The Best School Closing Excuse I’ve Ever Heard

When you were young, school was sometimes closes for the day. Usual culprits were bomb threats, power outages, and snow days (and apparently, in the mid-Michigan area this year, the barest traces of ice on dirt roads). Routine, normal excuses.

Nothing as awesome as this.

Last week, a Jamaican high school closed for, get this, demonic possession.

Oh yes.

The article in The Jamaican Star says, “the demon revealed himself and discouraged other students from praying for the possessed girl warning them that if they disobeyed he would leave the girl’s body and enter theirs instead.”

And so, to combat this mighty evil, the school administrators called in “a special prayer team” to combat the demon. It’s like a magnificent Saturday morning cartoon put out by a church.

ACTION FORCE SPECIAL PRAYER TEAM GO!

So, the prayer team arrives, where they are met by a group of Baptist pastors who want in on the action. The two groups team up into a SUPER DEMON FIGHTING FORCE and enter the school.

As a witness said, “The pastors said dem feel the evil spirit all over the school so they called the school population to an assembly. In the middle of assembly, suddenly out of the ceiling, a bird’s head, cut off from the bird, drop down inna the middle of the assembly. It was chaos after that.”

O. MAH. GAWD.

Now, school administration has been very tight-lipped about the event to the press, stating, “Whatever took place was not something drastic. Whoever told you should have given all the details.”

Apparently, dead bird heads fall from the ceiling at this school all the time. That witness should have checked her facts.

So, the school’s being close-mouthed about it all, and we have one witness stating some goddamn demon shit went down. The truth?

Oh man, seriously. Who cares about the truth? This is the best damn story I’ve heard in ages.

The Trouble With Tobermory

Galleons, I may have a hot temper, but there is very little that truly enrages me. I’m frequently irritated, sure. Often disgusted. But full-on, shaking, vitriolic rage… well, that takes a special kind of stupidity to evoke.

And sweet baby jesus, have I got some top-grade stupidity for you today. I honestly cannot think about any aspect of this story without feeling tremors of anger thrumming in my chest. One of those stories that you read and just kind of stare at, mouth agape, trying to figure out how the hell this is even a thing.

The Scottish Isle of Mull is the fourth largest of the Scottish islands. The capital is Tobermory, a quaint-as-shit fishing port sporting a population of about 700 people:

In addition to its 700 human residents, Tobermory sports your typical patina of domesticated animals, including one particular roving ginger kitteh.¹ The cat is kind of a local celebrity, wandering the town, lounging on cars, and, you know, generally being a cat. He’s like a town mascot- Tobermory’s cat:

He is, in fact, called the Tobermory cat, and visitors to the town take his picture and give him a good scratch behind the ears as part of the whole Tobermory experience. In fact, he has his own Facebook page…

Which is nothing out of the ordinary. I mean, shit, ginger ale, the LHC, and Jim Darkmagic (of the New Hampshire Darkmagics) have fan pages as well. I know plenty of folks who have made pages devoted to their own pets. I once made a Facebook group for people who wanted to quit college and run away to Europe to be part of a gypsy caravan. Rule 34 of the internet states “if it exists, there’s porn of it”. Rule 134 should probably be “if it exists, there’s a Facebook page for it”.

And so, since the Tobermory cat exists, he has a Facebook presence. There’s a page devoted to pictures of him and charming anecdotes.

Because there can never be enough cats on the internet, can there?

We now hop over to the Edinburgh region of dear Scotland, where Debi Gliori, a notable children’s author/illustrator (I have never heard of her, but then, I don’t read children’s books, so I can’t say I know any current children’s authors), receives a call from a local publisher. She’s known this man for many years, and he tells her he has an idea for a book. A book about the Tobermory cat. A Tobermory bookseller has been in touch with the publisher and is excited about the idea- it’s a great way to promote the town and give it some wider exposure, driving in tourists. After all, who better to draw folk to Tobermory than its unofficial mascot?

Gliori had never met Tobermory’s little celebrity. She popped onto his Facebook page and saw a few pictures of him, but she didn’t want to do anything with the character until she met the cat in person. So, she and the publisher traveled to Mull. They met with the local bookseller, who mentioned some local artist, Gus Stewart. Stewart had apparently set up the cat’s Facebook page (because, you know, that shit’s so hard) and was upset that Gliori and company were thinking of making a book about the cat.

Why, you ask? Why, because Stewart somehow thinks the cat is his intellectual property.

Yeah, this is where everything gets batshit crazy.

So, the publisher and Gliori meet with Stewart and tell him they aren’t stealing his… cat pictures. They say that Gliori is creating her own version of the Tobermory cat (it plays the violin or something… I don’t really care), with her own illustrations. It has nothing to do with Stewart’s fucking Facebook page.

Stewart never backs down, and the publisher and Gliori leave. Work continues on Gliori’s Tobermory cat story. Meanwhile, Stewart has starting cyber-stalking Gliori, sending messages to venues she’s going to be speaking at asking if they know one of their guests is a thief of intellectual property.

The whole situation is baffling, but I’d like to note here that Stewart never mentioned Gliori by name. These messages to venues and groups, along with statuses on the Tobermory cat Facebook page, are all those delightfully vague things that remind one of a 13-year-old girl’s status updates. You know, the girls who write stuff like “Some people aren’t worth your time and it’s best to just let them go” and “Life has a way of breaking you and putting you back together though the pieces will never again fit in quite the same way”. Stewart’s messages contain whiffs of that same faux-elite, actually attention-seeking drive to drag people into their overblown issues. For example:

Stealing creative works is not right. We wish to protect our creative rights so would kindly suggest people come up with their own ideas rather than steal or rework our ideas. We are open to suggestions for imaginative joint ventures based on our Tobermory Cat’s celebrity character but take a dim view of simple theft or derivatives which exploit the work we have done creating a celebrity cat.

Anyway, Stewart appealed to his fans, who rallied (as fans are wont to do) and started a campaign of cyber-bullying against Gliori and the publisher. Which is probably unsurprising, seeing as the anonymity of the internet seems to inspire newer, viler lows in humanity.

And why this sudden outpouring of hate? Because of a cat. A fucking cat.

No, not a cat. The cat didn’t do anything.

This is about Stewart, his complete inability to understand copy write law, “intellectual property”, or art, for that matter. And its about the people loyal to him, who blindly attack this author (without having so much as read her book, mind you) for daring to tackle a particular idea they think she shouldn’t. Not child rape, not the glorification of slavery- no, nothing so appalling. They are up-in-arms over a kitty. A run-of-the-mill ginger kitty in a small Scottish town.

This is about stupidity. This is about censorship.

***

Now, before we go any further, I think it’s important to detail exactly how Stewart believes the Tobermory cat is his “intellectual property”. Because, if you are a reasonably intelligent person, you’re probably trying to figure out just how the hell you can claim a living creature as your “intellectual property”.

“I wisheded the kitteh into existence, guyz. He iz mah kitteh- I madez him.”

Stewart seems to believe he created the character of “The Tobermory Cat” through his Facebook page. It’s apparently all part of some art project of his. Or something.

According to Stewart, his, uh, “goal” with this Facebook page of cat photos was to create “the worlds first famous for being famous cat”.

So meta.

Apparently, upon achieving this “famous for being famous” status (however you judge that), Stewart’s going to move on to branding, product placements, and merchandising. Which I personally find hilarious, seeing as it kind of flies in the face of what most artists stand for. Cheap commercialism and ridiculous celebrity are, in fact, the complete antithesis of what 99% of the creative community would consider art.

My guess is it’s intended as a playful jab at celebrity culture. One without any real artistic resonance, sure, but a cute little “gotcha” nonetheless.

What’s truly baffling about all of this is that Stewart firmly believes that the Tobermory cat belongs to him (for the record, the living, breathing cat does not belong to Stewart) because he’s responsible for its celebrity. Never you mind that the cat was already known as a staple of the town, its hijinks amusing and entertaining the locals. Yes, the cat may have been Tobermory’s unofficial mascot before Stewart, but by all the gods, he made a goddamn Facebook page dedicated to it. It fucking must be his now. The man admits he’s trying to create a cat “famous for being famous”, which implies the cat was famous before Stewart came around. So what the fuck is this about?

Stewart claims this isn’t just about cat pictures: “We are not interested in simply producing pictures of a cat, we are creating a celebrity cat in a place and with a back story.” I spent way more time than I wanted to browsing through the stupid Facebook page, and I don’t see some kind of character emerging from any of this. It’s a bunch of pictures of a ginger cat sleeping, walking around, and interacting with the town, with a bunch of mundane captions that add nothing to the cutesy photos.

So, it’s hard to see how a children’s book about a cat that does not belong to Stewart (I cannot stress enough that this is not his fucking cat) could possibly interfere with his Facebook page of cat photos and the kitsch postcards he makes from the images.

I could see him being a bit ruffled if he was releasing a children’s book about the Tobermory cat. He still doesn’t own the cat (and a physical, living creature cannot be someone’s “intellectual property”), so I don’t think he would have a case unless he could prove Gliori and co. stole the plot of the book or some character quirk not present in the real cat that he created for his own book. The cat itself remains its own entity, free to be a furry little muse for anyone.

Of course, Stewart releasing a children’s book based on the Tobermory cat is absurd. After all, when this all started back in December of 2011, Stewart posted on the Facebook page:

They intend to merchandise what we consider to be our creation by producing a kids book based on our Tobermory Cat. For commercial reasons T.C. Management really doesn’t want to go anywhere near Balamory – we preferring to work amongst the more playful adult demographic and don’t want our creation dragging off to play school.

BUT WAIT. Fast forward four months, when Stewart’s now deeply entrenched in his personal war against Gliori and co., and now he’s posting this:

our Tobermory Cat card collection was launched today. Next we intend to produce a children’s book based on the ginger tom cat character and stories we have created.

Yeah, Stewart’s a fucking artist and certainly not being a whinging little fucker just for the attention it’s garnering him. I believe it.

To be fair, Stewart old boy, you’re now ripping off someone else’s idea of a children’s book based on that kitty. By your own twisted logic, you’re the douchebag thief now.

Fucking wanker.

***

So, beyond Stewart’s glaring fucking stupidity, what really pisses me off about this story? I guess it’s the idea that we can cull and censor the very world around us, dam it up as it trickles into the pool of inspiration all artists (musicians, painters, photographers, poets, novelists, etc.) visit in pursuit of their next idea.

Artists pull from nature, from society, from the news, from experience, from history. Creative folk are struck by the slant of a sunbeam on dark brown eyes, by a cellist playing Albinoni’s Adagio in G Minor in the ruins of Sarajevo during the 92-96 siege of the city, by the unknown back stories of red shirts on Star Trek.

Once, seated outside a dormitory on a summer evening, I saw my friend Derek walking out of the darkness with a backpack on his back, fireflies flickering in the grass around him. This image inspired me to write a poem. The unnamed man in the poem is inspired by Derek, but it isn’t him. I am not creating an autobiography, I’m creating art. I was inspired by Derek, but he is not my “intellectual property” (and his wife would kick my ass if I ever said he was, heh). I do not own him.

The Tobermory cat is a lovely, large ginger kitty. He sunbathes, he explores, he pesters local wildlife. His cult status within the town is sweet and beautiful. It is, dare I say, inspiring. If I considered Stewart’s Facebook page “art” (which I don’t- I don’t consider any Facebook pages to be art of any sort), I would have to argue that it shouldn’t matter if he has this page and Gliori has a children’s book. The point of any art created around the Tobermory cat is to celebrate a living creature and his unique connection to the small town he resides in. No one person created this cat- he created himself. All any artist or fan could do is add their own little snippet to the mythos surrounding him (…like Slender Man, that creepy motherfucker). Nobody owns him. As Wright Morris said, “Cats don’t belong to people. They belong to places.”

The cat is the spirit of Tobermory, its fuzzy genius loci. Writing about/sculpting/painting/composing a jaunty jazz number² inspired by the Tobermory cat is no different than painting the Grand Canyon or writing about Cleopatra. It’s about being inspired. The Tobermory cat inspired a concept of a Facebook-centric art project for Stewart, and it inspired a children’s book for Gliori and her publisher. The cat himself, that ginger gentleman roving the streets of Tobermory, is owned by neither. There is no claim of intellectual property to be disputed.

To kowtow to Stewart’s ridiculous claim would be setting a nasty precedent. Russia may still go around persecuting people for their art, but Scotland (and most of the world) is better than that. Criticism is one thing. No one will ever please the world, and artists know this better than anyone (except maybe politicians). Criticism is useful- it helps us grow as an artist. The ever-so-talented Amanda Fucking Palmer was discussing this on Twitter this morning. A follower mentioned they were disappointed with Amanda’s last show. Amanda politely asked the follower to tell her more. Why was the show weak, in that girl’s eyes? When people started sending harsh messages to the follower, Amanda stepped up and told them to stop, that she is legitimately curious when people don’t enjoy shows she thinks were good. Amanda may be a strong and independent personality, a lady who does what she likes onstage because she loves what she’s doing, but she’s not oblivious to her fans. She’s one of those rare artists who listens to her fans and works with them. She gives us what we want, without compromising herself.

She’s got this art thing down.

But criticism is not the same as viciously attacking artists, working to undermine their credibility (as happened with Gliori), and attempting to trade mark nature itself to prevent art from being created. That, my galleons, is the most troubling aspect of this whole story. That is why I’m so ludicrously pissed off about this. I feel bad for Gliori, I feel disgusted by Stewart, but mostly, I’m thoroughly, 100% en-fucking-raged that people are spewing hate and filth in the supposed name of “preservation of intellectual property”.

You do not own the world. You do not own the people, the scenery, the animals. You do not enslave nature in the name of art. You share it, you celebrate it, you unveil its mysteries and its wonders.

Instead of attacking someone else and being a great tit about something utterly nonsensical, perhaps Stewart should just focus on his own art. Art isn’t supposed to divide us. Art unites us. It brings people together.

End Rant

1 In my half-assed research regarding this fucking cat (I am not a journalist and have never claimed to be), there are actually conflicting reports. Some refer to it as a singular cat, while some say the cat is actually a handful of similar looking felines. For the sake of this post, we’ll refer to a singular cat, though I do believe the cat in question is actually many cats.

2 On a completely unrelated note, I am utterly amused by the idea of a saucy little jazz song featuring bagpipes, to really evoke the feel of Scotland. SOMEBODY MAKE THIS A REALITY.

Before the Mass Effect 3 Ending Debacle: The Dragon Age 2 Disappointment

I’ve already gone into excruciating detail on my feelings regarding the fan backlash to the ME3 ending, so the fact that, after staunchly defending BioWare’s product, I’m about to turn around here and bitch about the failings of one of their other games might seem a bit hypocritical. Perhaps even worthy of some disdain. I’m going to ask you to roll with me here, galleons. Give me a chance to prove that my criticisms are justified, not just mindless whinging (yes, I think I’m British).

If I fail, you are allowed to mercilessly tear me apart in the comments. I’ll deserve it.

***

I really looked forward to the release of Dragon Age 2. While I didn’t enjoy Dragon Age: Origins as much as my beloved Mass Effect, I was still quite fond of the title. I will acknowledge that there were problems with it (particularly centered around combat), but what made the title so enjoyable was its throwback nature. Origins felt like the high fantasy games I’d grown up with, like Baldur’s Gate (which, given the developer, only makes sense). One hero, with their ragtag band of followers, out to slay the dragon/demon and stop the big nasty evil from overtaking the land. It was full of haughty woodland elves and misguided mages trafficking with demons and underground dwarven cities full of small bearded warriors/smiths. I fought ogres and golems and spiders and dragons and even some giant rats. I traveled with the bastard heir to the throne, the reformed assassin, the kindly healer, the drunk dwarf. It was just classic fun- nothing too new, nothing too special, just a solid, enjoyable game.

So, when DA2 was released, I expected an expansion on the sword-and-sorcery goodness of the first. What I got was… well, it was disappointing. It didn’t feel like the same series at all. And, upon playing it again now, I still feel the same way.

Here’s how DA2 failed me.

The lack of a grand scope/sense of the epic/any solid plot for a good chunk of the game.

It is basically a staple of high fantasy that there is some huge, overarching goal the main characters are striving to complete. Slay the dragon, save the princess, toss a ring into a volcano. You know, that sort of nonsense. In Origins, your character was a Grey Warden, part of a special order of warriors with the job of defeating the rise of the darkspawn (orcish creatures) every few ages (known as a Blight). You and bastard princeling Alistair are the last Grey Wardens, set out to gather a mighty army from the scattered races of Ferelden to march against the darkspawn horde, slay the Archdemon that leads them, and maybe have cake afterwards. Pretty standard fantasy goodness. So, your character travels across the kingdom, aiding the dwarves and elves and mages and men in order to gain their support for the final battle. And, in the end, your army marches to battle, you defeat the Archdemon, and the Blight is over.

Huzzah.

Then the expansion, Awakening, comes out. Your Grey Warden is now working in the province given to the order by the new ruler of Ferelden. You are dealing with increased darkspawn activity, something that shouldn’t happen with the Blight being over and all. You find some talking, weirdly sentient darkspawn who try to get you to help in their plan to free their people from the magical slavery of the Blight, so that the darkspawn race might prosper and eventually work with the rest of the races of the world. You can either agree to help or not, but it sets the stage for some very interesting future developments with the darkspawn.

And then DA2 comes out and… nothing. You aren’t a Grey Warden anymore- in fact, you are a completely different character from who you were in the first game. You are living up in another city-state as a refugee from the events of the first game. You don’t seem to have any more pressing goal than surviving and maybe reclaiming your family estate (which your uncle lost to pay a debt).

…I’m sorry, what the fuck just happened?

Da2 is split into three “acts,” three different years in the city of Kirkwall. Each year has a completely different kind of mini-goal to it, though the “goals” for the last two years are less “goals” and more “situations you accidentally become embroiled in over the course of the year.” If you were to tell me, upon starting the game, what the final battle dealt with, I would have been confused. Hell, you don’t even really meet the two people who become the two final bosses until Act Fucking 3. They have no real presence in your game until the final third of it.

The game just feels woefully cobbled together. Act 1 has you running around trying to scrounge up enough gold to go on this adventuring expedition that will (hopefully) secure your fortune and let your family reclaim their estate. Okay. I can get behind that, I suppose. Then Act 2 rolls around. You have your estate. So…? You kind of just run around doing a bunch of pointless quests because… you want the gold (even though you’re rich)? You want to help people (even if you’re choosing the mega-douche dialogue options)? There’s no fucking motivation for your character’s actions. Eventually, because of a few random quests you’ve gone on, you somehow end up involved in the big qunari (race of big dudes with demon horns who want to convert everyone to their religion/lifestyle or else slaughter them mercilessly)  vs. citizens of Kirkwall fight. You bring an end to it, everyone is happy, you gain a fancy title… Then, Act 3 happens. And, once again, you are kind of slowly, half-assedly dragged into this big war between the mages and the templars.

What. The. Fuck.

Everything feels so pieced together and tacked on. There are a few really interesting, rewarding side quests, but there is no real main quest. It’s not a sandbox, where you kind of build your own game experience, you just go around getting letters and doing jobs for people for seemingly little or no reason. Considering the game is an RPG, this is a major problem for the title.

And the game has next to nothing to do with the events of the first game. You can import your Origins save in, but all it does is influence whether or not a few cameos happen. Nothing that even remotely influences the actual story… because there is no fucking story. It takes one of the small areas of contention in Origins (the templar and mage situation) and eventually blows it the fuck up (literally) after 2/3 of a game full of shuffling your feet and misdirection and tries to pass this off as some grand story.

It’s not. It’s really, really not.

Take Mass Effect (I can’t help but compare the two series because they are both BioWare creations… sorry). Imagine Shepard had managed to defeat the Reapers in the first game. And then, instead of any continuation of the Reaper/Shepard story, the second game has you playing as a survivor of Eden Prime who, I don’t know, becomes a merc and fucks around in spaceland for a bit, eventually ending up involved in some kind of human coup on the Citadel, and finally accidentally ends up hardcore reigniting the human/turian war. You’d have been… disappointed, no? Confused, maybe?

I think the fact that the story from Origins didn’t directly carry over to DA2 would have bothered me less if they hadn’t pulled that “keep your save files, they’re going to matter” bullshit on me. My Origins decisions impacted less than nothing in DA2. Honestly, the idea of having different protagonists having different adventures across the same world is fine and dandy. But don’t bother with having me import a save if it doesn’t mean anything. The Elder Scrolls does it right- they set each game in different provinces (and at different times), you never import a save, you are playing isolated heroes. Lore grows and continues from game to game, but your old characters have no impact. And it totally works. Nobody’s complaining. Play it one way or the other, but don’t do this half-assed import bullshit, BioWare.

I know this is their story and their world and I feel kind of cheap complaining about it when I so harshly judged people for doing the same to the ME3 ending. I feel like I really have less issue with where the story went and more issue with how they got there, painfully limping along until they decided to make a point.

Speaking of the “point”…

The story got WAY too political WAY too fast.

This is a high fantasy series. At least, that’s what it had been touted as. We’ve already discussed some of what one expects when that term is tossed around. And that’s what the first game was.

And then holy shit, DA2 tries to jump into a completely different direction. By Act 3, when the thing finally decides to come up with some semblance of a plot, they’ve decided to just blow the whole mages/templars thing into a full-blown war.

In the Dragon Age world, mages are taken from their families at young ages and locked away in the Circle of Magi, a tower or something in every province where mages live and study under close watch of the templars, guards from the Chantry who are there to make sure the mages toe the line. Throughout history, mages just fucked with shit, calling up demons and using blood magic and making everything fucking awful with their sparkly magics. So, the templars keep them in check, killing the ones who show signs of possession or blood magic dabbling. The mages are essentially imprisoned. If you don’t want to live in the Circle, and you have magic, you are known as an apostate, and templars will kill you or haul you off to the Circle if they catch you using magic out in the world.

So, the mages are bitchy because they are locked in a tower their whole lives with horrible sword-wielding guards breathing down their necks and waiting to run them through, and the templars feel like they have to crack down harder as more and more mages escape/call on forbidden magics to try to escape their prison.

I mean, yeah, it’s a shitty situation. And I feel really bad for the mages.¹ But they go from mild discontent in the first game to full-on claw-your-face-off-with-lightning crazy in the second. And the templars go from being stern guards who at least attempt to be fair to religion-crazed-sword-happy lunatics. It was a situation I’d have been happy to play through and resolve, except that the two factions became so fucking insane that I didn’t want to side with either of them. Kind of just wanted to firebomb the lot and run off with the pirate wench.

Instead of gathering a giant army to face a demonic invasion of the land, I’m playing errand-boy/girl back and forth between these two whiny, completely batshit groups. No matter what I do, I’m about to help someone ignite a giant war across the world between these two factions. Try as I might to minimize the damage, in the end, everything goes to shit. I’m trying to be diplomatic and political when all I want is to go stab stabbity stab a dragon in the eye.

The game is incredibly claustrophobic.

The entire game is set within one city and a few small, surrounding areas. Mostly, it’s just this city. You don’t get to go anywhere else. Hightown. Lowtown. The Docks. The Gallows. Darktown. The coastline around the city. The mountain summit by it. A mine nearby. That’s it. So, you’re just running back and forth between different parts of the city. Again. And again. And again.

You spend the whole time feeling closed in and like you’re going nowhere (which is greatly exacerbated by the lack of cohesive plot). It’s fucking maddening.

Another facet of this is…

HIDEOUS FUCKING MAP RECYCLING

I have no idea who thought this was a good idea, but let me at ’em. I’m gonna bitch slap them so goddamn hard. There are, like, 5 (maybe) different dungeon maps that just keep getting recycled. They’ll close off a section one time, make you run it backwards the next, but it’s the same thing again and again and again.

This is one of the biggest complaints from the fan community. And with good reason. For a game that’s isolated to this one city, you feel like you could go nuts making gorgeous/interesting/complex/unique dungeons to keep things fresh. Instead, you have a handful of small, boring, shitty little maps being used again and again.

By the third time you’re canvassing the same map, you’re ready to strangle someone. By the tenth, you just want to cry in frustration. It’s the worst.

The Stamina/Mana and Cooldown Fuckery

Okay, so you have a stamina bar. That’s fine. You can only use talents until you are out of stamina, with the bigger, more powerful attacks using more stamina.

Or, you have cooldowns on your talents. You use one, then it takes thirty seconds or something for that one to be useable again. The more powerful the attack, the longer the cooldown.

But you don’t have BOTH. This is actually a carry-over issue from Origins. Not only do you have a stamina bar that depletes as you use your talents, but they all have cooldowns. Plus, your heath/stamina/mana potions all have a damn cooldown. It can make it fucking impossible to do anything in intense combat situations.

It would be like having both the weapon overheat system from ME1 and the thermal clips from 2&3. Together. At the same time. Just redundant bullshit making it unnecessarily harder to fight.

The romance options are incredibly one-dimensional.

I know this is a silly concern, but I’ve been spoiled by the ME games. Garrus. Liara. Tali. Thane. Ashley. They are all so interesting, with real personalities and humor and stories. They all feel like real, flawed, wonderful people. So, I expect BioWare to be able to create some really memorable characters like that for me in the Dragon Age games as well. And in Origins, they did. Leliana. Zevran. Alistair. Morrigan. They were all layered, interesting characters.

Then DA2 happens. I have Fenris, the broody elf with the sexy voice who is super emo and tortured because he was a slave and single-mindedly hates magic and mages. There’s Anders, the once-playful healer who is super emo and tortured because he’s an apostate and single-mindedly hates templars. Sebastian, the prince-turned-priest (sort of) with the Scottish accent who is super emo because of his complete, pathetic inability to decide whether he wants to stay a priest or go back to being a prince. Isabela, the skanky pirate wench who, bless her, is just a skanky pirate wench constantly trying to get in your pants. And Merrill, the totally naive elf mage who is actually stupid enough to think blood magic and demons are okay. The characters do not grow or change or have any real depth beyond this.

I forgive Isabela, because her wenching is hilarious. There are various scenes where she’s hitting on everyone and having to go to the healer for her STDs. She’s an unabashed tart. I can’t help but tip my hat to her.

But the rest… god, it makes romancing any of them a fucking chore. I get to the point where I want them all to just shut the fuck up. I’d rather romance the dwarf- he’s the most interesting companion of the lot. I romanced Fenris last go round and if I so much as tried to be a decent human being to a mage, he got pissed.

There’s a scale of friendship/rivalry for each character and you need so much friendship/rivalry to successfully romance one of them. Yes, that’s right, you can romance them as their rival. They hate everything you stand for, but man, then just can’t wait to jump your bones.

Most of the time, rivalmances make no sense. Then again…

Playing as one of the major classes doesn’t make any sense.

I thought about playing a mage on the play-through I just started, but I had to stop because it makes absolutely no sense that Hawke, who gets into fights all over town (including right in front of the templars at the very beginning of the game), could get away with being a fucking mage when the templars supposedly kill/imprison anyone who even smells like a mage. It would be completely unbelievable to play the game as a mage. There’s no way they’d constantly turn a blind eye to you, I’m sorry.

Then again, if I can’t figure out the motivations for my own character’s actions, how can I figure out the motivations for other characters?

***

So, okay, that’s a lot of bitching, I know. And it probably makes you wonder why I’d ever continue playing the game. Thing is, on its own, it’s not the worst thing I’ve ever played. As broken as many aspects of the game feel, there are other areas where it shines. It’s 100% BioWare in that the party banter and much of the dialogue is just great. And you have more varied options in conversations than you do in the ME trilogy- I love that sarcasm option like mad (it makes Hawke a smartass who makes really bad jokes only he/she thinks is funny… sound familiar?).

And I just really, really love slashing things to death with my daggers.

Anyway, unnecessary tirade over. I still maintain I’m not a total hypocrite. I’m allowed to dislike a game and/or portions of it. I’m not going to go around bitching and demanding BioWare change everything to make me happy. I’d like to hope they take some of their failings into account in the future (like never doing the map recycling thing again), but at the end of the day, I’m not going to love every game I play or even every game BioWare puts out. So it goes.

If you don’t buy my “I’m not a hypocrite” logic, I am more than happy to face the full brunt of your rage/disdain. I still am not sure I don’t deserve it.

1 DA2 makes it a little difficult to feel truly sympathetic for the mages’ plight, seeing as 99.9% of the mages you meet either become demon-possessed abominations or use blood magic at the slightest insult. The mages are more likeable in the first game- you meet abominations, sure, but you also meet mages who don’t run around with demons, who feel trapped in the Circle even though they are totally good guys.

Somehow, I Don’t Think That’s What the Build-a-Bear Folks Meant When They Said Their Toys Are “Stuffed With Love”

Galleons, we did a post a while back that featured this abomination of a homemade sex… toy:

And while I remain mildly disturbed by a woman copulating with a teddy bear, what you do behind your own closed doors (with or without the teddy bear’s consent) is fine. I’d say I won’t judge, but I’m a judgmental twat, so…

However, some people are taking their stuffed ursine lovin’ to the streets. Namely, to the streets of Cinncinati. And when I say people, I really just mean one bloke. Charles Marshall. Seems this fellow got himself arrested last Wednesday after he was caught making sweet love to a teddy bear in the alley behind a health clinic, hauled in on charges of disorderly conduct.

The fate of the poor plush victim remains unknown.

Things get interesting when we learn that this isn’t the first time Marshall has found himself in this situation. Turns out, the man’s been arrestedfour times in the last two years for being found, somewhere, beating the meat with a toy bear.

The first time found him with his pants down in a men’s bathroom at a city library, after which a judge told him to stay the fuck away from libraries. Probably worried the Berenstain Bears series was like porn to the guy.

The fuck?

A few months later, Charles was back in action, once again being caught with his trousers down and a teddy out. The arresting officer noted that Mr. Marshall’s predilections had becoming an “ongoing problem.”

Almost a year passed and everyone was probably starting to breathe a collective sigh of relief. It’s okay to go outside again, children… Oh wait, no. It’s not. Because there’s Charles Marshall, taking Mr. Fuzzles and having his way with your beloved bear. Once again, Charles is hauled in on charges of public indecency for engaging in plushie masturbation in a public area where “minors were likely to be present.”

Now, it’s happened again.

WHEN WILL THE MADNESS END?

…I just gotta know one thing: Has he been monogamous the past two years, or has it been a different bear every time? Is the bear special, or are these just a series of one-night stands in dirty alleys and public restrooms?

Charles, here’s what you do. You go to a furry convention. You mingle a bit, have a few drinks. You find yourself a nice little bear. Chat them up.  Take them home. And you stop giving the Cinncinati police nightmares of your wang in the furry embrace of a child’s toy, okay?

In Which I Address the Mass Effect 3 Ending Controversy

WARNING: I feel it goes without saying that I’m going to be laying down some solid spoilers for the ME3 endgame here. So, if you haven’t played and have been fastidiously avoiding spoilers, turn your gaze away from this page right the fuck now.

Also, I’m going to ramble like mad and piss everyone off.

Oh, galleons. What with the statement from Bioware released today, I feel like I have to finally write this. Really, ever since finishing Mass Effect 3, I’ve been toying with doing this post. Because, after I emotionally calmed myself after the soul-shattering end to a four-year span of my life, I found I was a little disgruntled with one teensy aspect of the ending. One tiny plot hole that I was having a hard time justifying.

Honestly, when 99.9% of the game is golden, though, it’s hard to be too upset about the last three minutes or so.

And I couldn’t help but wonder if I had missed something. I mean, I was sobbing by that point and helplessly chanting, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry” at the screen as I thought I was essentially destroying everyone I loved in order to save the galaxy as a whole (more on that in a minute)… so, let’s just say there was ample room for me to have missed a moment that explained away that silly plot hole.

It seems I didn’t, and when I turned to the internet looking for the answer, I found a whole slew of people whining about the ending.

So, here goes. Here’s what I have to say about it:

You are all a bunch of pussies.

I actually fucking applauded the fact that Bioware killed Shepard in nearly every ending. In fact, I’d go so far as to say I don’t think Shep should have ever survived. Let’s look at the facts here:

Shep survived not one, but two ridiculous-fuck-situations where she (yes, she) should have died: the Battle for the Citadel and the attack on the Collector base. In fact, Shep did die once. She’s mortal as fuck. And she gets her ass blasted by that Reaper laser right before the Hammer ground team hits the Beam to take them to the Citadel/Crucible. You spend the remainder of the game limping, in a haze of fucking pain. She is seriously injured walking into the final confrontation. God, when they tell her the Crucible isn’t firing and she’s hauling her broken, dying body up to respond… that’s fucking heart-wrenching, no? And it can only be so if we truly believe Shep is mortal and is dying there.

What I’m trying to get at here is that Shepard has been the paragon (pardon the phrase) of humanity throughout this series. She’s creative, she’s tough, she’s tenacious, but she’s human. Her humanity is highlighted even further in ME3 as we really see the psychological toll this war is taking on her and has been for the past few years of her life. She is forced to make tough decisions, I mean the fate of all life in the galaxy level of tough decisions, but she’s not a god. She’s a mortal woman (with a few fancy tech upgrades courtesy of Cerberus, sure). Her very humanity, her spirit, is a combination of both her strength and her frailty. To have her walk away completely unscathed from the final fucking war with a deadly, giant machine race would have been an insult to the character and to the players.

This is a war and you are a soldier. More so than the other two titles, ME3 really brings that home. All these friends you are making? You are dragging them into a fucking war zone with you. Not everyone gets to walk away from this alive. Statistically, that’s impossible. And you, Commander Fucking Shepard, despite being a hell of a soldier, are just as mortal as the rest of them. And really, you are being tossed into the worst places in the war. In that final battle, you are the front fucking line on Hammer team. That you make it to that Beam at all is a goddamn miracle.

Shepard basically had to die to make this whole journey even remotely believable. She was never a god. She was a mortal woman. A badass mortal woman, to be sure, but mortal nonetheless. Her incredibly emotional journey, the loss of so many friends and teammates… how else could this really end? It was always building to this, to that moment of ultimate sacrifice. She was always going to die to save the galaxy. This has always been her destiny. That is why she is the lynchpin of the trilogy, why we play her. Since she first encountered that beacon on Eden Prime, her course has been set. We knew this, deep down. Maybe we didn’t want to believe it, but we knew it. When she dies at the beginning of ME2, we scream, not because she died, but because she died without completing her task, without fulfilling that destiny we know she’s been walking toward.

But, I digress. Suffice to say, despite the fact that Shepard should die to end the trilogy, I feel like people are unwilling to accept it and that’s where a lot of the ME3 backlash lies.

I blame J.K. Rowling for this.

Honestly, the ending of the seventh Harry Potter book, that fucking epilogue, was perhaps one of the most insulting pieces of fan service in recent times. I loathe that the fans are now dictating the story, that writers are cobbling together that “perfect Disney ending” just to appease the whining masses who refuse to experience the honest story, the more somber ending, the bleaker look at how life sometimes works (particularly in times of war). No, we want everyone happy and married and popping out babies and eating cookies.

Now, Harry Potter was geared toward a younger audience, so I suppose you can argue that it needed hope and a happy resolution (though I think that argument is bullshit and half, but that’s an argument for another day). Mass Effect has always been geared toward a mature audience, dammit. Adults don’t get Disney endings, they get the goddamn truth.

Apparently, as Jack Nicholson so famously said, you can’t handle the truth.Because what I’m getting from most comments regarding the ending is people saying it’s “not fair” that Shepard dies, it’s “not fair” that they don’t get a perfect, mindless, generic happy ending to the Reaper threat.

True, a lot of forum comment monkeys are sniveling children (or the emotional equivalent of such), so I shouldn’t be surprised.

Harsh? Maybe. I’m not feeling particularly generous at the moment. I’m feeling irritable.

But, while I feel that most of this backlash is centered around that whole “dead Shep” issue, there are some points being tossed about that I’ll discuss.

The mass relay explosions

In the Arrival DLC pack, we shot a goddamn asteroid into a mass relay and leveled a star system (including a batarian colony). That sucked (not really… batarians are cocks). So, a lot of people are really fucking pissed that the Crucible destroys all the mass relays in the goddamn galaxy, but doesn’t wipe out any star systems as a result.

Were the writers ignoring their own established canon here?

No.

We have to take into account the fact that the mass relays in these two instances were destroyed in very different manners. In Arrival, we hurled that asteroid at the whirling ball of eezo in that mass relay. When that eezo essentially detonated, it fucked that star system up. But the Crucible appears to be using up the eezo in the mass relays it hits to fuel its passage to each subsequent relay. By grossly depleting the eezo in such a manner, we have a much smaller resultant explosion when the relay blows up. Think atomic bomb to conventional bomb here. The star systems would survive that.

Why did we just bring the whole galaxy together if we’re going to rip them apart by destroying the mass relays?

*sigh* Yes, you just spent all those hours making the galaxy play nice so you can bring a massive army to fight the Reaper threat. And yes, destruction of the mass relays means there are now a bunch of essentially stranded alien races in various star systems across the galaxy.

But… how is this such a mind-shattering thing? I think it was perhaps one of the most poignant parts of the ending. In order to “fix” the galaxy and truly break the cycle, we had to wipe the Reapers and all their tech out. That included the mass relays, which were not invented by any galactic race. Essentially, we’d been cheating at space travel this whole time. We had the tech for FTL travel, but we couldn’t jump between star systems in the blink of an eye (it would take many-a year at FTL travel to take a jaunt to another star system). The mass relays let us do that, but at a terrible price- the goddamn Reapers.

It was a fairly subtle commentary on the downfalls of using technology without truly understanding it. The races never really fully understood how the mass relays worked- they were never able to build new ones, now were they? But they blithely used them anyway. That kind of technological advancement of the races was never earned. We cheated. And what this hard reset of the galaxy did was give the races a chance to earn it this go-round. To build and understand and invent and create on our own.

Sir Isaac Newton (the deadliest son-of-a-bitch in space) once said, “If I have seen farther, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” But we didn’t just stand on their shoulders. We were strolling around on the ground, found a button, pressed it out of curiosity, and were teleported up there. We don’t know how the teleporter works. We don’t even know the giant’s name.

Without coming right out and saying, “THIS IS WHAT WE’RE DOING HERE,” Bioware conveyed that sense of us toppling from grace because we hadn’t earned our place there. Cheat your way to the top, and it eventually comes back to the bite you in the ass. But that doesn’t mean you can’t then try to get back up there… the right way.

And, in the same vein…

But all those turians and quarians will never survive on some of those levo-amino planets! And what about the colonists on more hostile worlds who needed shipments of materials in order to survive?

Yeah… no, they’re probably gonna die. Sorry.

Again, it’s that “needs of the many vs. the needs of the few” dilemma Shep’s been battling with the whole goddamn game. A choice had to be made, and it couldn’t be easy. We couldn’t have a crappy choice where everyone’s fucked and a great choice where everyone’s happy and call that a tough decision. It was a choice between “some will die to save the many” and “everyone fucking dies.” I don’t even feel Bioware has to justify this complaint, because it’s in the same vein as the “oh noes, Shep died” ones.

The ending was too rushed. We got no closure on what happened to the quarians (did they finally get to live outside their suits?) or the krogan (with the genophage cured, did they rebuild their culture?) or…

Blah, blah, blah. This was Shepard’s story. That is all. This wasn’t the entire history and future of the galaxy we were playing. This was one character’s journey through a pivotal moment in galactic history.

I think what some fans wanted was a Dragon Age-esque ending, where there were some text snippets telling you a bit about what happened after you valiantly slaughtered the archdemon. You know, the What-Are-They-Up-To-Now? bits.

Just because this trilogy is over doesn’t mean we’ll never see another game set in this universe. We don’t have to know everything that happened ever in the future. The ending of the game was a galaxy that has been torn apart by war and now has to rebuild. There’s that sliver of hope, though, that they can. Thanks to Shep. It was an emotionally perfect way to end it.

As for the ending being too rushed… maybe it was for some, maybe it wasn’t for others. I felt it was fine. I kind of liked that we never really knew exactly what the Crucible did until the very end, and it wasn’t what we expected. Again, it’s that whole “we’re using tech we don’t understand” dilemma.

And really, the Metal Gear Solid series has the market cornered on 2-hour cutscenes… let’s just leave it that way, yeah?

How did the Crucible accomplish the fusion ending? Space magic?

Okay, one of the possible endings for the game allows you to fuse organic and inorganic life in order to stop the cycle of Reaper violence. But, how can that happen? How can the god child (the Reaper AI or whatever that created the Reapers in the first place as a “tidy” solution to the problem of organics and synthetics killing each other chaotically, that’s been around for aeons and appears to you as the little boy that dies at the very beginning of the game simply because it’s emotionally resonant) fuse the two?

Yep, it’s space magic. Or, rather, Mass Effect‘s version of space magic, which is eezo.

I like that fans get all confused and huffy over this, but have absolutely no qualms with the fact that people perform these crazy ass “space magic” biotic tricks throughout the games. Is it because they were explained?

Guess what- their explanations translate tidily over to the fusion ending. Exposure to eezo was what caused the biotic powers to manifest in the races, because eezo changes a person on a genetic level. The biotic implants just helped folks utilize the powers they now had- they didn’t give them to people. Eezo did that. Like the coolest radiation mutation ever.

Because eezo has the power to rewrite organic genetic code, it could theoretically be used in a targeted fashion to rewrite genetic code to accept inorganic code as well. If fucking Miranda could fuse organics and cybernetics to bring Shep back from the dead, is it really so hard to believe this incredibly advanced AI god child, hanging out in the Citadel and watching/coordinating the cycle time and time again, the thing that create the fucking Reapers in the first place, couldn’t manage to make that eezo wave it sends out fuse man and machine?

It’s a slight stretch of the imagination, but really not much further than we’ve already stretched it. The whole situation calls to mind Arthur C. Clarke’s Third Law: “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”

People are up in arms that Bioware didn’t explain anything in the ending, but they did… they just did so over the course of the last three fucking games, not all at once in the ending. They were anticipating that their fans were intelligent enough to pick up on this.

Sadly, it seems they were mistaken. It’s a damn shame- they didn’t hold our hands through the end of the series because they weren’t going to patronize us, and that’s blowing up in their faces.

What does that say about us, gaming community?

Why are the endings the same for both Paragon and Renegade players? That’s stupid.

I actually think this is one of their more brilliant moves.

My very favorite author, Kevin Brockmeier, has a short story entitled, The Human Soul as a Rube Goldberg Device: A Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Story. As the title states, it’s a choose-your-own-adventure style tale, set in a regular day in the life of an average person. Your choices are basic, normal, mundane things. Do you put your book back on the bookshelf or leave it on the arm of the couch? Do you throw away your fountain drink cup or buy a refill? Perfectly boring, normal decisions. Each little thing moves you in a slightly different direction through your day, but there’s only one ending: no matter what you do during the rest of the day, you die of a heart attack.

It’s a clever way to explore the idea of fate, that the universe has some predestined plan for you. No matter what, the character’s fate is sealed.

In a way, Bioware did something similar with the Mass Effect trilogy.

In the first game, whether you Paragon or Renegaded it up only really impacted two things: whether you could convince Saren to shoot himself in the initial fight or had to fight him twice… and whether you killed the Council or not. And really, even if you Paragon the whole goddamn game, you can Renegade kill those Council bitches (I always do). It was less about “your decisions change the ending” and more “your decisions color the game and how people interact with you”.

Game 2. You can gain squad loyalty through either Paragon or Renegade choices and the rest of the squad’s fate lands in who you choose to lead the fire team/be the tech expert and whether you upgraded your ship or not. Again, whether you Paragon or Renegade the rest of the game, you can still choose either option when you are figuring out what to do with the Collector base. It makes no significant impact on the ending at all.

So… why would we expect a sudden shift in the formula now? Because this is the last game? Your Paragon and Renegade decisions decide who you bring to the final battle (fleet-wise)… your war assets. Which impact which decisions you have in the Crucible and whether or not the galaxy survives. But whether you Paragon or Renegade your play-through, you still get the same options at the end. This is the same thing that happened in both previous titles. And what should happen. It’s not Paragon=good, Renegade=evil. They are simply two different paths toward achieving the same ends. One way you’re diplomatic, one way you’re a bit more… aggressive. You charm or you intimidate. You sweet talk or you punch them. Either way, you get a similar outcome.

Like the character in Brokmeier’s short story, Shepard has a fate. She cannot escape that final decision. She’s going to get there no matter what else she does. She can shelve the book or leave it on the couch. She can let that terrorist go or shoot him in the face. In the end, though, all steps will lead toward that one end.

That end where you have to choose.

***

Now, as I mentioned at the start of this post, there is an actual plot hole I can’t seem to resolve (and maybe I’ve just missed something- I plan on replaying the game in the future and seeing if I can’t figure it out).

Situation:

I am part of the Hammer team, the ground team pushing its way through London toward the Beam that will lead to the Citadel so we can open its arms and connect it to the Crucible. As always, I have Garrus with me (as my buddy Tony said, “You only ever have to ask someone who their other squadmate is. Singular. Because you always take Garrus with you. ALWAYS.”), as well as Liara. We’re making our way toward the Beam. Between us and it is a fucking Reaper.

It shoots us. There’s this huge explosion. Shep shakily gets to her feet, severely wounded, and eventually staggers into the Beam. Either Garrus and Liara are dead at this point (GARRUS…. NOOOOOO!) or grievously wounded. There’s still a Reaper hanging out by them. The Normandy is out in space land as part of the Sword team.

Okay. Cut to my decision. My Shep decided to do what she came here to do- she destroyed the Reapers. As such, she really chose to destroy all inorganic life in the galaxy. Goodbye Reapers. Goodbye geth. Goodbye EDI.

You see the eezo wave shoot out from the Crucible… and then you see the Normandy in what appears to be FTL drive (since it’s outpacing the explosion to start), with Joker wildly hitting controls as the wave hits and the ship obviously is being fucked with. You don’t know exactly what’s happening there, but it looks fucking bad. And shit, I just chose to destroy EDI, who we learned early in the game is an essential part of the ship now and couldn’t be removed from the Normandy.

It’s at this point, tears streaming down my face, that the “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry” chant happened, because I’m fairly sure I just destroyed everyone I care about (between Garrus and Liara down on Earth and my crew up in space) in order to save the galaxy. And fucking emotionally eviscerating as that was, god, it was a hell of an ending. I was in awe even as I cried.

Then, you see the Normandy crashed on some garden world in another star system. And out climbs Joker… and Ashley… and Garrus.

Wait… Garrus? What the fuck?

Somehow, in the time it takes Shep to limp through the Citadel, confront the Illusive Man, talk to God Child, and make her choice… the Normandy manages to swoop down into Reaper central, pick up your wounded squadmates, and… do an FTL jump? To, what, avoid a Reaper? Because I’m never going to believe the Normandy would just leave the battle… Joker is a lot of things, but a coward isn’t one of them.

Oh, we also managed to completely patch up your on-the-brink-of-death love interest for you. Even while crashing. Way to go, Chakwas.

Honestly, that whole bit was confusing as hell. Those three minutes or so? I could have done with a bit more explanation, yeah. It didn’t make much sense to me. It felt like the Normandy was forced into an FTL jump with no explanation just so we could let the team survive… but in another system.

…

Yeah, I don’t get it. Joker’s a hell of a pilot, but there’s no way that Reaper by the Beam (not to mention all the other Reapers around Earth) wouldn’t have torn him apart if he’d attempted a rescue operation.

Weirdly enough, I’d probably be okay with the unnecessary crash landing ending if the Earth ground team just didn’t feature at all. They died. So it goes. Everyone else survived, I guess. At least there wouldn’t be such a strange plot hole.

That being said… I really don’t need Bioware to change it. So there was a hiccup there at the end. The rest of the game MORE THAN FUCKING MADE UP FOR IT, and I certainly didn’t walk away feeling cheated. At all.

***

Just because the game didn’t end the way you wanted it to doesn’t make it a bad ending. In fact, that kind of makes it a good ending, doesn’t it? The end was odd only in that, in the four years since I started playing this game, I never expected it to come down to that final decision in the Crucible. But that doesn’t mean it was a bad ending. I commend Bioware for being able to give me something I wasn’t expecting, for striving for a resolution that wasn’t the obvious.

The ending was visceral. It was hard. I didn’t walk away happy, but I definitely walked away satisfied. I was horrified at what I had to do, but by god, I wouldn’t want it any other way. That decision had to be brutal, and they did a great job of making it so. This war was never going to end with a shotgun shell in a Reaper’s face, after all. It had to have a big decision, that giant red button Shep would have to press… with all the requisite strings attached.

Bioware actually did a damn solid job of bringing a lot of the unique elements (Particularly eezo… get it? Elements? I’m funny, dammit) of the series into play in that final bit. It was the culmination of battles and knowledge acquisition, the sum total of everything the player should have learned about the Mass Effect universe and how its rules worked.

I’m sorry that the gaming community has failed the writers, not the other way around. If there were a few flaws in the ending, that is vastly outweighed by the sheer ignorance of those whining about the ending. Bioware gave us the chance to prove we are smart, clever folks. That we don’t need the writers to tell us, step-by-step, what is happening every moment of the game. That we could extrapolate from known information, could use our extensive knowledge of the Mass Effect universe, to easily understand how this could all work out.

I honestly hope the Bioware team doesn’t cave to fan pressure. There’s a line between listening to and learning from the critique of fans and bowing to their demands. Drastically changing the ending would set a dangerous precedent in the gaming world.

Anyway, I’ve prattled on long enough.

Rant over.

In Which I Consider Killing a Man to Preserve the Honor of Gamers Everywhere

Galleons, you all know I like me some video games. In fact, the very reason I have been so laconic here lately is because I have been spending so much time (probably too much time, to be honest) attached to my controller.

I own an Xbox 360. I prefer the system for a number of reasons, but they are purely personal. I’ve played the 360 a hell of a lot more than I’ve played the PS3 (the Wii doesn’t count- it’s really its own weird beast). All of the games I want are available for the 360 (not the case for the PS3). And, strange though it sounds, I much prefer the feel of the 360’s controller. It’s larger and fits my mannish hands nicely.

Mostly, I prefer it because it is familiar. I like to be comfortable with my gaming system. But I’m not one to jump in the trenches and start arguing with the PS fanboys about which system is superior. Frankly, I think the console fan wars are ridiculous. Just like with the Mac vs PC debate, both systems have their pros and cons. The PS3 is the more powerful system, but the 360 has more games available. The PS3 is Blu-ray compatible, but it costs more. The 360 has the more solid multiplayer and online experience, but the older models are known for dying spectacular, crimson-ringed deaths.

In the end, you select the console that best suits your individual needs. Just like with computers. Why can’t we all just be content that we are a cadre of nerdy game-lovers? Why must we puff out our pale chests and vie for a useless sense of superiority? This pissing contest irritates me, dear galleons, and it always has.

But it has never baffled/angered/appalled me more than it did last night.

About twenty minutes into my shift, I walked past a small group of my fellow retail drones on my way to retrieve some shopping carts for the backroom. Two of them were day shifters who I don’t actually know. To be honest, I don’t know the third man’s name either, though he actually works my shift. I’ve never bothered to learn it because he’s a surly, stupid jackass who pisses me off at least once a day. So, I just call him New Guy (or That Fucker/Cocksucker/Assdouche/Fuckwit/etc).

So, there I am, walking along, minding my own business (i.e. actively avoiding customers and coworkers so I don’t have to interact with them)… when I hear these three loudly debating which console is the best.

*cue Valley girl eye roll and disdainful sigh*

And then this happened:

Guy #1: Well, yeah, the PS3 is fine and all, but the 360-

New Guy: Shit, you know how I know the 360 is crap? Look at the fucking controller. It looks like a kid colored it in with their fucking crayons.

Guy #2: Wha-

New Guy: Our controller is so much better. Big. Black. None of that kiddie bullshit. Just a black controller and the little shapes.

Guy #2: Which are colored.

New Guy: God, you Xbox bitches are so stupid. So stupid. With your letters and everything. Shit, your controllers have all those letters and what if someone can’t read? They can’t use your controller. Ours just have shapes.

…

…

…

At this point, I had to just walk the fuck away (else someone was going to start bleeding). I have never heard someone argue that their system was superior because the ignorant could use it. The PS3: So simple an illiterate dumbass can use it. Yeah, that really sells me on how great your system is. You make it sound like the Idiot’s Guide to Gaming.

And might I point out that the 360 controller this heinous fucktard was pointing to when complaining about the color scheme was the black one. Which is 98.5% black, with only 5 little buttons with any sort of additional color on them. For comparison’s sake, the black 360 controller

And the PS3 controller

Yep, staggering difference in the color scheme. You’re right, New Guy. The 360’s controller certainly looks like a tablecloth at the Applebee’s after a group of five-year-olds has had their way with it.

It’s okay, though. My controller will apparently be seeing yours back in kindergarten. Mine will be learning how to color inside the lines, and yours will be learning how to fucking read.

Honestly, I don’t know how some people are allowed to live. I feel morally compelled to kill him and end his line. Let no more abominations spring forth from his tainted seed.

Trouble in Toyland

Oh, galleons. When sex toys end up in the news, it always ends in tears. And pain.

A week ago, Jeffrey Bowers pleaded “not guilty” to charges of striking his girlfriend. The 53-year-old man was arrested last month after he dragged his 51-year-old girlfriend through his residence, kicked her in the face, then pushed her out the door. In the middle of the night.

…Why?

Here’s what supposedly happened leading up to the alleged assault:

Bowers and his girlfriend went to bed in his Florida home. During the night, Bowers was awakened. Looking over, he noticed his lady with a “big dildo between her legs,” and he got rather pissed.

At this point, he told her [Are you read for this, galleons? This is my favorite part] to “cut that shit out and let him sleep.”

Wait… really? Your girlfriend is there, horny as shit, going to town on herself, and you don’t think, “Hey, I’m already awake, may as well have some fun?” You pick punching over pussy? Maybe it’s because I’m a lady in her mid-twenties and thus am possessed of the raging libido of youth, but I just feel like that was a poor decision on Bowers’ part.

Also, why did we have to specify it was a large dildo? Was this a key point of the argument? Did Bowers feel inadequate when compared to the silicone monstrosity nestled between his girlfriend’s thighs? Or was it just that big?  I feel like he would have been aware of such a monster fuckstick being hauled into his apartment. Mostly because it would require a team of horses and a steam-powered engine to transport.

The case will be settled in late December, but no matter how it turns out, I think we’ve all learned a valuable lesson here:

Take your twat rod to the bathroom if you want some midnight lovin’.

A Helpful Tip

Dear MSU sidewalk chalkers: if you want to complement random passers-by, at least use the proper form of you’re.

…And when being a pretentious defender of grammar, you should really use the proper form of compliment.

I’m just saying.

Blonde Moment

…Posting this is actually pretty embarrassing, dear galleons. However, seeing as I tend to share my idiocy with others on a regular basis, I figure I might as well share this gem.

I actually think my constant self-deprecation is a function of my extreme narcissism. Because I even find my stupidity awesome.

Yesterday, Karla 3.0 died a spectacular death, if having what amounts to an epileptic seizure and then just giving the fuck up can be considered spectacular. After leaving the bar last night and climbing into my car, I plugged her in and tried to turn her on. She started quickly and violently flashing between a black screen and the regular start-up Apple screen. She would do nothing else.

Upon returning home, I plugged her in, hoping that would stop her from being a massive cunt. I noticed that Ghiert wasn’t registering Karla’s presence, but I had company all night and couldn’t spend the time cussing at my technology and trying to fix her.

In the end, there was nothing I could do for Karla, anyway. She had been giving me signs for weeks heralding her coming demise. I had just been hoping I’d have more time.

So, I find myself sans iPod. Which is a fucking travesty, to be sure.

And now we get to the moment of sheer, fuck-all amentia.

I wake up yesterday, still in mourning, sadly contemplating the coming silent drives to work and class. After a few seconds, I realize that I could burn a CD, seeing as (for once) I have blank CDs in my possession.

Thank god for my bizarre habit of making mix CDs, I think to myself. Wandering into the bedroom, I grab the stack…

Only to remember that my car is too old to have a CD player. And I don’t own a Discman or the adapter for the Borgia’s cassette player, so my CD plan was out.

Groaning, I trudge back to my couch to watch Doctor Who. I am dreading the drives in silence.

What am I going to do?

I am going to die, that’s what.

I start to get really emo.

There may have been tears.

I’m an amorphous blob of sadness, squelching my way to the bathroom and back.

Even the Doctor’s latest adventure is failing to cheer me up.

I become aware of how pathetic I am.

I don’t care.

I need my music.

…

…

And then it finally hits me:

My car has a fucking radio.

O RLY?

You don’t get more blonde than that.

Like a Hole in the Head

Some lonely night we can get together
And I’m gonna tie your wrists with leather
And drill a tiny hole into your head ~Andrew Bird

Trepanning is one of the oldest forms of surgery and, frankly, one of the more bizarre. It’s essentially the boring of a hole into a person’s skull. The hows and whys differ depending on time and culture, but the fact remains that people have been drilling holes into their skulls for thousands and thousands of years.

The practice has assaulted me from three different directions this week. The first was in Andrew Bird’s Fake Palindromes, quoted above (and, incidentally, one of my very favorite songs), which was stuck in my head for a few days. The second was in The Subtle Knife (I have been re-reading the series for the hell of it), where trepanned skulls make an appearance in an Oxford museum, where Lyra comments on the amount of Dust concentrated around these strange skulls. The third was in the television series Dead Like Me, which I’ve been watching lately. One of the reapers in the program, Mason, died after drilling a hole in his head in the 60s.

…As an aside, he’s also gorgeous:

I've got a thing for lanky Brits, I guess.

And so, with The Drain spending this last week circling around trepanning, I decided we may as well discuss it here.

As always, my galleons, you are so lucky.

***

The word trepanning comes from the Greek trupanon, meaning “borer.” Which is an apt name, considering trepanning is simply the cutting, drilling, or scraping of a hole into the skull. The process first surfaced in the Neolithic Age, almost 12,000 years ago. The practice was widespread, with trepanned skulls found in Europe, South America, and parts of Africa. In a group of 120 skulls found in France dating from around 6500 B.C., 40 of them were trepanned. While most trepanned skulls belonged to males, there have been examples of women and children who also underwent the procedure.

Considering the dangers of the procedure (accidental lobotomies, meningitis, death), the most amazing thing about these skulls is the evidence that many of those who underwent the procedure actually survived. Many of these skulls show that the skull began to heal and form new bone, meaning the patient survived. In fact, many came back for additional holes.

But why?

Of course, we have no records of exactly why these prehistoric people decided to go about drilling holes into their skulls. Prevailing theories are that the holes were to release evil spirits, cure headaches, or even cure brain diseases and insanity.

Whatever the reason, the practice continued through the ages. In Ancient Rome and Egypt, the bone bits gathered from trephination were used to make potions to cure several diseases. The skull discs (rondelles) were gathered in many cultures to use as amulets and charms. Hell, Hippocrates himself wrote detailed instructions on how to perform trepanning for medical reasons. Each session took 30-60 minutes (with no anesthetic), and scientists believe roughly 70% survived.

Trepanning didn’t fall out of favor until well into the 18th century. In fact, Prince Phillip of Orange was actually trepanned a whopping 17 times by his physician. However, with the onset of the Christian era, trepanning all but disappeared.

***

While some African cultures still practice trephination the old-fashioned way, we only use it for a few instances in modern medicine. Trepanning (called a craniotomy if the bit of skull is replaced and a craniectomy if it is removed) is used to treat epidural and subdermal hemotomas. These types of brain injuries are serious and involve heavy bleeding within the cranial cavity, leading to an increase in intercranial pressure. Trepanning helps relieve that pressure and to help monitor it.

***

That’s basically the extent of trephination’s actual, medical usefulness, but that doesn’t stop people from thinking drilling a hole in their head will do all manner of exciting things to them.

Fucking pseudoscience bullshit.

Much as I usually loathe these sorts of people, however, I find myself more amused by some of them than others. Particularly the ones who believe the addition of a hole in the skull will lead them to the ultimate high.

I shit you not, dear galleons. Forget drugs- give me a drill, and I’ll show you enlightenment.

Bart Huges was the leader of modern trephination folk theory (and a huge druggie- he even named his daughter Maria Juana). A Dutch research librarian and medical school drop-out (apparently, he wanted to be a psychiatrist but failed the obstetrics exam), he created this concept called brainbloodvolume (…yes, it’s supposed to be all one word like that) which trephination impacts.

Okay, so what the balls is this “brainbloodvolume” nonsense? Huges’ first flickers of insight came when he was told he could get high by standing on his head. Using this (and a bit of mescaline), he eventually surmised that, by permanently relieving the pressure in his head, he could increase brain blood flow (or brainbloodvolume) and gain a permanent, natural high. According to Huges, when we’re babies with soft, squishy headparts, our brains are allowed plenty of room to breathe and grow. But, as we get older, we get all locked up in our bony prisons. With trepanning, we can get back some of that freedom. Return to a freer, child-like state of consciousness.

And so, using an electric drill, a scalpel, and a needle to administer a local anesthetic, Huges took 45 minutes and drilled a hole in his head. And how did he feel after? ” I feel as I felt before the age of fourteen,” he said.

Huges’ ideas have developed a small following, and the most prominent members would be Joey Messen and Amanda Feilding, Countess of Wemyss. Feilding spent four years, without success, trying to find a doctor who would perform trephination on her. Finally, she decided to do it herself. With a dental drill. Messen filmed the procedure. Following this, Feilding twice ran for Parliament on a pro-trephination platform (she wanted the procedure to be offered free by the National Health Service).

Mellen also wanted to undergo trephination, and was equally unlucky in finding a surgeon to perform the procedure. So, he and Feilding tried it on him. Twice. Unsuccessfully. In fact, they were so unsuccessful that the second attempt landed him in the hospital, where doctors severely reprimanded him and sent him in for psychiatric evaluation.

Of course, the moment he got home, he decided to try again. In his book, Bore Hole, written about his attempts at trephination, he describes that third try:

After some time there was an ominous sounding schlurp and the sound of bubbling. I drew the trepan out and the gurgling continued. It sounded like air bubbles running under the skull as they were pressed out. I looked at the trepan and there was a bit of bone in it. At last!

…The things people will do to get high.