How to live vicariosly through video games

staff

Hillary Dobbs & Sue A. PulseCollegian Editors & Roomies

Our gradual descent into the underworld of video games began innocently enough. Although we are not die hard video game freaks, (not yet, anyway) we realize we’d probably be 4.0 students if we roommates didn’t spend so many mind numbing hours kicking the snot out of each other via animated characters.

Our ultimate demise started with Killer Instinct, a Super Nintendo game like so many other violent video games where unnaturally muscular men and women with huge breasts beat the holy living crap out of each other.

Sue’s favorite character quickly became Spinal, the living dead man. How can you not like someone who can systematically kill his opponent by just sliding at him or her?

Mortal Kombat III eased our boredom with Killer Instinct. One can only wish he or she too could bleed in a rainbow of colors, including blue, green and the all too normal red. There is of course a violence and gore control, but honestly, what fun would that be?

Mortal Kombat III, like most violent video games, is typically dominated by guys who know all of the codes. However, we are more than content to just punch buttons incessantly until we develop a case of what has been termed “Nintendo thumb.”

Our spiral down into the world of animated fighting characters continued with Samari Shodown. This game, while not quite as entertaining as the other two, did provide us with many laughs due to bad translations. When one of the characters wins all of his matches, he claims that his “sweat bubbles for battle”. We did have some compassion for one character, Gen-Am, who claimed that “no one calls me a freak … no one but my wife.”

We almost hit rock bottom with Primal Rage; a game that pits dinosaurs against neanderthals. All of the characters even have worshippers (just slightly sacrilegious) who occasionally get killed during the action.

One of the most amusing events happened when Sue (by once again, pushing all of the buttons at once) discovered one of the characters, Chaos’, “secret weapons.”

“Oh my gosh! He just farted at you!” exclaimed Sue.

And sure enough, he had indeed thrown a large puff of green gas in the direction of Hillary’s character, which caused the character to enter into a frozen stupor.

“That’s the coolest,” said Hillary.

We also discovered that not only could he gas out his opponent, but he could also “power puke.” This makes a lovely smacking noise as it slaps the other person in the face with radio-active vomit. These two capabilities make Chaos our very favorite.

As with most drugs, these games didn’t sustain our highs for long enough. So, we had to move on to something “harder.” That’s when The Sims (the expansion pack, of course) hit us like a fat lady making her way to the buffet line. Although it is not a violent video game, (and it’s on the computer, not Nintendo) The Sims has started to dominate most of our free time. When we play this game, we enter into a kind of space/time continuum. We now live vicariously through this game.

For those of you who are unaware, Sims is a game where the the computer user creates a family of people (you can also just create one person) and moves them into a home. When creating the individuals, the player gets to control how neat the person is, how outgoing, how active and several other personality traits. After you’ve created your family and moved them into a home, you are God. You tell them when to eat, pee, sleep, read, play, bathe and basically anything else. You also control who they interact with. By forcing certain “Sims” to spend time with other Sims, you can even cause them to fall in love and marry each other (and gender is not an issue.)

Sims has so many activies and options that it would be impossible to discuss them all.

So, if you’re looking for a way to escape studying for a final, come on over to the dark side and waste your life away. It’s not productive or socially redeming, but shoot, that’s the whole point.

#1.888377:2026314742.jpg:hilsue.jpg:Roommates Hillary Dobbs, Op/Ed Editor, and Sue A. Pulse, Photo Editor, give in to their violent impulses in their living room and scream at each other. Does this happen every night? :Sue A. Pulse