Video Gaming

Video Gaming

I’ve no truck with these video games that plant people in front of their televisions like so much vegetation. Ian is mad for them, of course. His dear old lady mother had her face well-raisined from years of watching the future Duke of Frisbee addle himself on generations of Grand Theft Auto. You’ll not find yours truly, Maximilian Willoughby, whiling it away on such gadgets and distractions. I haven’t the thumbs for it.

One dismal day, with the sky greyed out by pregnant purple-black fluffies, I hid indoors and was tempted to trying by Frisbee. He was gaping in lobotomised ecstasy at an array of screens upon which ran armoured spacemen, opening all aggressive on each other with spacearms. A man to a screen, his friends fanned out along the line. Vaguely sensing his pal’s rainy day distress, the Duke himself reluctantly allowed his good friend Maxi to take the control. I had little idea what could be done, and my spaceman made it only a few steps before I was mercilessly ambushed. After being killed for a fifth time and without being able to fire a single round I cast the controller firmly away. Catching Tetrahedron with the full blaze of a haughty eyeballing, I removed myself to a distant alcove to sulk. No question that the Duke was relieved to see me go. He had cultivated his gaming identity to proudly mirror the worthiness of his grand title, Ian Tetrahedron; Duke of Frisbee. He was far from desirous for Turgid-Fingers Willoughby to bring disrepute to his unmottled reputation.

The closest I allow myself to video gaming is when I suspiciously eye vending machines. I am deeply perturbed by any purchase I am forced to make where I am not availed of the opportunity to use my charms to secure a fairer compromise. The vending machine offers none of this, it simply demands an unquestionable, set price. True, they can be tricked and jostled, but I find this brutish and unsatisfying. If there is no other course, I watch from a distance while Simkins does the jostling. This way I can at least imagine myself akin to a mob boss.

These peculiar types who enjoy computerised entertainment surely just lack the means and/or the imagination to see to their own amusements in the real world. I’ll share this yarn with you, it will more than weather another recounting.

One glorious Summer our generous yellow orb was so eager to visit that we enjoyed a pointedly prolonged blistering. The sheer audacity of the sunshine drove the oxygen from every house, forcing our nation of sallow cretins to embrace the wilder side. I braved the Duke’s abode, offloaded his deoxygenated shell into a rudimentary gambo and trollied the unfortunate to the, relative, safety of the outdoors. Little did he know, comatose as he was, that we’d soon discover the most satisfying episode of gaming ever to be enjoyed.

Tetrahedron is a fellow for who land was, presumably, made for. He took to the owning of it as a seagull takes to the eating of the vomit of drunkards. That is to say, opportunistically and distastefully, but with aplomb and a great degree of success. We were utilising only a small amount of his land at the time, picnicking, although to our credit we were enjoying the expansive view, which in a way was finding an occupation for large tracts of his property. I was blonding my summery Fu Manchu with healthy doses of mischievous mustard, which was instigating a sandwich mutiny, when I saw a group of children following the leadering on the private property which I had been occupying with my landscape appreciation. I was on my feet in a nano and my legs became a cartoon watermill which churned me to proximity.

“Now! Now, now, now!” I eulogised, transfixing the trespassing oiks where they stood. One squealed like a piglet in the embrace of a Vauxhall, and I battled for control of my facial muscles. I kept it stern and authoritative; they stayed frozen. The squealer shook slightly, and the pot he was wearing about his head see-sawed, eventually taking a dive to earth. His hair, now revealed, sprang out, each strand a piglet’s tail to match his vocalising. He fell to his knees and truffled the pot back into his possession.

“This is the land of the Frisbee Duke,” I continued, smelling the clouds, so haughty was my flamboyant offensive. “What are you about, coming here?”

“We’re onna quest fotha ‘Oly Grail, in we?” was the noise which came from a verminous youth at the back, an impressive approximation of human speech for one of so unfortunate a genetic build.

“Well, it is not to be found here,” I sentenced, then I bade them follow, and delivered them into the custody of the house staff, to be shipped from the estate and back to their negligent guardians.

It was seeing them stood in one of the Hall’s stony antechambers that gave me the idea. With their wooden swords and branch staves, in utensil armour which lolled off them in ill-fitting glee, I was made wealthy with gifts from the epiphany troll. Tetrahedron was piled messily on a chaise longue, glad to be inside again, but still sullen in his exile from a console.

“Ian…” I began, “are you still under the yoke of soothsayers in the Westernmost field?”

His eyes sought out the back of his skull, leaving only whites to face the inquiry. It was a, rather fraught, yes. I knew then for what endeavour this intrepid band had been delivered to me.

“You four,” I addressed them. They were all aquiver now. “I have a solution to unweave this knotty affair we’re tied in.” All ears perked as though they’d supped black coffee. “Give up your quest for the grail and accept mine in replacement. Do so, and your parents need not know of this trespass.” All eyes widened in the very same manner as a lady when heavy with child. I scrutinised my ragtag band.

“You brave four shall be known as the Knights of Frisbee. It is now your sworn duty to rout the cardwizards from the perimeter of the Westernmost field and back onto common land. To this end I christen you with your knightly names. You sir,” I indicated the halest among them, “are to be called Montford Hale.” The little sausage swelled with the helium of pride and damn near took off. “And you,” my finger swung to the secondmost, “shall be known henceforth as Henceforth Secondmost.” A little confusion germinated, and I cooled my creativity. “You,” this was the ratty speaker from before, “are Ratkinder.” Luckily the grub had no German. “Lastly we have you, Sir Truffledandy Baconpiglet.” The chubby one split a frown, like a damaged doughnut. “Now off with you, to arms!”

I was rather full of it for the rest of the afternoon. I’d given something back to the community. The kids would inconvenience the mystics, and with any luck the mystics would give a little lesson to my roaming Knights. I was warmed by the heat of my one stone killing and then igniting an entire flock of birds. I had chilled quite considerably by nightfall, however, with no regrouping yet apparent. I laid my concern on Tetrahedron. He was the Frisbee to their Knights, after all. He told me to quiet my fretting. I inquired as to the nature of his quietude. He assured me of his confidence in the plan’s success. I asked him to clarify. He told me the kids would certainly be successful in the rout. I asked him why. He then indicated a large cabinet, which stood much depleted. Only dusty chainmail and heavy gloves haunted the furnishing.

“I don’t follow, my Duke.” As he then used words to explain, realisation hit me like a woman scorned. It was his old armoury cabinet. It had been filled heavy with his peculiarly violent trinkets. Asian blades and early firearms, as well as sharp little nasty things to throw at people.

“They were my Knights, Maxi, I couldn’t send them out equipped as they were.”

Entirely agogged, my fine moustache picked dirt from the ground at my feet. It was a logical course of action for the Duke to take, but I’d never known Ian to show initiative.

Skies above, the sight that awaited us!

The Knights were as ripe strawberries, so reddened with blood were they. One of them had even set the caravans alight. Soothsayers, mystics and cardwizards were dead; men, women and children. I saw the body of one with some of the nasty thrower-type things decorating her. I felt a curling in my top lip.

“I am a little shocked,” I managed, “especially at you, Sir Baconpiglet.” And I was. But more than this I was impressed with what the dispassionate youth can achieve when they are properly equipped and motivated. Feeling quite entrepreneurial at the helm of my pubescent Knights, I savoured the success of my own little crusaders.

Coughing in the woodsmoke, I did my best to smile broadly, but failed somewhat.

*****

I am terrible at video games, and that infuriates me.  The thing is, I'm a sore looser, and the world of video games does nothing to help me get over this personality flaw.  It's a bit like an exaggerated version of reality; if you haven't the skill, then you will die.  And if you want to, you can boil it down to that; I do not want to die. 

At it's worst, my VGR (video game rage) sees me bashing myself and anything that's at my reach and inexpensive, to within an inch of its' life.  I can't seem to accept loss in that particular context. 

Nowadays, video games are very good at giving you an incentive to play them, whether it's unlocking hidden easer eggs, or just earning achievements.  I am fully aware that an achievement for destroying X amount of enemies in method Y is completely and utterly irrelevant to the real world, but by God I want it! 

Computer games can be both good and bad.  They can promote liberal though, as they do in RPGs that allow the player to choose the sexuality of their character.  They can be used to provoke thought regarding moral and political standpoints, and they can be used to develop thinking skills, such as creativity and problem solving.  

To be honest, I think that video games will soon replace films, because they offer an immersive storyline in an alternate reality, with an interactive element which films cannot, by their very nature, offer.  Although the appeal of watching a story line unfold in the passive manner which a film offers will never really disappear from humanity, it will, i think, wane.  Because, for me, art is about people, and people need involvement.  Video games provide a level of involvement and, to a certain degree, ownership, over their art which is hard to find in other sources. 

 *****

At last we've reached the fine topic of video gaming. A subject that i part take in so much, i find i have little to say about it. 

When i was young my favorite video game was called "Find the home movies and tape over them with anything on late night then forward through them to see if there was a good film with boobies in and secretly watch it on my own just to be naughty." But i couldn't really put that into a box, patent it and make myself a fiscal bomb that would explode my bank account into a plane to the Bahamas where i could live my days all happy.

But, then again, "Find the home movies and tape over them with anything on late night then forward through them to see if there was a good film with boobies in and secretly watch it on my own just to be naughty." was never about making money, it was about being sneaky and enjoying myself and also , like it says in the name, being a little bit naughty, just for the thrill.

Then i found a brilliant thing that didn't involve videos at all. It involved cartridges with brilliant pictures on them and a machine that made them come alive whence attached to your television. These were called Video Games. I called them "games" for short. 

My first ever game was Sonic the Hedgehog which set a pretty high standard for my opinions on games yet to come. Soon came Streets of rage 2, Dessert Strike, Earthworm Jim, Ecco the dolphin.....The list goes on. The cartridges started morphing and newer, better looking games came along. Then Compact disks.

Now-days video games come in many shapes and form. Im not just talking about the format you can play them on: Console, iPad, Internet, hand held... the list continues. But we have a plethora of genres that we can indulge ourselves in. 

I can enjoy them all. I've played fighters, strategies, first person shooters, hack and slash, RPG and even sudoku on my phone (i guess that's a puzzle game). 

I realise that this blog is just a list of things so far. Here's how i feel about it: Good, bad, silly, weird, stupid, tired and horny.

Although i love internet flash games and enjoy the odd hand held game im going to leave them alone for now. I also don't own an iPad so that can snuff off too. Im going to write here my feelings about your console games, classic and modern.

They both have such differing qualities. (duh (i just wrote "duh". Who the heck am I?)) It was the retro games that drew me into the life and love of controlling a picture on a tv screen with my hands. I think the main thing that appealed to me was the challenge (because they were harder back then) and the brilliant music that must've been necessary in the creation process because it never seamed to fail for me. 

From there it was an easy lubrication into the games that were more about the graphics the world they created for you to explore. Details became incredibly important and it made for a much more stimulating experience. I tip my hats to Ninja Theory for making the all out effort to make their characters look real in their expressions. They've also made me realise my goal of having the same job as Andy Serkis, which is basically gurning and making noises whilst acting brilliantly.

But wait! Im forgetting the RPG. Of course, over time they made STORIES more and more elaborate and challenging and down right brilliant to get through (sometimes).

My first RPG was Final fantasy VII. Less about graphics, more about story.

I went on to pursue new RPG games and discovered Knights of the old Republic. A brilliant Bioware game. I remember going to school and bigging up Bioware and then feeling bad because i never knew what Baldur's gate was. (I've played it now. It's hard) But i feel that Bioware have gone from strength to strength in story telling through video gaming. (I've even played the old Fallout games) 

Bioware, I salute you.

I'll end this entry with a Top Five. Game series'. But it'll have to be in no particular order because fuck you it's hard.

• Metal Gear Solid

• Zelda....

• Gears of War

• Final Fantasy

• Uncharted

*****

Adam Gilder
Gethin Down
Dafydd Evans