Tales from the Box - Gearheads Unite!

Kevin and I spent the better part of last night, between our usually productive comic creation process, testing a few delicious samples from the box that is the, uh, Xbox.

Dead Rising

The first game we tried was Dead Rising, which in concept sounds like a lot of fun – basically, you are trapped in a mall with hundreds and hundreds of zombies and you have three days to survive. You can basically use anything you can pick up as a weapon. With a mall full of stores and time on your hands, the idea of being creative with fighting off zombies got us pretty excited.

In execution though, the game’s only so-so. Sure, it was fun watching our character peel through fifty zombies with a shopping cart, as well as, throw cans of pop from a box, but it did get a little tiresome pretty quickly. While we didn’t exactly dive into the story whole-heartedly, it seemed as though it would be enough to hold interest for a few hours and nothing more.

The final verdict was Dead Rising is fun, but fun in the “rental” sort of way. Once you’ve played it, the freshness fades faster than a budget can of feminine hygiene product at an all girl rugby tournament.

Gears or War

The proclamations are largely true. Our jaws collectively dropped upon popping this into the Xbox 360. I’m not a “shooter” guy and even less so a “tactical shooter” guy, but this game had me at “finish him.”

Gears or War is graphically the best game I’ve seen on a console; from the minute our character went running into a firefight in some bombed out hotel with couches flying apart, pictures falling off walls and wood splinters kicking up with bullet ricochets, Kevin and I knew this deep within our very souls.

The gameplay supports graphical muscle in a way few games with nice graphics do. My first thought upon seeing the game was, man this blows me away like “Resident Evil 4.” The way characters roll, hide against cover and scan for enemies is top notch. The movements are smooth and surprisingly fast, plus there seems to be levels of complexity getting to know the intuitive controls. When we played, we were handed our rear-ends more often than I’d care to mention; this isn’t your grandma’s run-and-gun game like Doom. You need to know your environment or your likely going to be on the wrong end of a chainsaw gun; yeah, it’s as pretty as it sounds.

The final verdict; this game looks and plays great. And, I hear there is a feature where you and your friends and can together over live on a solo campaign (but sadly not multiplayer) which sounds like good chainsawing fun.

Call of Duty 3

Like the familiar hobo you threw epithets to every morning at the train station, Call of Duty comes around, whether you want it or not. This was the last game we tried and it was basically my idea to rent it because I heard the multiplayer could support some unheard number of people on one map (24, 24?)

The presentation is standard, the gameplay is exactly the same as it’s always been. Basically, it’s the game you know and love less and less each time.

One important “however” however. Call of Duty 3 lets you and your friends play together on one console while playing multiplayer. This in of itself is mind-blowingly fun. Kevin and I took to a map like cat people attacking one-dimensional Stephen King characters in a bad horror movie. There is something to be said about playing multiplayer with a friend where you can coordinate attacks, laugh at your foibles and basically have fun with your friend, instead of forcing them to watch.

The final verdict – the solo missions probably compete with “paint drying” in terms of entertainment, but Call of Duty 3 is built for the multiplayer and built on rock-and-roll, especially with friends over.

Hello Mr. Fantasy 8-9-10ish

Fantasy football seasons age in the same way that dogs do – for every one of our weeks, it’s like seven hard weeks on a fantasy football team. While some teams looked great out the gates, the same teams might be looking a little feeble or a touch senile lately - and in some worst-case scenarios – some teams that look poised to take a shot at the crown are now lost, wandering the aisles of Safeway softly urinating in their pants and mumbling about “the man who took their rutabagas.”

Paul’s Team

My fists are beginning to hurt from the amount of beatings I’ve laid to the dead horse known as Paul’s team – but, hey let’s go over it again – as long as Paul’s team keeps Johnson and Tomlinson, the rest of the team only needs to keep a level of productivity somewhere on par with an overweight Polish factory worker.

Lindsay’s Team

I haven’t seen this many rollercoaster rides since Magic Mountain in 2003. Last week, I was ready to anoint you as surefire number two with the revamped Ravens offense. This week, I’m ready to drop you like you were hotter than a Justin Timberlake single. Your team performs, albeit inconsistently like a Jim Playfair hockey team. If this keeps up, Larry just might overtake you.

Larry’s Team

Well let’s get it out of the way: your team has metaphorically fallen backwards out of the sidelines and torn its ACL in the fantasy football race. Your top scorer, and pretty much the league’s top scorer, is out for the season leaving you with Marc Bulger. That’s an ugly prom date and you gotta dance with him, alone.

With McNabb done, I can’t say I hold out a lot of hope. Ian’s not exactly lighting the world on fire, but he doesn’t have to – he has two quarterbacks to produce points every week, and that sadly, is enough.

Ian’s Team

The older brother’s veteran savvy takes over and Ian shoots past Brian on the standings. For a while there, I was going to leave you for dead. It was looking like your team would end up in the scrapheap of history somewhere between a BETA player and episodes of Little Wonder (it’s the one with the girl, who’s a robot and does robot-y things to a canned laugh track…wait…I’ve already said too much…).

Still, with Portis out I’m not loving your chances to go higher – you might hang on to your current spot but I’m doubtful you’ll be in the money by year’s end.

Brian’s Team

With each passing week, Brian’s face is getting longer than the line up for PS3’s. I don’t blame him. Brian’s team is beset by the inequities and tyrannies of evil men; that and depending on Reggie Bush or Carnell Williams to put up consistent numbers, which just isn’t happening enough. To be frank, Bush is looking more like a wide-receiver than a running-back with every game. When you can’t keep Deuce McCallister on the bench, you know something just doesn’t smell right.

Derek’s Team

Picking up Ladell Betts in any capacity is a bad move – it’s doubly bad when Ladell watches T.J Duckett do all the work while Mike Bell tallies in a couple of scores and 90 yards.

It’s these kinds of gambles that sink fantasy teams faster than electronic battleship. Your luck playing the fantasy football field is about as good as Ryan playing the field, period (ouch, sorry Ryan). As Homer once said, “the lesson here son, is never try.”

Dean’s Team

There’s this song by a post-hardcore band named The Fiction called “Kevin Jones.” I’m not sure if it’s about my Kevin Jones but it’s an okay song, and well, Kevin Jones is an okay running back; that is, when his foot isn’t falling off.

Speaking of falling off, all my momentum is dissipating faster than Jon Kitna can throw interceptions. Suddenly, the Lions look like the Lions again which can only mean one thing: Matt Millen’s loss is my loss. I hear rumours Martz might go to Arizona if Denny Green becomes homeless. If that happens, you can bet I’ll be jettisoning Jones and Kitna into space faster than Sigourney Weaver can say “Aliens.”

Ryan’s Team

If I was Doctor Phil, this would be around the time I would be sitting you down and asking “what’s up with you son?” Not like I really need to dig for an answer – Charlie Frye is your most potent quarterback, which is kind of like saying the Kevin Federline is a potent force in today’s culture.

Come to think of it, your team is kind of like Kevin Federline – not very talented, a little unkept, but has a faint glimmer of promise – if by promise you mean a long career of daytime talk show cameos and being featured in a Trivial Pursuit pop-culture question five years from now – yeah, your team has that kind of promise.

Dennis’ Team

If only Edgerrin could play the Lions every week. If only Tatum Bell could play at all. If only Hines Ward and Heath Miller were catching footballs instead of chasing defenders who intercept them. There’s a lot of “if’s” with this team and that really only leads to only thing: the fantasy football dungeon.

Wayne’s Team

There are only so many years one can blame a system on a coaching system or talent level. A perfect example would be the Houston Texans. They’ve had more than a few chances to prove worth and despite player and coaching changes they continue to tank. I’m not sure what stars are aligned to cause this curse to them, but it seems to be the same curse unfairly wreathed on Mr. Garberg.

Regardless of potential, here you are swimming at the bottom of the ranks yet again. Whatever deity you are currently paying homage toward, I’d recommend a change; perhaps Vishnu or Buddha will bring better luck. At worst, you could go Catholic since you’re already paying penance with your team.

Letters from Neo-Tokyo

Letters from Neo-Tokyo (thoughts on various sub-culture subjects such as gaming, anime, movies, and generally nerdy things I like).

I recently came across a couple of articles that really struck me on this topic and I thought I would share what I think…

Addiction: a strong emotional or psychological dependence on a substance such as “…”

Normally this sentence would end with “a drug” or “alcohol” or “gambling” but in recent years a number of therapists and psychiatrists have begun adding “video games” to the list. Sure, video games get the shaft for a number of things, no different than other forms of media that are usually part of some kind of sub-culture, the most prevalent probably being the holy trinity of comics, movies and music.

The most damning articles you’ll see in print are usually about the violent content included in videogames, not so much for the possibility that games may also (inadvertently or arguably for some games directly) prove to have addictive qualities. From what I can tell, this trend was minimal in the days of yore when games were essentially linear: you plugged it in, you played it, you beat it, you stopped playing it. Not altogether different from books or movies, games were an entertainment device aimed of creating a particular experience until the gamer beat the game.

Not so, today. One could make an argument that the prevalence of addiction and video games has come with the birth of MMORPG’s or other online-functional games. What’s the difference? These games are essentially unbeatable, especially today. In the beginning, the lack of sophistication in these games meant that players could in relativist terms beat a game by leveling up to a point where the usefulness of playing was rendered null. With new iterations of MMORPG’s such as World of Warcraft (WOW), this isn’t the case as often. I’ll give respect to Blizzard for one thing and it’s that they know how to make a quality product – and with that – they have learned how to refine continual content and story upgrades to keep gamers playing. From a business perspective it makes sense. The company retrieves subscriptions fees from its players. The company’s best interest is to deliver a constantly dynamic experience so that players continue playing the game.

The problem is, there may be adverse effects from creating such a seamless online world, especially in regard to a tendency for some players to become psychologically dependent on playing. Further, some researchers are starting to point out that the playing of the games may also inadvertently be creating physical changes in the human body that enhance the addictive behaviour.

The psychological findings are pretty straight-forward for anyone who plays any kind of role playing game – it’s called sunk-cost fallacy. When a person commits so much time toward something (as you would need to do in any role-playing game), it’s hard to stop a certain behaviour because so much time has already been committed.

The other psychological motivations behind gaming are kind of obvious as well; games are an escape. The problem is, with increased sophistication the games become a better, more fulfilled escape. One research paper I came across noted that like any behaviour that is rewarded, there is an initial rush. After time, a person will continue sinking time to reach a “higher” high. Of course the other issue that comes out of providing players with an escape, an other world is that there is a tendency for some to choose that virtual world, over the needs of the present one. In the same said research paper, a clinical psychologist noted it as the “Peter Pan” complex. Some gamers become addicted to these games because they feel a strong emotional link between themselves and the characters they spend so much time developing.

What compounds this issue is that although many MMORPG’s create an online community for social interaction; they also bridge a stronger need for some gamers to stay in them, continuing to work for better levels and rewards as a way of proving worth to others. The psychologist noted that this issue was especially prevalent in people with prior issues with social interaction, depression or just plain boredom. A player can possibility become addicted because the world they inhabit online allows them to work hard and see success; unfortunately, real life doesn’t always work that way.

So, what’s the impact?

There’s a wealth of “gaming widow” sites and although it sounds sort of far-fetched and plenty or jokes are made between gamers, one look at site like this one (http://www.gamerwidow.com/) and you come to understand the very real impacts that an online world can have. In all honesty, after reading a few testimonies from gaming widows, I begun to wonder whether the addiction was truly the “exception” and not the “rule.”

The testimonies are real examples of people and how their behaviour changed due to excessive gaming; plenty of the descriptions are symptomatic of addiction such as withdrawal from society, lying to family/friends, changing life patterns such as missing classes/work etc., apathy, depression and hygiene issues. I always think of these as the extremes, but when reading people’s comments, is happens more than I’d like to think.

I found other articles in the press from ex-addicts (particularly Everquest) such as: http://news.com.com/2100-1040-881673.html. Similar to the widow’s descriptions, gamers themselves describe the issues that arose when gaming took over.

Arguably, the true science is still out there – one clinical test noted that excessive dopamine is produced when gaming – still, the real effects of this test and its validation have not been done.

Like doing anything too much, games can be bad. As someone who likes videogames, I do think there are a number of positives and that they are a legitimate entertainment vehicle.

That said, I think that as a society we haven’t fully gauged the impact that videogames will have – particularly so – with the new rise in online gaming and continuous gaming. As the Internet before transformed nearly everything about daily life, I don’t doubt that we haven’t fully understood how online gaming will impact how we are entertained and what that truly means to psychologically and socially.

Upsell

privilege a kind of sieve,

gaps or sieges

score, in the exegesis

it excises it,

daylight.

Hyundai, Fuck Yeah!

What's this? Random sketches from work. I'm moving desks and discovered some of the stuff I've done while supposedly being productive over the last couple of years.