Penny Arcade

I, um…  Hm. 

I am open to the idea that we (as people who have a specific pastime) have needs that may not be satisfied effectively by ordinary products.  I can’t think of an example, but the universe is vast and somewhere its infinite reaches may contain the answer.  But I don’t, that is to say I do not believe that we need our own Goddamn food. 

The reality is that, at the LAN parties I’ve been to, people often eat things that explicitly are not food.  When the pizza is gone, the greasy box becomes a meal.  The next hungry being, hand still working an unseen mouse, will tear the corner of the chili packet off and tip the powder down their gullet to feed a roaring demon furnace.  Another person will eat the little plastic table each box includes, and the last person will chew the receipt slow, like cud.  There’s an entire beautiful ecology and we’re a part of it.  This is some amazing nature shit and someday someone will make a show.   

    So no, I don’t think our "bar" needs are so extreme that existing bars fall short.  Probably best to dig in now for the inevitable assault.   

Final Fantasy XII enthusiasts should take note: Gametrailers has new videos of the DS sequel that show in greater detail how it would actually be played.  It’s similar to the twelfth Final Fantasy, as promised.  When played with a stylus, the exact same system is an RTS with a rich progression structure - which (scientifically speaking) be fresh.  While I was trying to enjoy FFXII, I kept wanting the ability to pull the camera out and watch everything, which is exactly what’s going on here by default. It may be too much to hope for writing on par with the PS2 predecessor - I understand that the characters meet a special "sky friend" who is a winged boy with whom they can have adventures(?).  Familiar faces do abound, though, and we may hope they are implemented with care.

Theater Hopper‘s Tom Brazelton asked us if we could deliver a guest strip for him, as he would shortly become a father and would need help holding down the (virtual) fort.  A guest strip wasn’t going to happen, because Gabriel enters the Art Mines for our game early and then emerges from them at the end of the day weary and smeared with soot.  Unable to provide what he wanted - but also unable to let him twist in the wind - I offered up my side of the enterprise as a stopgap measure.  I also wrote the intro for an upcoming compilation of Applegeeks Lite, presumably to cement my role as webcomics’ elder statesman. 

(CW)TB out. 

her name is eve

Robert just updated the hotels page on the PAX site - information which may be of use to you, especially if you like to sleep on beds.

(CW)TB
 

You might have seen this story on CNN about the teens that murdered a homeless guy and then equated it to the sort of thrill one might get from a “violent video game”. There will be plenty of articles focusing on these kids and their crime. I’d like to take a second and talk about the parents of these teenagers instead. It is the job of a parent to teach their children certain rules. Obviously the rules themselves and the emphasis each family places on them will vary, but there are certain universal constants that these parents obviously failed to pass on.

Things the parents of these kids failed to teach them(in order of their severity):

1. Don’t drink until you’re 21.

Now this is a tough one. The 15 year old boys have admitted they were sharing beers with the homeless man. This is a difficult rule to enforce with many kids and that’s why I’ve listed first.

2. Don’t do drugs.

In addition to their beers these lads told investigators they had just finished rolling some phat doobie blunts, or whatever it is they do these days. This is an important one but also very difficult to enforce. I’d say it’s a notch above drinking but we’re still dealing with pretty common teenager issues.

3. Don’t murder people.

Ah here’s a big one. I wonder, did the parents simply avoid the “don’t murder people” talk the way other parents might avoid the “sex” talk? Maybe one day as the father was running off to work the mother called behind him,” Don’t forget, you promised to talk to Chris about not murdering people today!” The husband already half way out the door would holler back “Yeah yeah, I’ll do it when I get home tonight.”

4. Don’t take shit out of your butt and rub it on the hobo you just killed.

To me this seems like the easiest lesson of all. My son is only two and already he’s coming to understand that “poops” belong in the potty. How did this kid get to the age of fifteen years old without learning this? Here’s how easy this one is:

Hey son, come here real quick.

Yeah Dad?

Don’t take shit out of your butt.

Sure thing Dad.

Done! How hard was that? What kind of crazy fuck takes poop from his butt and rubs it on someone? I’ll tell you right now I’ve never seen that in Grand Theft Auto. These kids were twelve kinds of nuts and that’s a fact. Their parents either made them nuts or weren’t paying attention while they went nuts on their own. I don’t know which scenario is worse.

-Gabe out