I’ve been pretty busy lately what with taking on a bunch of extra shifts, but so far I have tomorrow off barring being called in. I can’t say that working a lot has kept me from posting, though. On the contrary, I’ve had a bunch of fascinating and funny experiences that would make for amusing posts, but by the time I get home I’m just happy to sit on my butt and pop in the next DVD of the X-Files. One funny thing that I thought I’d point out before babbling about computer games is that I found a note in a returned copy of The Great Gatsby that said basically that the insipid nature of the book was enough to dull a person into idiocy. I thought it was funny. 🙂

So about computer games. I don’t remember what sparked the renewed interest, but I pulled out all my old Infocom games and started playing them again. Come to think of it, I guess what got me thinking about the old games was that I was copying all my old 3.5 floppy discs to the computer. I don’t have all my Infocom games on old floppies (many of my discs have gone missing), but it was enough that I felt like playing a few again. I found a program that lets me play the games without the ton of glitches that occur when run on modern “DOS” fakes. Ah, good old games. I remember when I first got the gray boxes and began flipping through their hilarious manuals, looked at the fascinating toys and extras, and then loading up the games, typing everything I could think of to try and get my character to solve puzzles before finally denigrating into typing ridiculous commands like “pee your pants” (to which the game often replied “Grow up”). It’s amazing how old text-based games are so great when there are high-cost, high-end, very graphic-intensive games nowadays that just suck ass. Don’t get me wrong, there are video games that are fun and everything, but their presence doesn’t mean that text-based games can’t also be awesome. I suppose that people who can’t get into Infocom games simply aren’t word-oriented and are more visually-based, needing graphics to understand what’s going on or to get into the game. I bet a lot of those same people are the ones who would rather watch the movie than read the book. Me? Gimme text, I’ll provide the images.

That being said, I think I’m going to try and finish Wishbringer again. I’m getting so close to beating it; I can feel it. I just have to figure out how to carry the cat back to the magic shop before midnight without getting caught by the boot patrol again. I don’t think that I’ll get saved by seahorses again…unless all of the boot patrol got eaten by those sharks. Are the games random as hell? Oh yeah. That’s part of why I like them. I’ll take platypus princesses and cavorting mailboxes, especially if it’s told with a dry wit and tongue-in-cheek sarcasm. And the great thing? I have tomorrow off so I can spend the whole day playing Infocom games! I’m looking forward to the silliness. For now though, it’s: push submit button, put computer on desk, stand, north, climb into bed, sleep. 😉