Bitterness is a symptom of Awesomeness

Well I’m glad to hear Señor Conquistador got a PS3. He's having fun playing… well, NOTHING yet! Ha! (Deep down inside I’m really just jealous.) Now I have to drive 5 hours to Nowheresville (population: S.C. and Jane) just to play Rock Band when it comes out. Or max out another credit card and get the $800+ (still not sure if it includes 1 or 2 guitars) behemoth of video game rocktatude myself. I need a new job.

Honestly, I’d say between work, school, updating the 5th Stage and the plethora of amazing looking games on the way, I’m not going to have any time for life’s simple pleasures, like bathing or changing clothes. I hope these camo shorts hold up. I guess it’s a good thing I had training for this that summer that I lived in a basement and played PSOne, NES and Sega Master System games for 3 straight months. Thank the gods for food delivery people, or we probably would have starved. And of course, we had a few outdoor barbeques, but we just brought the TVs and consoles outside for those, too. Oh, the good ol’ days.

These days, though, I am forced into virtual slavery; can you believe I am expected to pay for my OWN video games and food? I mean, seriously, what kind of communist society are we living in? How am I supposed to play all these 80+ hour RPGs, and still have time for action, adventure, first person shooter, puzzle and rock god simulators with this kind of schedule? I thought this was America! The land of laziness! What went wrong?

I’ll say one thing, all the censorship isn’t helping my plight. I can’t believe they are trying to stop the release of Manhunt 2. What, a little shanking isn’t acceptable in our society? Hey, just because it gives us an opportunity to practice suffocating psych ward inmates (and I REALLY want to try that on the Wii) people get all squeamish. It’s just practice for where today’s youth is going anyways, according to the same people who want to stop it from coming out. Might as well let them learn early, I say. But I guess it’s healthier to tell them stories about a group of brothers chasing their own kin into the desert to steal the coat their father gave him, and then sell him into slavery. Or two sisters getting their elderly father drunk and “preserving the family line.” You know, feel-good family stories.

It seems like parents just don’t want to raise their kids these days; they are so busy telling the media what offends them, they just don’t have time to TALK to their kids, and teach them right from wrong. No, it’s EVERYONE ELSE’S fault, of course. This bugs the hell out of me. My parents set guidelines and taught me to differentiate fantasy from reality. I watched every violent movie, played every shoot-‘em-up game when I was a kid, and I came out (relatively) fine. At the very least, I’ve never gone on a GTA-style rampage like those self-righteous parents said I would from playing those games. You see, I was able to tell that it was JUST A GAME.

Hell, I even listen to heavy metal. By these people’s logic, I should have horns growing from my cranium and a pointy tail. Yet I have still been able to maintain a semblance of normalcy. Whenever some loony goes and cracks, usually after years of isolation and torment, they start to play the blame game. Never mind that a lot of us play games and listen to this music as a release and to feel connected to something. It’s not like people didn’t go out and do sick crap before Terminator and Devil May Cry. The Bible has more brutal stories than any modern story (see above) but it’s always the entertainment that gets the blame. Funny, huh?

So in closing, just make your own decisions about what’s right and what’s wrong. 99.9% of us are never going to emulate the violence we see in games and movies, or hear in metal. Yeah, it’s unfortunate that a few dicks have to make the rest of us look bad, but that's how it always happens. More people have died over religion than any other thing in history, but we don’t try to ban churches. Some people are truly disturbed, and unfortunately a number of them are bound to snap someday. This is the way it’s always been, and it’s probably always going to be this way. But we can’t let it interrupt our lives anymore than it has too, because that’s when the terrorists win. Just try to set a good example for everyone else, and I’ll try not to get too preachy. Deal?

Bang your head, and shake your Wii-Mote.

Just give me a simple life--my tastes are not demanding, And whatever life may hand me I'll accept it with good grace; For I'm just a simple lad with few ideas about my station, So ale and song will apt suffice to keep me in my place.
-Skyclad