Charlie Brooker: “Why I love Video Games”

For those who don’t read the papers (Shame on you), you’re often missing out on little articles which actually praise videogames instead of condemning them to video nasty hell. Yes they’re a rare occurrence, but when they appear they’re surprisingly lovely to read.

A few weeks back, I read an article by a Mr. Brooker about why he loves videogames. I chortled, wooped, wept in pride and… well forgot about it pretty quickly but I found it again on the Guardians technology section today so I thought you’d all be interested. It’s a rather riveting read and one that everyone should print out and stick to their parents / partners / dogs foreheads.

Click me to read!

Videogame Cliché's - No 104: The Toilet Lurker

It's a cliché that we all know and love, whether it's the Ganados that's misusing his privileges by hiding in chief Mendez's toilet in Resident Evil 4, the countless Russians doing the deed in Goldeneye or the more than lovable Johnny the IBS sufferer in Metal Gear Solid. It's funny, it's disgusting and yet at the same time, it's something that we've all come to expect from games. If we see a toilet, we get ready to fight.

However, it seems as though the golden age of toilet humour may finally be at an end. Having recently explored most of Fallout, I have discovered a truly terrifying truth. All of the toilet cubicles, are empty. Not even a radroach in sight. It doesn't just end at Fallout either, even titles which have a slight sense humour behind them in general such as Saints Row and Crackdown show a complete absence of defecation related lulz. Some games, such as Metal Gear Solid 4, have even tried to revolutionise this concept by showing the original toilet hider himself, Johnny, shitting himself straight into his trousers in a public place. What has this world come too?

The point of this rather vulgar contribution? I want to see a return of this cliché, which i regard as highly as the red barrels and health packs.

Top 5 Worst Videogame Quotes

So after a recent discussion it's been decided that from now on, pretty much once every week unless something seriously important comes up like Valve releasing the next Half Life game in a  toaster, I'll be making a short but simple top 5 list covering various topics and of course, reeking of personal opinion, and what a better topic to start on than God awful dialogue from our favourite games!

Of course, these go from worst to best ;)

1) "SHINE GET!" - Mario Sunshine (Gamecube)

Ok, so a lot of people won't agree with this but this has always been a pet peeve of mine. For a game that had been in development for so long, surely Nintendo could have translated such an important piece of dialogue a little... more professionally? 

2) "I might need you to play Twing Twang" - Heavenly Sword (PS3)

Not only was this line so utterly ridiculous but combined with the horrendously serious cutscene it appeared in, I'm not surprised if about half the owners of this game just turned it off by the plug. Twing Twang? This is a game about a freaking female version of Kratos, why the hell would she want to play a game called Twing Twang? I think one of the worst things about this was also because Sony deemed this one of the best games on the console... Pfffft

3) "Do you believe that love can bloom, even on the battlefield?" - Metal Gear Solid (Playstation One)

Now, don't get me wrong. I adore Metal Gear Solid, but my GOD does it have some of the worst cases of dialogue ever seen in video games. 90% of the time, the games so pretentious and stuck up it's own arse it's inside out. This quote, which actually makes me physically cringe everytime I hear it, is one of the worst. 

4) "I see the president has armed his daughter with... Ballistics now" - Resident Evil 4 (Gamecube)

Christ,  does this one even need an explanation? It's so out of the blue and just so random that it never ceases to make me laugh. God bless Capcom, believing that they can sneak in a cheeky chebs joke without breaking the flow of the story. Unfortunately however, they believed wrong.

   

5) "You were almost a Jill sandwich!" - Resident Evil (Playstation 1)

There are a plethora of quotes from this classic title that I could have used, but "Jill sandwich" is certainly the most humorous. A close second would of course the epicness of "Master of Unlocking" and that line about Chris's blood. I don't know what Capcom were thinking when they wrote this, or for that matter when they hired the voice actors, or when they released it! Still, it adds to the fact that this is still a pure joy to play.