People From Los Angeles

"I think about making art, in general, as a dialogue. That's what it is, in the end— you're expressing yourself, and your audience gets their chance to express themselves. And especially with video games — it being interactive and it being software — it really is a continuing conversation— very directly now, and very literally. [...] In this moment, it is a conversation, as well as being this long-running conversation throughout history."

"I've started to think of myself, personally, as a "work in progress" that will never reach completion— but in order to keep progressing, I have to release games. [...] You're releasing a game, but you yourself are not "done". And so, I think that takes some of the pressure off for me— to think about things that way. And in general— to think about art and life as this cyclic thing, because you're going to keep going and make more things, so just put out what you've got and do the best you can. It's not a final judgment of you, as a person and an artist, when you release a game."

"Everything in Spelunky was designed with a similar sensibility, where we're trying to draw out the personality of each area, of each monster, from very simple actions and things that they do. And when they all come together, you get this complexity that's very interesting, and that makes every time you play in this randomized environment fun— because you start to see — over time — all the different patterns that can arise. [...] That's the emergent gameplay that comes out of it."

"A degree is a piece of paper that says you can do something in theory— game developers want to know that you have enough passion to do real work, regardless of whether you're being graded on it. And if you're thinking of going indie, it won't matter what other people think— you'll simply need that passion to succeed or else you won't."

"The key to making a challenging game that's not frustrating is to give the player all of the tools that they need to overcome the challenge— and never make it the game's fault that they lost. [...] Roguelikes give you lots of those tools, so even though they're really tough, it's always fun."

"That might be the core of game design to me— making connections from every part of the game to every other part of the game. [...] I think it's been really fun to be able to do Spelunky Classic, Spelunky HD, and now, Spelunky 2. And it really feels to me like seeing the evolution of a lot of our favorite childhood franchises and seeing how they've grown up, and being inspired by that."

"We know what identity politics does -- it divides, and it polarizes. No matter how you want to look at it, that's just the effect of it no matter how great the intentions are. We all know the road to hell is paved with good intentions."

"Jihad is the secret these investigators are keeping, but only from themselves. It drives the murder spree against infidel troops. It also is part of the culture that renders U.S. utopian plans to train an Afghan army and police force dead on arrival. Not saying so doesn't make it go away. It just wastes the lives of our people. Does anyone care?"

"I do feel like I’ve been fortunate to step into these roles that exemplify young women stepping into their power in the sense of owning who they are and making a change in the world. [The people I represent] might not necessarily know it was through their example, but as the actress I now see that I was somehow able to be a role model by living that character’s story. Not every single part is that extraordinary where I get to do that. I also like to play roles that are super fun and wacky, but it feels good to be able to have that variety and step into a place of empowerment."

"I feel it is really different to be there at a show. It is such a great feeling and I hope that doesn’t die with the Internet as so many other things have. Go out, support those bands, have a beer, listen to some live music and don’t forget about it!"

"The animation can go anywhere, and the music has to go with it. What is especially great from a composer's point of view is that the music in these shows gets featured, not buried; these shows appreciate the value of what the music is doing."

"It would make no sense whatsoever to say, "Well, we shouldn’t honor Catholics who present the antithesis of our Catholic doctrine, but there’s really no problem whatsoever provided the person’s not a Catholic," that evades common sense."

"Christ has infinite patience with us. When we have doubts and fears, He never stops reaching out to us with his love. He wants us to love Him back, he wants us to trust him completely. We sometimes lack faith because the realities of the world press in on us: a financial situation, a job situation, a difficulty in the family, and other factors. When these concerns cloud our hearts, we begin to lose the clear vision of faith that frees us. Trust Christ! Have faith! Do not be afraid to trust Christ completely, offering Him your worries and fears, your joys and hopes. Jesus, I trust in you! This is the great exclamation of the Church. It is only through trust that you will begin to experience the depths of Christ's love for you. And when you begin to experience this love, deeply and profoundly in your lives, you cannot help but see the world around you differently."

"The studios really don’t care very much about the individual artists – they just want to get the shots for the right price. I don’t think that’s an artform that’s based on artistry or passion or vision, or anything, it’s just a commodity, a production line."

"Seeking out help is never a weakness. Whether that's just phoning a friend or finding a therapist or starting to read up on things on the internet or in books. Sometimes we think that means we can't help ourselves, that it's a bad thing, but it's not. It's just becoming more self-aware, and I think that that's a really amazing gift to give yourself."

"Let us in our own day and age, in this 21st century become witnesses to the resurrection. There are a million ways to do that, but we essentially do that by bearing in our heart an unquenchable joy. And we carry that, maybe, in the depth of our heart when life gets tough, and it’s been tough, and when life gets overwhelming, and it’s been overwhelming, when we have experienced tragedy, and we have. There is always in the depth of our heart a measure of joy that can only come from Jesus himself, that can only come from the assurance that he has been raised from the dead."

"Back then, he admits, his theory still had some shortcomings; for example the three generations of fermions didn't quite come out right. But this was in 2007. In the years since, Garrett has solved some of the remaining puzzles. Still, his masterpiece is unfinished, not yet to his full satisfaction."

"I think that, without experimental checks, physics can — and has — gone off the rails ... experiment has to be the ultimate decider of what is good physics."

"Is our universe fundamentally a mess, or is there some simple and natural structure that all this could emerge from, or be parts of? One approach to answering these questions is String Theory (or, more generally, M-Theory), but string unification models have grown excessively in complexity while producing zero predictive progress. After several decades of extensive theoretical exploration leading nowhere, it is time to consider that the string program may have been a wrong turn. If we backtrack, imagining String Theory never happened, we can go in a new direction, building on the success of Grand Unified Theories and recent progress in Loop Quantum Gravity. The structures of GUTs and LQG rely heavily on Lie groups and are remarkably compatible. By considering the known Lie groups and fields of physics as parts of a larger geometric whole, we move towards Lie group unification."

"For almost a decade, Lisi moved on no fixed schedule between Maui, where he likes to surf, and the mountains of the West, where he snowboards. Four years ago, Lisi persuaded his girlfriend, Crystal Baranyk, who is an artist, to move with him into an old Colorado ski-shuttle van; he remodelled it himself, shipped it to Maui, and parked it by the beach. They lived in the van for a year, with no toilet. He worked intermittently, sometimes as a snowboard instructor, once on a short-term consulting contract when a friend’s software company needed an algorithm solved, but mostly he tried to think about physics."

"I just think it’s funny that a couple of logical tweets have made me a “conservative,” such a strong label. I don’t even know what it means to be conservative, or what a conservative is anymore. I feel like the meanings of these labels are changing. I certainly would never have called myself a conservative."

"I’m grateful that I have faith that provides perspective. This is important work, but I always have to remember that there is even a higher calling: serving God. We serve our country, but ultimately I serve God in what I do day to day. It would be difficult to serve here without being grounded in faith."

"We've seen what Big Government looks like. No one would have thought that the IRS would turn against the American people, and yet here we are. We must always be vigilant and guarded against the overreach of power."

"We may be the first generation that instead of sacrificing for our kids, we’re sacrificing their future with an inheritance of debt."

"When you abandon God, the only thing left is yourself, and when you remove God from the equation, what is the reason for any altruism, any sense of the other? How do I really care for people if I do not believe in a God? The whole approach of a secular culture and liberal culture is to focus on my own pleasure and what’s in it for me. So we see young people very easily moving in and out of relationships, without much thought or meaning, and then they cannot understand why they are so unhappy."

"Once you create the show you are always its creator, no matter how many other versions are produced."

"He was always charming and gracious, and willing to give any harebrained scheme of mine a fair hearing before saying, “You’re nuts, Buzz.” He was without question one of the nicest people I’ve ever met -- and it’s been my privilege to have met and worked with a lot of super-nice people."

"I like to challenge the faithful to grow in holiness and become saints. When I give a confirmation homily to children, I ask them, “Are you called to be saints?” It is amazing that a number of them say no. The adults in attendance look stunned by the question. I then tell them we are all called to holiness, and we are all called to be saints. Vatican II teaches this; Christ tells us this in the Gospels."

"God just put a love for it inside of me, I love telling stories, drawing and painting. Animation is a fairly solitary art form. But what happens when you sit in a theater with an audience and you hear their audible responses to your work—the crying, the laughter—there is nothing like it. I just love storytelling. I am a ham actor with a pencil. I love performing on canvas or on paper or right now on a digital screen."

"No man escapes Death. So Death must not be the enemy. Life must not be the prize. It must be the gameboard, on which Death teaches its savage lessons. You could heed those lessons, or ignore them, but never evade them. Death, then, was the ally. Not to be sought, but heeded."

"“Cynical bastard, aren’t you?” “Every man is a mirror,” Nozawa said flatly. “We all reflect what we see.”"

"It would have been a terrible thing to die a fool and a liar. Truth, at any cost, is worth the price."

"Lesbianism is the ultimate expression of a feminist philosophy."

"Aubry looked at her without shifting his head. Damn, she was lovely. An unpleasant question remained: What where they to each other? It was hard to say sometimes. Did he truly feel love, or just the effects of the Cyloxibin mushroom? And was there a difference?"

"He had no choice. And that one thing turned Heaven into Hell."

"Truth could not be spawned in lies and deceit."

"“Don’t be afraid of dying. A Warrior lives with death, Aubry. Welcome it as an ally. All other fears are just fragments of death, forms of unbecoming. A fighter clings to life, and therefore cannot win. A warrior treats life and death as the same thing, and therefore cannot lose.”"

"Definitions are just words, just labels. And once you label something, the label gets between you and the thing."

"The world doesn’t give a damn what we feel or want. Only what we are, and what we do."

"“It’s bigger than death, Aubry.” “You’re wrong,” he said, his voice utterly chill. “Nothing is bigger than death.”"

"Hate comes from the past, fear from the future. Pain and pleasure are now, and therefore their own trap."

"“That was what we were told. It doesn’t entirely ring true.” “Why not?” “Because the President of the United States is always bound by the deals that he makes to get to his position. Delacourte can’t make any kinds of drastic changes, regardless of what he claims. The chief executive isn’t an emperor.”"

"It was on one of those terrible, fever-clouded days when the serpent beneath southern California awoke. It stretched from slumber, shedding its skin, the screams of its wrath heard in the shriek of tortured steel, of splintering wood and concrete. Maxine was torn from her slumber by the moans of the dying and the awful sound of her ramshackle apartment shifting on its foundations. “Earthquake!” She pulled herself from the bed, stumbled from her building into the street, and watched the lurching structures and snapping powerlines, the buckling sidewalks and exploding water mains, as a seismic debt long outstanding came due."

"Marketing is finding women who like sex or would like to find out if they do. Sales is convincing them that they want to go home with YOU, right NOW."

"The price of chemical ecstasy was a dear one, paid in flesh and spirit."

"“Chicken?” “Don’t want my feathers ruffled, it that’s what you mean.”"

"And your life is ruined because you tried to do the Right Thing. Join the club honey—guess what, there are a few more of us out here who’ve had our brains beaten our with our own dreams."

"I’m damned tired of being needed. Being needed is just the flip side of being royally screwed."

"“You know, it isn’t that you can’t get information in electronic form, or microfilm, or disk, or cube, or any of the other forms—tape, holographic computer feed.” He paused. “Tell me, Aubry—what’s the similarity between all the modes of information storage I’ve just named?” Aubry scratched his head. “They don’t take up as much space as books, I guess.” “Yes, that’s true enough—but as far as I’m concerned, the difference is that they all require an external power source.” He cocked his head sideways, until he looked absurdly like a bird examining a piece of fruit. “Do you understand that that makes you dependent upon others?” Promise ran her hands over the spines of a nearby stack, then shook her head. “Not cubes. There are plenty of solar-powered cube-readers. One sunny day a week, and you’re set.” “True enough, but you are still dependent upon others to repair your viewer if it breaks down...the more advanced a technology, the more fragilely inter-dependent it is.” “So what?” Warrick shrugged. “It just seems to me that the most valuable thing that any human has is the ability to educate himself, to find out about the world around him, to program his primary organ of perception—his brain. And that basic, inalienable right should be as independent of external factors as possible. Once a book is printed and acquired, it’s yours. Nothing else is needed except a pair of eyes and daylight. Individual books have lasted for hundreds of year—do you really think you can say the same of your little viewers, or computers, or whatever? If you have a hundred libraries stored on cube, and your viewer breaks down, you have nothing. Give me an encyclopedia, and if it isn’t totally destroyed by fire, I can dig it out, dry it off, piece it together, and still have something of value.” His gaze became direct, and piercing. “There is nothing more important than directing the flow of information into your mind. It determines all—your attitudes, your actions, your life. You can rely upon the visual and audible media all you want—but they should be in addition to reading, not in place of it. If other forms replace reading, then your input is restricted, and much more dependent upon other people, who may or may not have your best interests at heart.” “So, that’s the most important thing you can think of in life? Reading?” Warrick sighed. “You are being obstinate, my friend. You learn if you learn.”"

"…I like the word impressionistic more than experimental for some reason. I think experimental, I think of abstract language met with geometric stage gestures, while my writing tends to be worlds and people that we know and recognize, but the rules have changed on them. And on us, the audience, but the struggle is that I want the audiences to not spend time trying to figure out the rules, rather to accept them and see what it means to them as the world unfolds."