Jury Duty

I have been requested to do jury jury 3 times before, and 2 of them I just waited for 4 hours and got to go home, and 1 I had to go into a whole thing because I didn't live in the state anymore. I felt like my number was coming up for a to actually sit on a jury for a case this time. 

I had already delayed it for a year, so it was finally time to take my chance, and fulfill my civic duty. I got on the train at 7:30 AM, and got to the courthouse around 8:30 AM. We then proceeded to wait for 3 hours (got some book reading in), and then the jury selection began. It was a civil trial for a car accident that happened in 2018, so they only needed 7 people (I think actually only 6 were needed and 1 alternate), and there was 18 people, so my chances of being picked were low. They had actually picked 7 people, and I was ready to go home, but then they dismissed 2 people, and called me up. I told them I was in a car accident before, so I may be biased, but they didn't give a shit apparently, so I was now in the jury box.

The case started fine, the two lawyers said this was a he said/she said issue, and that an older couple was suing this this 30 something guy. The thing is that the older couple didn't speak English. This normally doesn't matter, but in a place where they have to be interviewed and cross examined through an interpreter, it unraveled pretty quickly. The lawyer for the older couple looked nice, and had an accent that I could only really parse 50% of the time. I only really understood the interpreter, and the questions for the first 2 hours of the trial were mainly just about who the old couple were, and how this crash effected them. I still had no idea what the crash even was, or what happened, which is really what this whole thing is balanced upon.

The defendant's layer was quite possibly the most hipster person I have seen since 2010. He had a bow tie, and a jacket that just needed a steam punk hat, and he would be at home at the experimental music section in any record store. He was clearly trying to "gotcha" the old couple, but he was foiled every time. For example, he would show the old lady a picture of this crashed car, and ask them if they recognize it, and they would say they don't remember. He then would still move on to the next question ("in your opinion, does this look like a car was going slow when it was in that accident?") as if the prior question had the answer they wanted, rather than the one they gave. 

My favorite exchange was where they said they were in an accident in 2017, and they told their chiropractor that they had lots of back pain, but why they didn't go back in 2018? The old lady just said they weren't in business anymore, and the lawyer just said "fair enough." There was even a moment where the older couple's lawyer was trying to establish that the weather was nice and sunny on the day of the accident, and when the defendant's lawyer tried to pull a gotcha implying that the sun being out meant that they were liable for the accident, they then went unto a whole thing where they said only the weather was nice. When the defendant's lawyer tried to ask if it was sunny outside during the accident, the translator just didn't get through, and we never actually found out.

Now, maybe I have just watched too many detective shows, but since they knew the date, and the time of the accident, whether or not the sun was out during the accident isn't a mystery. This is something you can look up. I actually did look it up, and it looks like sundown was at 4:31 PM on the day of the accident, so it was probably pretty dark. This could not be said in court though, and it did make me wonder about how this happened in 2018, and yet both lawyers seemed to not be prepared for this case at all.

By the end of day 1, I was more confused about this whole incident than I was at the beginning, and we still had no idea how the crash even happened. The next day (Friday, which is my day off by the way) at 9 AM, they brought us back in the waiting room, made us wait another hour, then brought us back into the court. We sat for another 10 minutes, and then the judge said to take a break. I took this chance to get some donuts. After the break, the judge steps into the jury waiting room, tells us they are making a legal ruling that they don't need us anymore. Luckily I had donuts, but the whole thing left me so confused, that I don't even have an opinion about who was liable. I never even heard the defendant speak. It was just a bunch of hours waddling through translations, without having to actually rule on it.

It was a confounding experience. Any sense that I had done my civic duty had dissolved, but at least I now have this story to tell.

Resident Evil 8 VR Review

Playing through Resident Evil 8 VR made me realize that I only a fraction of a fraction of people will be in the same situation as me. That is to say that as a person who could afford a Playstation VR2, never played any VR other than PSVR1, and never played Resident Evil 8 before, it is hard to imagine many people being in my position. That being said, I wanted to write a review because I think RE8VR figured out something about survival horror that I had not even considered. 

Survival Horror as a concept has been codified to mean something that makes getting through the game tougher and more resource focused. Whether that is through challenging game play and forcing you to use healing items, movement systems that force you to be more deliberate, and limited inventory space, Survival Horror hinges on the player making (hopefully) interesting choices to get through the game. As time went on however, Survival Horror as a concept will cling onto some of these concepts, and leave others behind to make getting through the game more akin to an action game than something you have to "survive" through. Resident Evil turned from a Survival Horror series into more Horror Themed action series. RE8VR keeps this tradition, and it is very much an action game, but the VR adds two important things: the VR enables visuals with added depth, and motion controls that, by default, require you to manually reload your weapons. 

The first added thing is obvious: what makes VR virtual is how the environment now has full depth, but it is surprising how much RE8 feels like it was made for VR. Perhaps this is just how the developers use a first person perspective, or remnants of how Resident Evil 7 in VR was made, but there are moments and environments that seemed tailor made for virtual reality. Whether it is something going right into your face, or the ability to look around and look right at the monster approaching you, never has Resident Evil felt like a horror movie (perhaps not since RE7VR).

The second thing isn't as obvious, which is how the game by default requires you to use motion controls to take out and reload your weapons. Some VR games are compatible with a normal controller, RE8VR utilizes the PSVR2 motion controllers to aim, choose your weapons, and reload. Reloading via motion controls is on by default, and it is something you can turn off, but new functionality redefined what Survival Horror meant for me. Before, it would be about what handicaps the player has in order to facilitate interesting choices, but now with manual reloading, the ability you have to precisely reload a gun while something is trying to harm you adds a new dimension to Resident Evil. In games like Resident Evil 4, being able to shoot with a laser sight and reload like a button made you feel like a special ops badass, but fumbling to put in a clip, trying the trigger, and then having to remember to cock the gun, only for you to run away from whatever harm is quickly approaching you, reintroduces the horror and interesting choices. As the game progresses, you get better and better, but then as you get more powerful guns, figuring out how to reload them in the middle of a fight is something you have to relearn as the game progresses. 

These two things work in harmony to bring what could be a new direction for the Resident Evil series (well, at least in VR). Having things that pop out at you, and then fumbling to make sure you can continue to defend yourself, makes for an experience that I really enjoyed. Survival Horror becomes more about that moment when you realize that reloading your new pistol isn't how it used to be, and scrambling to pick yourself up and put yourself back into a place of power. It just feels right to be in the shoes of RE8VR protagonist Ethan Winter's shoes, and not knowing how to reload a sniper rifle while fighting a dragon. It feels like the ideal way to play the game for me.

While is was ideal for me, it should be said that it isn't a perfect experience. With some cut scenes still being in 2D (including the ending), some loss of motion tracking (only happened to me once in a fight, but it wasn't great), some graphics clearly not being made to be looked up close (it was also a bummer to try and read any book titles as they were always blurry), and special modes like Mercenaries not making the cut (no trophy support was also disappointing, but I'd rather had more modes than trophies), it feels like all the polish and time went into the full game, and they didn't have the time or money to work on anything else. Overall though, Resident Evil 8 VR redefined what it means to be a scary game, and the potential they can have to make some fun, scary times.