Disneyland Nostalgia: You Can't Go Home Again

You Can't Go Home Again is a very interesting book written in 1940 about a man who comes home after many years and finds things are not what they once were.

Just about everyone has experienced nostalgia which for me means Disneyland in a nutshell. I can’t think of two things that go better together than these two.  

I will never forget the single greatest bit of nostalgia in my lifetime; riding the Peter Pan ride with my father for the first time. I was 7 years old, and the world was mine. It was magical, we were flying. I did not notice any of the obvious cables holding the car in the air. No, I was soaring above this world, which only got better. I was transformed, I was alive, and then it happened. Suddenly I was soaring over London at night. 

It used to look so real..

I could see tiny car lights on the streets. I wish I knew at that moment that although life has some great moments, it really does not ever get much better than that. I had no bills to worry about, house payments, a job to hold down, or anything else. My belly was fed, I felt safe, and most likely slept through the drive home from Anaheim that night.
Disnelyand is the center of the world for nostalgia, but really, what does it all mean in the end? More importantly, as an annual passholder, what am I really doing? Have I spent thousands of dollars over the years trying to chase and re-create moments like this, if not for myself but for my sons as well? If so, I should know better. Nostalgic moments happen organically and are not “created” on a whim. 

Perhaps I have unknowingly created nostalgia for my sons without even being aware?  But that’s for another time, let’s stick to Disneyland.

Yesterland is a great website, and I often love to visit it. I love to look at the pictures and information form classic rides like the Mine Car through Nature’s Wonderland. Now extinct and occupied by Big Mountain Thunder Railroad, Nature’s Wonderland was part of a dying breed of rides that were just…chill. I sound like an old fart I know. “These kids these days and all of these rollercoasters, blah, blah”. But slow rides where you can look at nature (or fake nature) just don’t get the turn styles moving enough anymore. People want bigger and faster, and it seems like it’s that way with everything. Or maybe I really am getting old?

Remnants of days gone by

I do find that I am able to catch bits of nostalgia through Disneyland but they do not last long; just a few minutes at a time. Disneyland has done a great job in particular at keeping Main Street intact. The stores, the food shops, old time music, horse carriages, just about everything there is about the same as it has always been.

But I miss the people mover, and I miss the Rocket Jets being up high, nestled into a Tomorrowland that seemed way better back then. And I miss Mine Train through Nature’s Wonderland. But time moves on I guess. And maybe, just maybe it is the new rides that will someday give the younger generation nostalgia when they look back? And thinking about it, I am okay with this.

The Lost Ark of Ambinet Music

I don’t know when it happened but in mainstream gaming and even movies I have noticed a shift from ambient to bombastic “in your face” music. Now, there are some moments where this is necessary. If you are playing a first person shooter like Doom the hard rock just adds to the flavor and chaos. But more often than not the background music should be ambient and should assist the situation or scene, not dominate it. I know a lot of gamers like to turn the in game music off and play their own and that’s fine. For the few of us remaining who like to enjoy what the musicians provided for the game, I would like to comment on why I think ambient music is important to get right.

In an MMO, there is a lot of repetition; you are questing in some zones for hours at a time, and often return to these zones on other characters, gather ingredients for crafting or sometimes you are tasked to return to these places. You cannot have loud crescendos or overbearing music that is repeated over and over. No one got this wrong more than the MMO Wildstar, which was supposed to be the sci-fi spiritual successor to World of Warcraft. After years of near-futility, the game is closing its doors for good this month. I have a theory that the game was just too frantic. The UI, the monsters, the pacing, and yes, the music, was so crazy and nuts and so fast paced that how could anyone sit down after a long day at work or school and relax playing a game like this for hours at a time? It was shame because the game had promise; it had some beautiful artwork and nice mountains and vistas. Unfortunately the developers never thought about the importance that a nice ambient, soft background tune goes great with open scenery.

World of Warcraft has always gotten
its music right

In movies there is a fine line when you notice the music, and when the music completely takes over. Raiders of the Lost Ark (scored by John Williams) has some of the greatest music sequences I have ever heard and accompanies the scenes perfectly. But what happens when you push this a bit further? You get Hans Zimmer, a great composer, who went on a brilliant streak of amazing music in the 90’s (Thelma & Louise, Crimson Tide, Prince of Egypt, Gladiator) and a nice collaboration with the equally impressive James Newton Howard for the Dark Knight films; suddenly decided to have his music take over the end of Inception and completely drown out half the movie Interstellar. Maybe the sound mixer did not want to hurt Mr. Zimmer’s feelings but would it have been too much to ask “can we turn this down slightly so we can hear the characters speak”?

My Steam Collection is out of control

I now have over 157 games on Steam and that number has been creeping upwards for months now. At this point I am beginning to think that even if I don’t ever buy another single game from now until the time I die, I won’t be able to finish all of my games.

I guess I owe all my wasted time playing MMOs to blame. They are addicting and basically don’t have an ending. That’s how they are designed and for that I have completely failed the Skinner test.

When I finish a game that has an ending I feel sad. I swore for years I would not ever finish Skyrim; I didn’t want it to end. I wanted to live in that world forever and take my walk in the later afternoon heading west from Whiterun, with that beautiful, open view. I suppose I can still do that now but I finished the game. It will feel pointless…until I find that other game that scratches my itch. 

So every now and then I take a break from World of Warcraft or Elder Scrolls Online. I get excited because this is my chance to dig into my Steam games, get some hours played, and get some completed games under my belt.

The logo that haunts
my dreams

And after all of this I still look forward to the large Steam sales that arrive annually during the summer and winter. By this time I always have my account armed with cash, and a Steam wish list full of a couple dozen games. And of course new game purchases mean that you have to play them right away otherwise buying them would feel pointless.  

It is an endless circle that shows no signs up stopping. The problem is there are just TOO MANY games out there period. There is so much crap to sift through. But with all of this crap, at any given time there are quite a few good PC games to play. When I was younger in my Commodore 64 days it never felt overwhelming. Is there such thing as too much of a good thing? Absolutely. 

I tried creating an Excel spreadsheet to track all of my games and tackle them systematically. That did not work. After a week or so I found myself playing what I REALLY wanted to play. And that is the point of this isn’t it? If you are playing what you really want to play don’t make some schedule in your mind. Just play. You only live once, sit down and play whatever you feel like playing. 

Just think first before making ANOTHER Steam game purchase or you will end up like me. Don’t be like me, please.