the 941

This roundup’s been idling in the blog machine for days, and we still can’t fix the formatting, so here goes the [Stop] route. Our apologies. [Stop]

A day to defeat the video game, a lifetime to live down the shame. [Stop] Big ups to web traffic! [Stop] Jessica Simpson to stump for beer. A light beer. Substance-less, in fact. Yep, that sounds about right. [Stop] Winehouse back to rehab-Blake redux. Again. Once more. [Stop] Dave Matthews’ sax player LeRoi Moore, dead at 46. RIP. [Stop] Hasbro’s Clue circa ‘08: The butler did it, in the bathroom at Koi, with the knife seen in those scandalous pics with Lindsay Lohan. And don’t forget the super powers. [Stop] Not content to live la vida loca with one bambino, Ricky Martin does dos at once. [Stop] Forbes reveals the hip hoppers living largest. (Guess which money-monikered rapper?) [Stop] The New York Post has no love for our Cous Cous. That’s okay, we have plenty. [Stop] Bleep, meet the new bleeping bleep. Really bleeping funny, you bleeper. 

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My roommates – good people who also happen to be doped-up World of Warcraft fanatics – approached me last night with what they apparently considered to be a brilliant plan. They were taking a break from a WoW marathon, and a rolled up bill was on the coffee table beside the dregs of Oxycontin powder.

They had happened upon the forum, they told me, of an online game called Warhammer. (Warhammer, like WoW, is a massive multiplayer online role-playing game. It looks pretty awesome. I don’t play such games because I wouldn’t get anything else done.) They looked into the profile of one of those forum users and found that it was full of drawings, each of which depicted a different “furry.” Furries are anthropomorphic animals that supposedly have some erotic value somehow. People dress up in furry costumes and go to fetish parties or something.

Each of this user’s drawings, otherwise a normal-looking manimal, had an oversized phallus growing out of its fur. They messaged this user about the drawings, they said, and he told them that each furry is an avatar, or alter-ego, that he uses in a different online forum or game. Then they told me their plan:

“We’re going to send him a message offering like twenty bucks to create a character for us. We’re going to ask him to make a drawing that’s half manatee, half mandingo – ’” uproarious laughter – “and it’ll have, like, big Anime eyes.”

“Then what are you going to do with it?” I asked.

“Well, we’ll have this drawing of a furry manatee that we got this guy to make, with a giant dong. I think it’s a pretty good practical joke.”

“But he won’t face any humiliation. And you’ll be the ones who lost money. It doesn’t fit the accepted idea of a practical joke.”

“No,” said the roommate who hadn’t spoken yet. “I guess not. I guess the joke’s on us.”

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If there’s anything that pouting girlfriends, hollering family members and freaked-out strangers have taught me, it’s that Scrabble is a divisive force. Let’s just look at what happened in the little Internet city that Amanda Schurr likes to call the Book of Face.

First, Hasbro sued Rajat Agarwalla and Jayant Agarwalla, the makers of a Facebook application called Scrabulous, and the game was disabled. Then Hasbro put up its own Facebook application, since it had licensed online Scrabble to Electronic Arts.

However, Facebook Scrabble is unplayable. It was victim to a malicious attack! We don’t know for sure whether the attackers were Scrabulous fans, but I think it’s pretty obvious. Anyone who’s ever been challenged and lost, but only because the dictionary was stupid, knows that that game makes you mean.

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Even Extreme Makeover recipients aren’t immune to the foreclosure crisis…

The earth moved in a sizable, seismic way. Here’s hoping our west coast friends are okay.

Winehouse in the hospital. Winehouse out of the hospital. Rinse, and repeat.

Hallmark and Fox team up for, um, blockbuster greeting cards with no substance and shark-jumping special effects.

“Two tickets to the gun show?” Or just this instead?

Speaking of which, “Hey Laaaaadies!” Jerry busted for packin’ heat.

Starbucks — More cuts in coffee town. Those without jobs? Likely as bitter as the brew itself.

If only Starbucks had implemented their “appreciation beanbag toss.” ‘Cause, you know, it’s all about “appreciation.” And, tossing tossers.

(more…)

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I don’t object to violence in video games. It’s fun and cathartic. The human destruction drive is not going to go away any time soon, and maybe digitized bazookas are a good way to exorcise it.

But why, so often, is the character you control in a video game a U.S. soldier, or a supersoldier, or a mecha-destroyer module for the American federation? I’m talking about games like Call of Duty, Splinter Cell, Halo and Crysis. That’s not to mention America’s Army and Future Force Commander — addictive, realistic first-person shooters developed as recruitment tools for the armed forces. The Pentagon spent millions on these games, and it distributes them for free on the Army’s Web site.

Command and Conquer at least allows you to direct the communist army if you so choose, but otherwise, I mean, why do the video game companies kowtow to the military-industrial complex? It seems to me that gaming ought to be an individualized, subversive experience because it empowers the player beyond his marginalization by the ruling class.

Where are the video games about rebellion, anarchy and revolution? A nod to Half-Life, but how about a game where you subvert the CIA instead of some aliens?

Check out this interview with Nina Huntemann, who wrote Game Over: Gender, Race & Violence in Video Games. She compares militaristic video games to the propaganda film Why We Fight, which was commissioned by the U.S. government before WWII in efforts to sway public opinion. Excerpts after the jump. (more…)

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You know the economy’s in dire straits when the porn biz is a hurtin’.

Catfight! Catfight!

This just in: More time suckage to be had — TiVo to stream YouTube videos.

Defamer’s headline department scores another audible laugh.

A couple of weeks ago, my Morning After column bitched to this effect. Thank you, Gawker.

If you’ll excuse us, we couldn’t finish reading this before getting through our ice cold PBR.

Clueless, Mean Girls and Pretty In Pink to get the videogame treatment. Sha! As if!

(more…)

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Last week I laid some groundwork for this year’s World Series of Poker Main Event, how Harrah’s planned to halt play once they got down to the final table of nine people until November in order to jack up mainstream media interest and let ESPN’s not-so-live TV coverage catch up. Let the media frenzy begin.

The WSOP Main Event started July 3, with 6,844 people ponying up the $10,000 to participate, resulting in a prize pool of $64,333,600. Anyone who managed to beat out more than ten percent of the field managed to take home some dough, starting at $21,230 at 666th place. At 3:30 a.m. this morning, Michigan pro Dean Hamrick was in the uncomfortable position of being knocked out at 10th place, resulting in a booby prize of almost $600k.

The final nine received a payout of $900k — the minimum they will be winning once play resumes — and a 117 day vacation that they’ll likely spend negotiating endorsement deals, studying opponents and training, training, training. $900k is a lot, but 1st place will take home over $9 million, along with an easy, almost-guaranteed lifetime income as a sponsored pro. There are a few amateurs, a few pros, a mix of ages, and five different countries represented among the surviving few. All men, though, as the final female player was eliminated in 17th place.

Locally, our own former CL columnist (and current traitor) Jaden Hair got a little windfall from the WSOP. Her husband Scott (that’s him looking stern in the pic) — a good online poker player — managed to ride a short stack into the money for a cool $27k, finishing 466th when his pocket aces got two-outed by pocket queens. Bad beat, Scott. And Jaden, out of respect for you, I refrained from making a joke about “riding the short stack”.

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When we saw the headline, we thought the guy paid two million bucks to lunch with Jimmy Buffett. But this, this makes much more sense.

For those awaiting the forthcoming Tampa Ikea store…

We heart this article on catchphrases. It is what it is, you know?

Nelson Mandela’s 90th b-day concert drew pretty much, um, everyone. Even Ms. Winehouse.

Getting outta dodge for the Fourth of July? Be green while doing it.

Are you fueling your Corvette today in anticipation of tomorrow’s festivities? Yeppers, it seems the House has just discovered irony. Again.

The online sweatshop?

Today in creative euphemisms: “Among high-stakes professionals,” gambling is a “lifestyle and a passion.”

Obamapalooza continues.

Exile in “Why”-ville: Russia’s ex-pat biweekly is nyet more.

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Holy jeez, it’s fracking hot, hot, hot this Sunday afternoon. We’re hunkering down, trying to stay cool, and this article got us thinking… What films would we make into video games? At first thought, the nuanced neo-noirs of L.A. Confidential and The Usual Suspects sound like PS3 fodder.

What about you?

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Especially if you’ve driven through North Central Florida or the panhandle, you’ve seen these billboards:

A while ago me and a friend, writer and current Baton Rouge Advocate photographer Casey Anderson, decided to come up with a few of our own. Our goal was a submission to McSweeney’s lists, but our list never quite got there. We revive the project here. Our ideas blow? Submit some of your own in the comments to this post.

Jesus is coming. Do you have an extra toothbrush? - God

Pervert. - God

Global warming, huh? How about a flood? - God

Come with me. She doesn’t love you anyway. - God

They’re demons, demons. Kill them all. - God

Did you like the cancer I sent you? - God.

Fat porn? C’mon. - God

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