The only good thing about driving somewhere is Depeche Mode's album Violator, and I'm willing to be fairly firm on this point. The place we were going to go was not two hours away, as had been claimed, but rather five hours, according to cartographers, but what would they know about land, elevation, and distance.
I sent Gabe a quick email yesterday from this place of abject despair. Would I survive? And who would care? My corpse would feed the spooky, bare apple trees of the Methow Valley, permeated by packets of wireless data. Arguably, more people would eat apples than read this site, so if I want my byproducts to reach the largest audience I should have dug a hole right there and just laid down in it. These are the thoughts that occur to a person who has made their peace with eternity.
I had brought along my Sidekick, which I am never without, in the hopes that I would be suspended in precious signal long enough each day to keep up with your world. I have been meaning to extol the device in a post, as the device is a super big deal to me whenever I can get it away from Brenna. However, it has become readily apparent to me that we are no longer allowed to like or enjoy things, because liking or enjoying things is evidence of collusion between ourselves and gigantic corporate identities. I have absolutely zero inclination to engage in your part-time, pop nihilism. Yes, yes, everything is quite droll and tiresome. Nothing is worthy. Everyone is a hypocrite and so forth. Your parents don't understand you. Get your account at the Something Awful forums, provided they don't just come free when you turn thirteen.
In any event, my trip was essentially a point to point journey though every part of this state that has no cell access. It was as though I was travelling straight down through the strata of the Earth, a sort of low-tech time travel. I can tell you this much, the farther away you get from population centers - from civilization - the better the pie. This pie was, I mean, it was what every pie longs, strains to become. It represented the potential inherent in each pie. It was superior in every way to oral sex. I have been married for a while, so perhaps I should say it is better than the memory of oral sex. I seem to recall it being pretty not so bad.
Oh yeah, Ain't It Cool Games. I don't really care one way or the other.
(CW)TB out.
nothing can stop me
I'm starting to wonder if I like beer at all or if I just like naming it. Hugh Hefeweizen. Short And Stout. Portergeist. Sin. Who knows. Fire Sale is between an ale and a porter in terms of its motif. But I'm here to talk etymology.
There was a bug in the Army Game beta that made crawling sound really loud. If you were crawling through the underbrush, ostensibly a stealthy maneuver, it sounded as though you were playing a drum set in the middle of the forest on a clear night. You could hear them miles away. "There's Crawly Bob," we'd say. "He's crawling up a storm."
That part isn't particularly auspicious. Follow me, here.
Moonbase Commander created many words. The opponent's primary hub, the object of all your violence, quickly became known as a Hoho. Not only have Hohos historically been delicious, it also stands for Heart Of His Operation, which is demonstrably true. There is also a type of remote bomb that can move through shields, called a Crawler. This was truncated to Crawly, and then became Crawly Bob for some reason. It even moved forward to Crawli Baba And The Forty Thieves, but this proved unwieldy in common usage. Also, it didn't seem quite accurate.
Something one can do in desperation (or even just for fun!) is send waves of crawlers after an opponent. This quickly became correlated with Going Out Of Business mythology, like on those crazy mattress commercials. The Boss is out of town! Crazy deals! We've gone insane, and we're passing the savings on to you.
A crawler rush eventually became known as a Fire Sale.
(CW)TB
(CW)TB
Anyway I got out of bed long enough to look at some game news over at the Magic Box. There is a little blurb in today's news which reads:
"- Sammy / Arc System Works announced that they are working on a new installment of Guilty Gear, called Guilty Gear Online, as the name suggests this game will have network support, for people to battle over the Internet."
If they confirm its release for the US I will know that Jesus has indeed answered my prayers. I haven't heard any rumors at all about the GG series making its way to any other consoles so I have to assume that this is for the PS2 and that kind of sucks. I'd much rather play it over Live with voice support and friends tracking. Oh well, beggars can't be choosers.
Another news item there says that Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball has become the second best selling Xbox Game in Japan. I don't really have anything to say about that but the story did remind me of the terrible fucking commercial I saw for the game while lying in bed today sipping my soup and watching Peoples Court. Let me break it down for those of you who haven't seen it yet. Picture a bunch or teenage boys gathered around a television set watching DOAXBV. A few cuts back and forth between salivating young gamers and bouncy virtual titties. Then a quick shot of a pert round polygonal ass and all the boys immediately reach for something to cover their crotches. The implication being of course that they are all sporting wood.
I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall when the ad guy pitched this idea. I imagine it must have gone something like this:
"So I was at home thinking about the new commercial and what I immediately thought of was young boys with erections. I just had this really vivid picture in my head of a bunch of young men all snuggled up on a couch together and all of them with their compasses pointing due north. Look I even drew some pictures. See, just like a bunch of little turkey thermometers. What do you think?"
And then the scariest part is the Microsoft guy's response
"I love it, let's run with it!"
I am still holding out hope that the whole thing was a fever induced hallucination.
-Gabe out
-Gabe out
For example, Chokie Roberts has proven particularly enduring, and as more games enable the player to strangle opponents - in effect, to "Put the Chokie Roberts On Them," or "Give Them A Little Chokie Roberts" - it seems as though this term will live out its days with few intermissions of usage. The lingo made its debut with WCW Nitro for the N64, and recently saw an extraordinary resurgence with the release of Ubi Soft's Splinter Cell. It is a corruption of Cokie Roberts, one time NPR correspondent, and all the time idiot.
This is far from the only example, of course. Tribes 2 was a highly productive game in terms of slang, giving rise to classics such as Jumpy McHopsalot, which is not a form ("X McXs-alot") unique to Tribes by any means. Gabriel's insistence on the energy-sapping ELF gun earned him the nickname "Silkk The Shocker," as in the younger brother of Master P, who - like Ludacris - represents the dirty south side. The ELF gun also gave rise to the term "Fish On" during Team Aerial Combat 2 matches, as the victors would fire their arcing beams at helpless, falling opponents.
Lisa Bonet has also proved surprisingly resilient, though understanding the term requires something in the way of mental gymnastics. One is said to be Lisa Bonet if they are completely fucked beyond any attempt to resolve the issue. This is not a comment on Cosby Show star Lisa Bonet, rather, it is a very free conversion of "Bonet," to the past tense of the French verb "Boner," meaning literally "To Bone." This word does not actually exist. One is said to be Ender Wiggin if they are not keeping their cool, i.e., "Wigging."
Every gaming group, by necessity, coins terms to describe the places in each map that must be defended, attacked, and so forth. The "Bridge" map in Medal of Honor has a church - called "the Church" - very near the Axis spawn point, far from the Bridge they must destroy to win the round. However, as often as not, shy, tired, or perhaps simply lazy Nazis would simply wait at their spawn point in easily defensible positions while overeager Allied troops fell into the trap. To say that "They Can't Plant From The Church" has a specific meaning in this map, namely, "Be patient." They can't win by waiting back there, and we gain nothing by attacking their position. Since this game has fallen out of favor with the group, "Planting" and even "The Church" have become metaphorical terms. They are now applicable - and, indeed, applied - to any situation where an opposing force must actively commit to an objective in enemy territory.
(CW)TB
Anyway, this new i-store is scheduled to open its e-doors in about a month. The plan is to kick things off with some fresh shirt designs and some cool new posters. Eventually we'd like to see stuff like Mouse pads and umbrellas but we're starting small. What we would like to know is what you want to see in this store. After all you will be the ones spending your hard earned cizash there. So I need you guys to help us out with the kind of numbers we are gonna have to order as well as the designs. That means I need some clicking out of you.
New Shirt Ideas.
**UPDATE**
I just wanted to clarify. The t-shirts will not simply have these comic strips printed on them. The links to the strips is just to remind you about the characters. The Div Shirt For instance will have a small div on the front with the words “Zero to drunk in twenty dollars” on the back along with his famous martini glass.
Please give a clickeroo on the ones you would most like to see made into shirts.
Div-Zero to drunk in twenty dollars
The Fruit Fucker- Drink my juice it's fucking nutritious
The Period-Your friend at the end
I am sure eventually they will all get made into shirts but we will probably only be able to start off with two or three designs.
The posters I am already working on actually. The store should open with a Cardboard Tube Samurai Poster based on the wallpaper I did a while ago. An Over Easy poster done up like a movie poster and then finally the poster we sold at Comic-Con that has the whole crew on it.
If you have any ideas for what you would like to see in the store please send them to Brad at this address.
-Gabe out
(CW)TB
