Sad, Sad Stories

We've been working on a new game, and thought we'd bring you in on the process a bit.   Let you know that we're working on stuff, polishing ideas, and generally doing what you think we're doing (probably). 

The game is tentatively called Sad, Sad Stories, as it's based on our uncle. 

His idea, rather.  At our other uncle's birthday party, the first uncle started leafing through magazines, finding happy pictures, then telling us about the sad, sad story we didn't know about.  The two children walking across a lawn with a pail and shovel who had just buried their parents and could never, NEVER tell anyone.  The mother who cut off her daughter's legs then made her wear a long dress and sit on the couch so the mother could wear her daughter's legs and be taller, because that's how the world works these days.  Tall people are better. 

That sort of sad, sad story. 

Our family has some issues, because this was the best party ever.  Also, we couldn't see any reason why we wouldn't turn our issues into a game. 

That's why they're issues. 

Fortunately for you, you just get the game!  And it's good times, looking at pictures and crafting sad, sad stories.  We're toying with a couple of categories and game types, but thought we'd be able to give a few examples of sad, sad stories that might be told during a game.  Also, feel free to add your own sad, sad stories based off of these pictures--or add your own picture and tell a sad, sad story about it!  There's a wonderful little site at http://www.public-domain-image.com/ that has scads of pics you can use in absolutely any way you see fit without any guilt whatsoever about using them.  That's what we're scrounging through to make the game, and believe us--some of those pictures are already sad, sad enough without us making up some stories about them.  But sometimes, you just have to let your issues guide you and tell a story about patricide.  And fetishes. 

Now, to play along, simply look at the image for a good 15 seconds and start realizing what could be off about it.  Then, add your Sad, Sad Stories to the comments of this post (or just read a couple examples I made up for each image). 

Enjoy!

(for commenting, we'll call this one Girl with Net)

Pokemon aren't real. 

She's looking for her REAL mother. 

Her aunt sold the dog, but they have to go out and LOOK for it every day.  During her aunt's stories, too!

She's wearing those glasses.  And a strap-on. 

(Skull Girl)

She found that in her basement. 

All those boys aren't looking at the skull; they're looking at her future. 

Malfoy over there is REALLY lost. 

In this society, only the women need to wear name tags.  Because only women find fucking SKULLS LIKE THAT. 

(Happy Boy Finds Joy)

His older brother told him his father is over there, running away.  And he's too young to realize why. 

Brown shoes.  Black shorts.  TIE-DYE?  This kid's screwed. 

Oz has had some cutbacks.  Not in pedophiles, though. 

That kid is imitating that tree, and I'm too dead inside to appreciate his naivety. 

Shoot him in the head! That should weaken him!

Season 3 of the Walking Dead premiered this Sunday, and I recently caught up on Season 2 (and then re-watched seasons 1 & 2, because how could you not?), and I've been thinking about why killing zombies feels so important.  

I wasn't a zombie guy before the Walking Dead (with the exception of Shaun of the Dead, of course), so I'd never thought much about why zombies are great.  They're people-eating people.  Stupid cannibals.  Things even most fat people can outrun (as evidenced by the general lack of fat zombies).  

Until now, I'd gone with Chuck Klosterman's argument, which he outlines on the other side of this link http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/arts/television/05zombies.html?pagewanted=all , but for those of you not wanting to read an entire article because of the article you're reading, I'll sum it up: killing zombies is the same as our day-to-day tasks.  We feel overwhelmed by emails, tweets, things we must like, and simple but never-ending tasks from all sides.  Killing zombies is the same--destroy the brain, then the next brain, and on and on with the cranial smiting.  You'll never reply to all your emails, the same as you'll never kill all the zombies.  

Which makes sense.  We're combining the tension between feeling in control (knowing how to solve the problem) and being overwhelmed, plus tossing some violence into the mix.  Of course we love it--that's America right there.  

Maybe it's just because of how I've been feeling lately (misanthropic, we'll call it), but I started thinking about how destroying the brain kills the zombie.  Even decapitation doesn't work--if the brain still ticks, the zombie's not dead.  If it's not dead, that mouth will still bite, that brain in there's still hungry.  It still wants to consume.  It's still a threat.  

Do we fear that single-mindedness?  

Nope, saying something only wants to eat isn't a fat joke (for once).  I'm thinking about consuming in a broader sense.  

What about our media?  

Are we afraid of becoming like the masses of people who consume shitty content all of the time, who have terrible taste and just keep consuming more and more of it?  

And it might go even further--zombies represent all of the people we don't want to be.  Not just people who like [Insert shitty thing here]--all of the unthinking people, the masses that move our culture, the people who make awful decisions and have stupid opinions and are just plain dumb heads.  

(This works on either side of any issue, of course, since we believe any situation has only two sides in America)

Which obviously makes this apply to politics, too--a lot of yelling from both sides, mindless yammering about the same shit without anyone meeting in the middle and actually talking things through.  

If we could talk to zombies, we could show them that all this eating of the living is really pointless--there's a limited supply of tasty man flesh left, and if they keep eating us, it's all going to disappear. What's left for them?  They don't even enjoy it that much--a remotely shiny thing will distract them from a meal, so they can't be eating with that much relish.  If we could talk to them, they'd see that their viewpoint hasn't been meticulously considered, that there are shades of grey, that we might achieve some level of mutual benefit if we stopped killing and just talked, mano e dead mano.  

Ultimately, we're afraid of conversion.  We're afraid we'll be infected by their thinking and become one of them.  Some unthinking corpse that doesn't care what it consumes, so long as it moves.  It's a plague driving us to become the lowest common denominator.  

But if we just pop them in the head, no worries.  Keep them at a distance and destroy that brain, and there'll be no problems.  

Or the gore's just fuckin' cool, man.  

Putting the "meta" in "Betaphors".

Betaphors are like modern art which is like Portal.  

Transcendent!  The world has never experienced something that so makes it question itself/genre/boundaries before.  Everything is torn wide open.  Literally--space-time continuum, unzipped.  

The use of color, and shape, and GUNS.  

And you can open a blue portal next to you, and an orange portal on the opposite wall.  

You can see yourself.  

You're looking at yourself.  

Over and over and over again infinitely.  Everything you're doing, you're now acutely aware of it. Times eternity.  

And you can shoot a blue portal on the ceiling and an orange one on the floor and fall forever.  





Betaphors are like the cake is a lie.  

You wouldn't keep reading without tasty morsels of mind-blowing WISDOM dropped throughout to keep you smacking your lips.  

Which means that the cake is here, though.  And also not lies.  Plus you're eating in the same way that I'm using you by having you read all of these morsels.  

Which serves me by... it's like an enormous experiment in the human capacity to learn--


What?  


Of course they're metaphors!  Metaphors + Beta = Betaphors.  


What's a simile, like some sort of half-assed metaphor?  


It's exactly like that?  


Like like?  Like what?  What are you doing to me?  


A simile is like a metaphor... but a metaphor is a simile?  


Like hell I don't understand what you're saying!  The cake is a lie is a metaphor AND a betaphor now, thanks to me, yes.  



Yes, this WILL get many likes on facebook!  

Diablo II is like long-term relationships.

You show up, and you're a savior.  You will lead the world out of darkness.  You are everything a man could be.  

You will kill Hell itself.  

You go forth.  You try new things together, you complete tasks, you're learning about the world and yourself and what you're good at.  Because you are good at things!  You'd forgotten how much change you could make in the world, and how much the world wants you to change it!  

You kill the demon bitch Andariel (which is every woman who is not your girlfriend whose tits you want to see (and which drive you to murder with their taunting).


Yes hon, it is a totally normal response to demons!  And female sexuality!  


Now that you're done with the tit vanquishing, you've beaten the first Act!  You've recaptured the Rogues' Citadel for them, and you're onto Act Two, which is in a desert.  

It's pretty much the same as Act One--going forth, completing tasks, impressing people--just in a different place.  Although you notice some of the same monsters here.  They're just blue now.  It's still fun--you're learning, spending quality time making the world as great as the love inside your souls.  

Act 3 is some shit, though.  Winding paths, endless, meaningless, heart of darkness jungles.  You're fighting fucking demon frogs and devil trees and midgets and Catholics, and after years of cutting through brush together, you're starting to wonder how great this really is.  

And then you get to Mephisto.  Diablo's brother, one of the Prime Evils, Lord of... Lord of... the dark... side...


He's what?  The Lord of Hatred?  


Why are you listening to my hate rants so dispassionately?  What changed between us?  When did we get like this?  


Anyway.  

You get to Mephisto, and he looks how you feel about love.  

You beat down those emotional skulls, then trap him in a Soulstone, because repression is easier.  

And then you're in Hell.  Which, weirdly, is shorter than all the areas before it.  But it's still the same.  There's just nicer stuff everywhere.  You're always wearing nicer things, surrounded by nicer things, you're pals with an angel, it's all very nice.  

But Hell.  

You venture into the River of Flame and find the Hellforge, then whip out Mephisto's Soulstone.  When you smash the Soulstone, you're rewarded with more beautiful jewels than you've ever seen in your life.  Amethysts, flawless sapphires, perfect diamonds.  

The demon who looks like how you feel about love you trap inside a rock.  Then when you crush those feelings, you're rewarded with gems.  

It's beautiful at first.  

All I'm saying is you used to be beautiful.  



Point being, you venture into the Chaos Sanctuary to face off with Diablo, and you totally wreck him because he's the Lord of Terror, but you've already smashed all your feelings so fear can go suck itself off as you beat it mercilessly into the pulp of demon seed you've always thought you were and which you now just channel into your relationship or take out on video games, because they're fucking cool.  

And that's all it takes to beat the game!  Eponymous demon sundered!  Complete!  Nothing more to worry about!  

And then the nightmares begin.  

Well, just Nightmare mode.  Same game again.  Bluer monsters.  Even nicer things.  

All over again.  

New experiences are few and far between.  

You trap your feelings again.  

You smash them into jewels.  

Not so shiny anymore.  

And then Hell difficulty.  

Everything again.  

Again.  

Again.  

The only difference between long-term relationships and Diablo II is that when you battle Diablo, he growls, "Even death can't save you from me".  Thank God that's still an option.  

This is about video games.

So I went into the bathroom to take a leak during break.  I noticed the handicapped stall door was closed, so assumed someone was in there.  I approached the urinal, unzipped, and heard a weird noise. 

Not from my pants.  From the stall. 

A weird mechanical sort of creaking.  Hopefully not human. 

It was distracting.  But I gave peeing another go, and then heard it again.  Louder. 

I was determined to leak this time, so I'm about to go--and the sound happens twice, in combination with a shuffling of clothes around ankles.  As I decide that first sound was just the toilet seat straining under pressure, I hear the following from the stall:

1.  Shuffling

2.  Footsteps

3.  Panic

4.  "Oh shhhhhh-"

5.  Slams on the stall door

6.  Absolutely nothing else

Something something video games improving hand-eye coordination.