Seriously?

Let me make absolutely certain I’ve got this right.

1) Liam Neeson.

2) Berserkers, a la Fred Saberhagen, brought up to modern Tranformer sci-fi special effects.

3) Liam Neeson.

4) U.S. Battleships, which (unless I’ve suddenly gone batshit insane) do not even exist anymore, not since like 1995.

5) Liam Neeson.

6) A deus ex machina plot device to explain why naval air power, and the use of aircraft carriers as a platform to project that air power, cannot in this instance be used.

7) Liam Neeson.

Look.

I don’t ask for much in this life.

(Stop snickering. I’m being melodramatic for effect here.)

I said I don’t ask for much.

But if you’re gonna make this movie… if you’re gonna make Battleship and you’re gonna put Liam Neeson in it…

You gotta make Liam Neeson strap broken bottles to his fists, jump onto the alien ship from the broken hull of his impossible battleship, and punch a robot Berserker Transformer shark to death while saying in his chill voice, “You sunk my battleship.”

Otherwise, wtf is the point of this movie?

Oh, and you know I’m going to see this, right?

Superb.

Say it again, I dare you.

Su-perb.

I have just read that paragraph, and I hereby share it with you.

From the master of the true essence of Star Wars Role Playing that is Darths & Droids, I bring you;

Always know where the escape pods or life boats or similar such devices are located. This includes biplanes attached to zeppelins. Whenever you board a commercial vessel, scout it out and plan your escape route in case of iceberg, fire, or sahuagin attack. Memorise all paths to the means of escape, so you can follow them in pitch blackness. Even when carrying a cat cage and flamethrower and being chased by an alien carnivore.

Words to live your role playing life by, my friends, with an example that is pure genius. Such a perfect association unleashed with stark brevity!

Truly, words to live by.

Or, in the case of retcons, words to think you lived by while actually condemned with the ultimate horror all unknowing.

That’s right.

The true moral of the story?

We as gamers know what it is.

The player can go through all those procedures, memorize the layouts, practice the routes blindfolded, perform preventive maintenance on the life rafts and even stock the ships with food (and a means of opening the cans, har har), but no matter how hard you try, if the GM is in a bad mood, your character just got impregnated in her sleep by an evil alien between game sessions, and there is not a single damned thing you can do about it.

All you can do is suck it up and reroll with the punches, reroll with the punches.

The saga has taken a turn, and I don’t know what to think of it.

There are bonfires, cooking fires and campfires all over the place in lower level zones. Quest givers stand around campfires, Innkeepers stand near burning braziers, there are little flames at building entrances here, there and everywhere.

When you stand in these fires, you get rewarded with a gentle ‘poof’ of smoke from your butt.

There is no other way to say it… my son loves to stand in the fire.

‘poof!’

You ever wonder where those people come from? The ones that just stand in the fire? Now you know. They like to see the gentle poof of smoke coming from their butts.

Alex loves Druid Cat form, running at high speed through the jungle, using Dash for a burst of speed immediately followed by Darkflight to keep that rush of movement going for as long as possible. When he gets the Stampeding Roar talent, he’s going to be buzzing like a ferret on Red Bull. I can see it coming, oh yes I can.

One thing I have learned in playing with Alex and going at his speed is that no matter how excited you are about the next quest, there is always time to stop and notice the small critters and insects that populate a zone… and kill them. Snakes, rabbits, small deer, cows, sheep, roaches, you name it, he kills it. And proudly announces it as a running commentary.

“There’s a snake! I pounced on it, I got it! Oooh, there’s a roach! Got ‘em!”

…. okay. I know mommy doesn’t like you to kill critters, but you can kill all the roaches. I grew up in South Florida, I approve. Kill all the roaches. In fact, Blizzard, show me some good old South Florida house lizards, we can kill all those little bastards, too. I’ll make a Mage just to perpetrate a house lizard holocaust.

His favorite critters in the game at the moment are the rats. Or, as the logic train he pointed out to me goes, “cats eat rats, and I’m a cat, so I’m pouncing on my lunch!”

And that brings me to his true, most special love.

Feral Charge.

He started out getting addicted to Skull Bash, which you get at level 22. We’d be hunting Worgen in Darkshire, and he would have me wait while he lined up carefully on the target, inching forward slowly to get within the 13 yard range of Skull Bash so he could fly through the air, pouncing on his prey.

Skull Bash obviously isn’t supposed to be a charge, it’s supposed to be a spell interrupt with a short range leap, it just brings you to your target, that’s all. Alex doesn’t know what mana cost increases and stuff really are, or spell interrupts, or PvP functionality. What he does know is he had a pounce that let him slam into his enemies from a distance. Gotcha!

The 13 yard range ended up causing a little frustration. He didn’t know how to tell if he was in range of the bad guys to use the spell or not.

I didn’t understand the problem at first. On my UI, when I target an opponent, each button indicates if I’m in range for that spell or not by lighting up. I tried to explain this to Alex, only to have him tell me his doesn’t do that.

As I tried wading through the Interface options looking for where his was turned off, Cassie asked me what I was talking about like I was crazy. She uses a mostly default UI, and hers doesn’t put any form of range indicator on her buttons either.

WTF?

It turns out that the XPerl UI Addon I’ve used for, what, five years now or more has it built in, and since I never, ever play the game without XPerl, I took the range indicator on individual buttons for granted. Hell, I thought it was standard for the game, how else do you know not to waste time activating an ability that has a varying range? It’s one thing on flat terrain, but some of the new sloping terrain designs are deceptive, and make accurately estimating distances difficult.

So, I got Alex set up with XPerl. I would have preferred just installing an addon that would put range modifiers on the ability buttons rather than completely revamping his whole UI, but I didn’t know of one. Honestly, this subject never came up for me before. I don’t know how Cassie and other players manage without a constant visual indicator of target range. I guess you’re just that good?

I got XPerl installed on his system, and now Alex knows how to stalk up to his prey in stealth, get just within extreme range and then unleash the leaping kitty Skull Bash thunder! Pow!

He had to use stealth for Skull Bash, because the second cause of frustation was that Skull Bash’s short range meant he could sometimes face pull before using his spell.

Ah, but I had the answer for that. And it came at level 29, when Alex was finally able to spec into Feral Charge.

Feral Charge. Sing me a song of Feral Charge, for Alex is in love with you.

With Feral Charge, Alex has a leaping kitty roaring pounce that puts him behind the target and is useable from stealth, plus he doesn’t have to be as careful with range. It’s got a much longer range than he’s used to, 25 yards, so he can be less focused on range.

Alex now Feral Charges all the things. ALL the things. Mobs, critters, pirates, you name it, he tries to feral charge it.

Last night, I caught him trying to line up on me from extreme range at the rear.

“Alex, you can’t feral charge me. I’m on your side.”

“Awww. You should be able to feral charge people on your own team too!”

“…. yes son, yes you should. Sometimes, I pray for the ability to attack members of our team, Feral Charge them and gank them and gank them and gank them….”

“What?”

“Nothing, nothing. That Crocolisk looks pretty cool. You wanna kill ‘em?”

“Yes!” *manuevers in stealth to feral charge the crocolisk*

At level 31, he was able to put a point in Stampede. This to me wasn’t that big a deal. To Alex, this was a VERY BIG DEAL.

I explained to him about the haste buff and the Ravage without positioning/stealth modifier, but it didn’t register until the first time he did a Feral Kitty Charge, and the Ravage button lit up.

“When I leap on them, the Ravage button lights up, and I’m not even in stealth!” Ah, the light in his eyes, the delighted glee at free mayhem. Having one of his stealth-only abilities, which must mean it’s special, available after a charge is like icing on an already delicious cake.

Then I paid closer attention to what he was saying.

He wasn’t saying “leap”.

He wasn’t saying “Feral Charge”.

No, when he was using Feral Charge to attack the enemies, ALL the enemies, what he was doing was singing a little song he made up on the spot, and sang over and over as only an 8 year old can;

“Headbutt madness, headbutt madness, they don’t call it head buttin’ for nothin’. Headbutt madness, headbutt madness, my head to his butt, POUNCE!”

At that point, I just grabbed a notebook and put it next to my keyboard. Gotta be ready to write this shit down.

Good thing I did. Not two minutes later, as we raced through the Stranglethorn Tigers (that we vastly outlevel) to grab our last two, Alex calls out, “I’ll get the one behind you so he doesn’t attack your tushie!”

Ah yes. Even on a Dwarf Shaman, my butt makes for a tasty target.

Butt protection, isn’t that what everyone wants from their adventuring companions?

You ever have someone tell you that you should keep a dream diary beside your bed, so that when you wake up with vivid memories of a dream, you can write them down fast before they vanish like a Rogue in the night?

I don’t do that, but this one time I’d like some lasting record of a dream I had. If this kind of thing annoys the shit out of you, I do apologize. I know it won’t make sense, it was MY dream. But I’d like to save this one for future reference so I can recapture how it felt.

I have been working a lot lately, managing crews of people cross-shift in a plant that has continuous major breakdowns. I’ve also been interviewing and hiring a lot of new people to build up my department to what it should be.

I have noticed, oh how I have noticed, that my posting has gotten scant lately, not from lack of writing topics but from time. I am at work at least 60 hours every week, so when I get home I spend time with family, play WoW and then sleep. I almost never have time to read or even browse the internet at work. Oh noes, am I right? I don’t even take breaks most days, and that was my prime blog writing time!

Shoot, I even bought a twelve pack of beer last Thursday, and I still haven’t had a chance to crack the box and drink one.

Now, when I’m in WoW, the number one thing I’m doing is playing my Druid. I am in ur LFR, kitty DPSing the boss, I’m in ur 5 mans, tanking ur fast runs.

With LFR being what it is, I am also spending a lot of time waiting for LFR to pop by farming and flying.

Last night, I slept after playing with Cassie (on our Paladin and Priest duo, which makes the dream even stranger to me), and in this one vivid dream, I was in Home Depot, getting tools for the job site. I don’t know why, since I actually use a local hardware store called Menards to buy tools instead of Home Depot. But I did used to go to Home Despot a lot for tools, so who can tell. It was a dream, and sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar.

In the dream, the employees at Home Depot were milling every which way like sheep, as they so often do in the real world. Suddenly, in my mind I knew it was my job to get people organized and to work at the tasks that needed to get done. I started assigning people to jobs, giving work direction, etc.

I stressed to each of them the importance of getting their tasks done right, because I knew that the Home Depot was guarded by Arabian Nights-themed djinns, spirits that would keep everyone at work at their jobs, imprisoned and unable to leave until everything was done correctly no matter how long that took. These spirits surrounded the Home Depot at all times in whirling lines of air and force, materializing hands and arms and claws and upper torsos of giant djinns to punish and grab and pull people back in the plant.

I didn’t grasp it while immersed in the dream, but what I had imagined was an orange Home Depot building crossed with that one instance from the Throne of the Four Winds that is all ramps and platforms. Seriously. But instead of floating high in the sky, the whole thing was on the ground and surrounded for miles by a black tar asphalt parking lot with crisp yellow lines. And the harsh winds of the djinn swirled and surrounded us, blowing hard and fast.

I was organizing people, bringing order out of chaos and dealing with all the people milling about not knowing what to do until I told them, when suddenly a thought hit me.

“Pop flight form for a second and get a better look at where people are at and what they are doing.”

So I did. I popped flight form, transformed into the exact trademark purple birdie I see on the screen every time I play my Druid, so yes I had a third person view on it at first, but at the same time I was the bird, I was the one flying, and I felt that sensation, and then I had a first person view as the bird.

For the first bit as a bird, I was focused on battling the air currents, clawing my way higher into the sky so I could get a better view on where people were so I could get them to work.

I swooped and dove to get a better view.

Then, while up high, the thought distinctly registered, clear as a bell, “I should go down and get a camera so I can take pictures of the view of the plant from up here. You’d normally need a helicopter to see this, this is cool.”

At that point, the dream broke from the established narrative, as I reveled in the glory of being able to fly as a Druid in flight form, and I spent time swooping and diving and soaring and climbing.

I spent quite a bit of time from there flying around, being aware that it was a dream but fighting like hell not to break myself out of it.

It’s hard to describe, but I knew without knowing, just bubbling under conscious thought that if I let myself think about how impossible what I was doing was, I wouldn’t be able to do it. I’d be aware ‘formally’ that it was a dream instead of reality, and I wouldn’t be able to do anything ‘not real’.

I don’t know how long I hovered on that edge of flying, and enjoying flying, but trying to avoid thinking too hard about what I was doing, and trying to avoid thinking too hard about not thinking too hard, stressed that I would lose the glory of doing what I was doing but shouldn’t be able to do, and so on.

Fortunately, before happy-time dissolved in self defeating double-think, I flew down closer to the Air Elemental Home Depot, where I saw some of my new dreamland employees being harassed by a djinn in one corner near the parking lot, unable to get past to freedom.

I swooped down, landed in the middle of the scrum and went into purple kitty form to fight it, yelling to my employees to run to the safe zone (which was, in my mind at the time, the break room, wherever the hell that was. I’m sure the dream employees knew.)

Instead of turning into a real catform, though, I turned into a Worgen version of night elf cat form, purple with cat features, but the Worgen half animal/half cat style, with my long claws at the fingertips of my furred hands.

I had another moment to register a fleeting disappointment that I wasn’t all kitty the way I was all flight form before.

I launched into full-on furry furious cat attack on the djinn, ripping and tearing at it’s form.

I had no health bars to gauge it’s vitality, no level indicator to know it’s power compared to me, no casting bar to tell me what it was going to do next. It was just it and me, in an all-out furball fight, my cunning and strength against whatever it could do, and I moved and hopped around and bounced, pounced, danced around it, keeping it whirling around disoriented, slashing and grabbing chunks of air and trying to get it focused solely on me and away from the rest of the people that scattered like sheep.

It blew at me, and it’s huge hands grabbed at me and punched and it tried to throw me aside into walls and off ledges…

And then once the people had all scattered away, I tried to go into flight form to fly off in a long range hop to get some distance and bring it into a more open area where I could really move on it.

I did manage to fly and gain altitude, fighting the air that pulled at me, but the double-think was even stronger now, and within moments the entire thing dissolved and I woke up enough to think, “Wow, what a great dream, holy shit I’ve NEVER had a flying dream that felt so much like I was really flying before”, and then I tried to immediately fall back asleep to get right back into that dream, but instead I fell into a dream where I was still in the Marines, and some of the people I manage now were in the dream new Marines and I had to bring them up to speed on working at the plant, and yadda yadda… NOT what I was looking for, dream wise, at all.

As an aside… looking back on it, I have to wonder. What would World of Warcraft be like if we had no health bars, casting bars or level indicators of the enemy at all?

Just how different would the game be if we had no way of knowing how strong our opponents were, or how much life they had left?

Would we see people attack an enemy, and when they tried like hell but started to lose health, and had no idea what shape the enemy was in, would we see some of those players break and run instead of hang and fight knowing the bad guy was just that close to dying?

Would we see more people face every fight as if it might be their last, using stealth and guile and trickery and cooldowns and every tool in their arsenal, even while leveling up?

How much does our knowledge of our opponents every move and capability affect our attitude towards the game? Would it be considered as ‘easy’ and boring to so many people as it is now?

Sadly, that sale is no longer in effect, but I took advantage of it while I could.

For months now, my son Alex has had a free account to play in WoW, and by watching over his shoulder I’ve seen just how miserable it really is to play on one. My son was initially excited to play WoW on a free account, but one of the biggest draws was the idea of playing with mom and dad, grouping and chatting and questing.

His enthusiasm waned pretty quickly, and as I want him to do what he wants without being pressured into playing with what I think he should (or with what we spent a lot of money on and damn well want to see played with, that shit is expensive yo), I let it go for a while.

Recently, I asked him why he wasn’t really playing WoW anymore.

He said it was because his WoW is different than ours, and because it was so difficult to do the stuff we take for granted. On a free account, he can’t participate in trades, he can’t be in a guild, he can’t just log in and say hi to us (initiating a conversation), get or send mail, buy things on the auction house, make a Worgen or Goblin, etc.

All the things that prevent free accounts from being useful to a thief. Er, by thief I mean gold seller, a title which is semantically equivalent to thief, but should have the added emotional qualifier of ‘unwashed scrotum sack’.

This made me a sad bear. We do spend time with Alex of course, but he sees both Cassie and myself play WoW as our only real ‘adult’ hobby thing. Being able to play WoW would become yet one more thing we did together as a family.

So I caved. Last weekend, I used the fresh WoW boxes to upgrade him to a full WoW player.

Queue the doom bell.

Alex was very excited, and I found I was in the perfect position to see the game through fresh eyes. What would he run to do first? What excited him most that he hadn’t been able to do?

What would be his impressions?

The first thing he did was make a dwarf shaman. Then a dwarf rogue. And now he’s got a dwarf hunter. WTF?

I found out why he makes so many dwarves… Dwarves are SHORT, like Alex is! He can relate to the short little buggers. Doesn’t answer why they all have beards, though. Or why he doesn’t like gnomes.

Well, I guess the ‘doesn’t like gnomes’ thing is self-explanatory. And he’s too short to punt them himself. (Sorry Gnomer, love ya man.)

He also explained that when he makes his new dwarves, he looks for faces that appear kind and gentle, he doesn’t like the fierce or angry faces. Surprisingly, there are some peaceful, kindly dwarf faces to choose from when making a character, and he selects those.

He got going on his shaman, so I made a dwarf mage to travel and quest with him, and we had a lot of fun cruising to level 10 before we quit for the night. I let him do all the leading. I nudged him a bit to keep us on track with going from quest to quest, but otherwise he had made so many dwarves in the starter set that he was well familiar with the area.

First impressions;

He may go from quest to quest, but there is ALWAYS time to stop and kill the wabbits.

He prefers killing the fat wabbits to the skinny wabbits. I didn’t even know there WERE fat rabbits. Lrn2rabbitrecognition.

He doesn’t want to get overwhelmed with things to remember, so he has been taking one quest, doing it, then turning it in before taking a second quest from the same place. I explained that the game was mostly designed so all the quests available from one place at one time could all be completed in one trip. This came as quite the surprise.

Shamans are cool because they can drop colorful totems with neat flames and stuff, and because they can cast spells that make their weapons glow with fire. Also, they can shoot things with lightning. Shooting things with lightning is great. It’s also great to be able to beat things up with two weapons. But since he doesn’t like to get hurt and wants to be invincible, why can’t he do Enhancement combat with a mace and shield? Why does his special ability require an offhand weapon? He likes his shield.

Funny how unsatisfying it can be to answer, “Because the game is designed that way.”

The next day, he decided to create a Worgen. A Worgen Druid.

I created a Worgen Warrior just to help out, because Gilneas ain’t easy mode. All that instancing and scripting makes for buggy play. Fun and interactive, but buggy.

In an eyeblink we were both level 6, and he was having fun playing with me, but very, VERY frustrated at playing as a caster. He was ready to toss the character and try something else.

Why?

Because his shaman can cast neat spells like lightning, but when it came time to fight there was a mace and shield to beat up the bad guys! This druid worgen is all lame, smacking things with a stick.

I encouraged him to hang on until level 8, when he could get kitty form.

Once level 8 came around, he started having a lot more fun. He likes hopping around, killing rats he passes by (because cats kill rats, don’t you know), going into stealth and moving around that way, and using Rake.

I may have made a mistake explaining the relationship between Mangle, Rake and Ferocious Bite.

He gets the idea of combo points, he explained to me (quite patiently) that he didn’t HAVE to wait until 5 combo points to use Ferocious Bite, he could use it at one or two, and it does lots of damage.

What he does as his main attack, though, is use Rake.

I explained to him that Rake was a damage over time attack, just like a snake biting and poisoning the bad guy.

He seems to like the idea of poisoning the bad guys and making them suffer, so he uses Rake as his main attack, so he can poison them. He does also use Mangle, I’ve been watching, and I’m impressed with the way he mixes his attacks up with Mangle, Rake and Ferocious Bite if something lasts long enough to get it in there.

What I really find interesting is my response to how he fights.

I haven’t said anything, but as I watch him, I see him flip into Kitty, use his Mangle and Rake, flip out to caster and Moonfire Spam the SHIT out of something, flip into Bear and smack it, go back into Kitty for a Mangle when it’s dead, and then on the next mob just stand as a caster, sneak up and blast the crap out of it with Starfall, then Moonfire Spam again, and then a Wrath.

My gut reaction was to want to coach him to stay in one form to maximize his damage output with combo points and finishing moves. Just for a second, but watching him switch out of kitty in melee range to cast Wrath hurt.

I had to ask myself… why? Why feel even a moments twinge? That’s the way it’s supposed to be played. Even now, casting something like Wrath as a pull before shifting in is legitimate to get some starting aggro, although with the changes to aggro all that precast stuff is mostly redundant as long as your group holds their horses.

I used to pride myself on taking the time to have fun swift shifting in combat, just for the hell of it. Here my son is doing just that, and it feels like I’m watching someone doing it wrong, just because he cast the kitty stuff first before switching to caster for the long cast times when already in melee range.

He’s trying stuff out, and he’s migrating naturally to fast reaction time stuff. Early days.

I still haven’t decided whether to laugh or cry that my 8 year old instantly discovered and fell in love with Moonfire Spam.

Getting Kitty form was just the beginning, and once he got Bear it’s been shift city.

“I like bear, it’s great being an Invincible Bear!” (bounce bounce bounce)

We wrapped all the questing and leveling up the other night at level 17 (one more night ’til he gets his first mount!), and I watched to see if he’d log out, or what he wanted to do.

He logged into his dwarf, and found that I’d mailed him a pet cat (the calico) that looks just like one of ours. He saw that, I showed him how to learn the pet and display it, and then he asked where I got it. I told him the auction house, and he insisted I show him where the AH was, and how to use it.

Once I got him started, boy did he take off.

What did he want to do?

Browse pets he could buy.

He even bought a pet himself, a cockatiel he thought would be very pretty. He pointed out one rather odd feature of the pet section of the auction house.

Why can’t you get a picture of what the pet looks like when you’re browsing pets? How do you know if you want it, if you can’t see what it looks like until after you bought it?

I have to admit, that’s a good question. It makes me think the feature was intended for collectors who want to buy every pet they don’t already have, regardless of what it looks like. Adding picture preview for pets would be awesome.

One last observation.

We’re in the Gilneas starting zone, and we’ve just watched Lord Walden jump off a cliff. As we head up the trail between the hills, the path is covered with a flock of sheep.

A lot of sheep in a very small area.

It turns out kitties like killing sheep.

As the slaughter of the lambs began, Alex made the comment, “I hope none of them are mechanical sheep”.

It took me a minute before I remembered what he was talking about.

A while back, I flew down on my druid to group with one of his old free starter edition dwarves, and fly it around on my dragonform.

As we flew over the mountains from Stormwind to Burning Steppes (I think), we flew over a point of interest that included sheep.

I landed, and he killed sheep.

I noticed something, and mentioned it to him. One of the sheep had that engineering robot look to it. Nobody around, no dwarves or NPCs, just a flock of sheep with one mechanical sheep hanging out. Clandestine Robot Sheep.

Alex, attacked it, and it blew up, blasting him in the process.

He remembers that, and it made him pause months later to do an Exploding Robot Sheep check.

How cool is it that I live in a world where I can write that last sentence? That right there is reason enough for the internet.

Now to go to phase two: destroyer of lunchtimes.

Most of you are so internet savvy that you were probably right there from the start, but it’s been a long time. Maybe what was old is now new again for the New Year.

Say hello to the Bastard Operator From Hell.

There was a period of time where I spent not just hours but weeks reading every single story from every bit of the archive on my lunch breaks…

And then moved on from there to the literally YEARS of stories archived and still coming out (mostly) weekly on the Register UK.

You learn something new every day. Today, I learned the BOFH has books out at Plan Nine Publishing. Now I know what I could have asked for, for Christmas.

If you want to learn what true evil lurks in the hearts of the devious and criminally insane customer service professional (or IT boffin), then the BOFH has just taken away your free time.

You’re welcome.

To tell you the truth, it had been so many years I’d completely forgotten about him, but oh shit, the internet really IS eternal!

I therefore have the incredible pleasure to introduce you to Gord.

Love the Gord, but above all, FEAR the Gord.

If you have already met and enjoyed the Words of Gord, then this will be the stuff of pleasant memories. If you haven’t… seriously, buckle up and get ready for an afternoon of reading and evil laughing.

For all the reasons we hate Paul Cristoforo, we still have to enjoy the stories of Gord.

Why?

Because Gord directs his ire on the screwers of the customer world, not the screwed. AND, he does it with snarky brilliance, not frat boy drunken anger issue ignorance.

As soon as I’m done working today, I’m reading all of Gords stories again.

Most days, whoop de doo, I know. “Dear lord, how many years can this idiot keep blathering about a video game?”

Today is not that day. Today is “Share a moment of hilarity” day.

Do you read the webcomic Penny Arcade?

Part of the singular joy of Penny Arcade is the combination of mocking imagery and erudite commentary. You get a collaborative webcomic mostly about video games, and then you get what boils down to a blog post that might tie in loosely to the comic, or might wander far afield, but never disappoints in entertainment value.

It’s impossible for me to do justice to all that is Penny Arcade without being overly verbose, even for me. I’m trying.

I guess the best I can say is, two guys started to draw webcomics about video games on the internet, and in the years since they have grown into a major force within the video game industry itself. Penny Arcade webcomics have grown into Penny Arcade Expo video game conventions on both coasts (PAX East and PAX West), and all sorts of other influential activities.

There is so much more, but the point is these guys are heavy hitters in the video game industry… but they’re still two creative, imaginative guys, they’re not MBA suits trying to weasel their way up a corporate ladder by edging out Stan in accounting or Emma in marketing.

This brings me to today, and the blog posts that have gone live in the last two days on Penny Arcade.

It turns out that there was this dude, and he pre-ordered some gaming gear on the internet, paid in advance in full, waited months for his product to arrive in time for Christmas, and when the original ship dates were missed, emailed in to customer service to see what was up.

Sound at all familiar to anyone? I know I’ve been in that position before. Most of us have, by now, if you order from small businesses with an internet storefront, or do pre-orders of cutting edge gear.

What made this special, was that he got some truly legendary replies that started a conversation of epic fail rolling… and drug Mike Krahulik, one of the aforesaid video game heavy hitters, into the mix.

From that point on, it’s been the stuff of rapidly growing legend.

I haven’t laughed so hard in weeks. If you haven’t seen this stuff yet, I hope you enjoy it even half as much as I have.

At Penny Arcade, the first mention and majority of “Are you freaking kidding me?”.

Then, an update to the “WTF”

Then today, there was a Penny Arcade comic devoted to the hilarity that has ensued, and really, wouldn’t you expect one at this point?

And then, the accompanying articles, making it pretty clear that Paul is getting royally buttsurfed by the internets today. Right now. As you are reading this, a man’s professional life is spiraling down the shitter.

Already, gamers are running with this, and again, why wouldn’t we? Penny Arcade links to a kickass video about it already out (in one freaking day! OMG!)

Oh, it’s just getting started. I can already see this is gonna be the target of choice for mocking this week. Pauls’ emails are insanely quotable. 

What I love the most about this whole thing is, this has all descended on someone who is part of a PR/Marketing firm that somehow is clueless as to what the internet really is, how it works, and how eternal an email can be. Once you send those words, they’re gone, and you have zip control over what happens next. 

I have no sympathy for him. At all.

I ain’t even IN customer service or PR, and I sure as hell don’t get to walk up to customers visiting our plant or respond to their calls and tell them, “Oh hey, you don’t like the delay on our ship commitment to you? Well, suck it bitches, if you don’t like it, we’ll just take the shit you bought and sell it on ebay!”

In what universe do you think that is in any way remotely professional?

It’s not professional, but it sure is entertaining!

Since somehow my link to aforesaid kickass video was broken, here is the video embedded for your viewing pleasure. NSFW!!!

I looked at the picture. Excellent, very evocative of a distinct pair of personalities. The image told a strong story just with a glance.

Nice picture, but is this an ad? Where was the message?

Oh, there it is, words wrapped lovingly around each rich curve and lush swooping angle.

I read the message and wondered aloud, “WTF?”

Turns out, I wasn’t the only one to wonder the same. No, a quick search on the internet showed me that “Penny Arcade ESRB” gets plenty of hits dating from 2006.

Well, I never pretended to be a relevant bear.

Kotaku and Joystiq both had interesting things to say at the time.

I do want to look at the design of the ad, and wonder aloud again, “WTF?”

Let’s take a look at the ad I saw in the magazine, a magazine printed for the 2011 November or December issue of PC World, I might add. It’s still a current ad. Apparently, they’re proud of it. And if you got Gabe to draw your ad, wouldn’t YOU want to show it off?

This is the Penny Arcade ad done for the ESRB called ‘The Andersons”.

Now, long time readers here know I love me some Penny Arcade. Just search, you’ll find Child’s Play drives and all that stuff on my website. And I love the images they did, I do. THis one speaks directly of a gamer and his willing but struggling dad. And it’s sweet, rather than snarky.

It’s the message of this as an advertisement I’m scorning. /scorn.

Riddle me this, Batman. Who is the target audience for ESRB ads in PC World?

Is it the young gamer looking for guidance from a rating on content? 

No. This is PC World magazine, and young gamers aren’t going to be interested in the opinions of anyone other than their peers.

The target audience is, really, slightly out-of-touch parents that know enough about technology to have some grasp of where a clue might be found, cool enough to take in interest in what games their kids play and maybe even play with them, without being so reactionary that they ban all games as ‘The devil’s work”.

This person looks at that ad, sees that image, and the art of Penny Arcade compels you.

You should chant that as if you are a priest, banishing demons from kids stuck playing Sega Saturn while their friends are rocking Xbox 360′s;

“The Art of Penny Arcade Compels You!”

“The Art of Penny Arcade Compels You!”

You zoom in closer, entranced, and your eyes spy the text wrapped around the image.

Then you follow it back until you find the beginning of the sentence, because the bold face type first draws your eye but that’s not where the sentence starts, “Where the hell is the start of this thing? Oh, there it is.”

Not an auspicious beginning.

Then you read this message;

Because the Andersons play games, theres a system in place to make sure they bring home the right ones. This is how that system works; First, Mom and Dad select games using the ratings on the box. Step two, (continued on the other side of the image) everyone gets a controller. Step three, the kids win. This quality time is presented by the ESRB.

I gotta say, that’s just amazing to me, after 5 years that ad is still flying? 

I don’t even want to dissect the message itself, but I have to say one thing.

Step one: Mom and Dad select games using the ratings on the box?

Really? Who out there initiates the game-buying event by going to the store, picking up the box, and selecting which ones to consider based on the ESRB rating?

Are we really supposed to be that clueless?

No. No, you either heard one was good, or you were asked by your kid to buy the game.

Or, you’re trying to get a gift for someone else’s kids and have no bloody idea if Wonder Pets Save The Amazon Rainforest has nudity or mature language.

I’m saying, your kid knows if they want to try it or not. You’re not flying completely blind, unless you are Grandma, in which case you don’t care who the ESRB is, you’re gonna do what they tell ya.

Your kid wants to play a game. They ask you to buy it for them, ’cause you’ve got the cash. Or the game has an ESRB rating that prevents the clerk from selling to your kids age bracket. Either way, you are the gateway to video game happiness.

You are entering this scenario as the parent, the responsible adult, asked to make an informed decision as to whether this game is appropriate for your children based on your own personal standards.

Pop quiz, hot shot. You know nothing of this game.  Your smartphone has no reception, so you can’t look up reviews on your favorite gaming sites like an intelligent adult.

What do you do? What do you do?

You could say no, it’s always a viable alternative.

You could say yes, hoping for the best.

You could just buy it, play it yourself, and once you beat it decide if it’s acceptable for your kids.

Or, and this is a wild thought, you could check out the ESRB rating to get details on what you can expect to see in the game. 

So, think about it. Did their message give you enough info to understand what they’re all about without actively looking at the back of a game box?

I don’t think so. When viewed without preconceived ideas of what the ESRB is, it came across to me a little threatening. If viewed a certain way, it almost seems to make a case that the ESRB wants to decide what your choices should be, incidentally giving them great power over game designers and publishers. ”Do what we say, or we will bury your game with a bad rating, and parents won’t buy it.”

To my way of thinking, an advertisement should answer the following questions;

Who are you, what do you do, and why should I care/buy your product or service?

can we do any better?

I think we can. In a millisecond.

Just a thought, but how about this?

“ESRB: we play the games your kids want to play so you don’t have to.”

Who are you? The ESRB. What do you do? You play all the games and know what is in them. Why do I even care that you exist? Because with an ESRB rating on a box I can make an informed decision on the fly without having to play the game myself first.

I can just say, “Nope! The ratings on the box says this one has bad language and visceral decapitations, and I hate bad language. Hey Marge, what does visceral mean? Is that like my goddamn Crown Royal? Is there booze in this f’ing game?”

I love the image, but it takes more than great art to get your point across, and if you’re not clearly articulating your point with your ad, why the bloody heck are you running it in the first place?

I like WoW.

I like webcomics about WoW. Duh.

I like The Daily Blink. Great stuff. (loved loved LOVED todays strip.)

All that aside, The Daily Blink has sidebar advertisements.

So what, so does most gaming-related sites, if only to make enough moola to cover server costs.

But The Daily Blink is special, in that they are firmly in the “webcomic + MMO + video game” demographic.

And so, as I enjoyed todays cartoon, I got to see this on the side of the screen;

I have to ask.

WHAT F’ING GAME ARE THEY RUNNING OVER THERE?

I mean, I had to read it a few times to get the idea that this wasn’t an ad for porn, this was an MMO teaser. For an assassin character.

The Silent Assassin? What, you “can’t hear her coming”?

Okay, that was low, even for me.

Hows about, you won’t be prepared for the ganking you’ll get when she slides down off that pole?

Sorry, I know the trend is ridiculous fantasy female portrayals to grab the eye, but does it work when the art blows past interesting and slides right into satire?

Hmm. I detect a subliminal trend here. Better stop, and go take a shower.

Seriously, though. WTF?!?