naturally, incredibly inspired to create my own videos, and I spent years going at it, making the most meager things imaginable.
I've gone through a number of channels, finally finding myself in a place where I am reasonably content - I maintain a YouTube channel, GEMSimov, and I upload only things that I think are meaningful enough to be there. They are also not repugnant garbage, or AI slop, because I've put in reasonable amounts of effort into making all of them, with the amount of effort put into making others being far beyond the reasonable.
Expression through video is something really appealing to me, and so I constantly find myself desirous of the opportunity to engage in that once more. Alas, it takes time and the work that goes into it, for me, is akin to beating a stone with another stone until the beaten stone takes on an appealing shape. The processes are slow and incredibly obtuse, courtesy of video editing software being horribly made and my personal computer's hardware being older than most family dogs.
New things might pop up, who knows? Until then, peruse this library of material:
The "Bionicle: Voya Nui Online Game" Video Trinity
This is was an exceptionally ambitious project of mine, as I spent months on it, but it is also among those that are finished and out in the world, which makes it rather special. It includes a short-form, satirical review of the titular "Bionicle: Voya Nui Online Game", a reading of an essay on a topic related to said game, and an hour-long megalith of audacity - me, playing through the game, cutting out repetitive bits and focusing on conveying the story through as streamlined a manner as possible, while also endeavoring to provide voice acting for all the characters in the game. I also found out that the musical pieces found in this game did not exist on YouTube, as a result of which I uploaded them in as high a quality as I could manage - with the goal of storing them somewhere, for while I doubt they would wind up lost, it is better to have them in more places than in only one.
I must express my great gratitude to the BMP(old-site-here), the BioMedia Project, which is an unofficial, fan-run collection of all official Bionicle media, where the game can be found and played.
The Voya Nui Online Game Play-through: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The Voya Nui Online Game Review Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The Voya Nui Online Game Essay Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The Voya Nui Online Game Review: (click-to-read)
The Voya Nui Online Game Essay: (click-to-read)
The "Diablo Trilogy in anticipation of Diablo IV" Video Trio
This is my second "big" video project. As I was getting ready to see Activision-Blizzard's game "Diablo IV" appear on the market as a playable product, what I was seeing from Gameplay previews and trailers did not fill me with excitement. My great adoration for the Diablo franchise, with the exclusion of "Diablo: Immortal" (the one for mobile phones), spurred me on to engage with those wonderful games in an expressive manner, and so I cobbled together three "reviews" of the first three entries in the franchise. Those reviews are in the style of the video review I made for the "Bionicle: Voya Nui Online Game", but with the added caveat that they are being directly compared to an upcoming game and have a very clear thesis, expressed in their titles - that they are all going to be better the named-as-fourth entry in the franchise. I do intend to revisit those three games and give them more attention and respect, as I believe they deserve it and are very important for the "world" of gaming as a whole, but that will wait.
I must also admit that, with hindsight, it feels incredibly good to be vindicated.
The Diablo I video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The Diablo II video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The Diablo III video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Define Woman" Video
A few years ago now, as Ketanji Brown Jackson was going through the process of being nominated and then approved for a position as a Supreme Court Justice in the USA's Supreme Court, she was asked a plethora of questions. One of them was, of course, very relevant to the "culture war", and it was: "Can you provide a definition for the word «woman»?"
Jackson replied that she could not, and that was taken as an incredibly foolish thing to say by all the least qualified people. I, on the other hand, found her answer very appropriate - for a judge must have no predispositions or biases, or must be able to rid themselves of their biases to the best of their ability, to banish any foreknowledge they have, because of their task to weigh two versions of a story and decide which is more convincing. If a judge has this baggage brought with them, then the scales of justice will be preemptively tipped in favor of one of the versions, thus - leading into a potentially unjust ruling.
So I set out to make a satirical "MEME" video, dubbed a "shitpost", on the subject, as a means of promoting an essay I wrote regarding the topic.
The "Define Woman" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Define Woman" Essay: (click-to-read)
The "Tier List" Videos
This is going to be an ever-growing collection of videos as I make more and more. The concept is simple - set up a board of ascending tiers, then arrange a number of things in the tiers. The tiers are determined by yours truly, but they, mostly, relate to quality and are reminiscent of the grades one may receive in an USA based school, ranging from S (the highest), through A, B, C, D, E and ending in F (the lowest).
These videos are satirical in nature, and do not require as intense an amount of effort as the other videos (those above the bar) do, but are still pleasant to think about, work on and watch. I also decided to endeavor to accompany those videos with an essay related, if a tad loosely, to the topic at hand.
The "Civilization 1 Leaders/Civilizations Tier List" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Civilization 1 Tier List" Essay: (click-to-read)
More to come!
The "Showcase of Accomplishment" Videos
This is another one of those collections of videos that will grow, hopefully. It features some exceptionally low-effort videos, though not THAT low in effort, which show off an accomplishment of mine in a certain video game. That is literally it. Of course, I have also endeavored to add something to those videos, be it commentary on the achievement itself or critique of the game that allows for the achievement to be complete, but the whole ordeal is not exceptionally challenging to put into video form.
The "Mageseeker Jarvan+Shyvana fight on the Highest Difficulty" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
Also read the review for "The Mageseeker": (click-to-read)
The "Tyrande Whisperwind Solo Kill" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
More to come!
The "MEME" Videos
This is a collection I am uncertain will grow, but it might. It features memes. Satirical little videos that may be funny or provide another type of feeling to the viewer. Most of their creation involves "stealing" from others, so it is not very honorable or difficult, though the original ones have the potential to be "high-effort" works of abstract art, which I greatly appreciate (and probably will not engage in creating).
The "Savior" video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
More to come?
The "League of Legends" Videos
This is a collection I'm almost certain will not grow, thanks to Vanguard (the anti-cheat system implemented by Riot Games, the company behind League of Legends). It features a few excerpts from my experiences playing League of Legends, most of which revolve around unbelievably bad programming manifesting as bugged interactions. I've played League of Legends for a decade, but, thanks to Vanguard, I have been clean for a very long time now. I somewhat miss it, but, at the same time, I get to experience other games, and the horrible sensation of playing League of Legends has not tormented me in quite a while.
The "Malphite" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Vi" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Headshot" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Vel'Koz" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Grievance" Videos
This is a collection of videos that feature at least one character from a video game walking for an extended period of time while I talk about a topic that might be related to the character and the game, or it might not be. In these videos I am spurred on by a grievance that I feel is rather great and my concerns regarding it need to be expressed; I endeavor to make these videos more than simple "rants", as that word strikes me as derogatory when used to describe a video, thanks to many of those who create such material, thus providing additional thoughts and as much research as possible. Still, those are on the lower end of effort, and are simply eruptions of emotion channeled into something somewhat productive and meaningful.
The "Acitivison-Blizzard Human Right Violation" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
The "Itch+Steam Adult Game Ban" Video: (watch-here)(on-youtube)
More to come!