GMZ

GMZ #3 – Razor Blades, Plastic Surgery, and Philanthropy

The Tricks are in the Treats
By Edmund Ronald Shey

Oljners Leonard Denholm Mann, famed hermit and wooden sword enthusiast, was recently arrested on 5 counts of child endangerment after it was discovered that trick or treaters visiting his cave (as if that wasn’t enough of a tip to not visit him) were given bags of candy containing razor blades. The incident was first realized when a young boy opened his bag to reach in for candy, and pulled his hand out to notice there were a myriad of cuts on it. The boy, when questioned by our news team, responded only saying “I wanted to get some beans for my blob.” The boy did not receive any serious injury and was released by doctors only twenty minutes after arriving. The local police, upon being told by the boy where he acquired the candy, immediately responded and arrived at Mann’s house only minutes later. They arrested Mann, and concurrently, more and more reports of dangerous candy were being reported to the main office. While being handcuffed, Mann was reported to have repeatedly shouted “They needed something sharp! It was too dangerous to go alone!” 

Toxie’s Plastic Surgery Disaster
By Dick Culpa

The 98-pound weakling turned superhero who used his popularity to score lucrative endorsement deals had his first public appearance since announcing last year that he would get plastic surgery. Privately, friends have said that Toxie decided to get the surgeries with the goal of rejuvenating his movie career and is hoping to get serious, dramatic roles. Based on the results thus far, I think it’s say to say that no one who looks like Toxie did on Sunday will ever have a successful serious acting career unless someone makes a zombie drama in the near future.

From Pirate to Philanthropist
By Edward Teach

Ezechiel Pregzt, former pirate and current death row inmate at Louisiana State Penitentiary, has decided to reinvest all of his plundered funds into philanthropy and estate. The former booty buccaneer has said “I hope to turn my home, Derceto Mansion, into a foster and youth boys home, to allow disadvantaged young men to grow into able bodied members of society.” Pregzt’s fund holds approximately $17,000,000,000, all of which will be put into foster care and adoption services. Locals are calling it Ezechiel the “Robin Hood of the Modern Era.” Pregzt has also expressed interest in being buried on the Derceto estate, and was quoted saying “I just have a certain connection with the land there. It’s my eternal home.”

Freddy Krueger and Jason Vorhees Announce New Game
By Tom B. Stone

Even though Elm Street and Camp Crystal Lake are located in different states, they will become one in the retro-styled open-world next-gen game announced last week. “It’s gonna be awesome! I mean, you get to run around this vast world that includes both Jason and I’s usual stamping grounds and kill lots and lots of kids. What’s not to love?,” explained Mr. Krueger. The game will have pixelated graphics, but instead of going the Retro City Rampage route, it will adopt a style much more akin to Minecraft, while allowing players to play as Jason or Freddy. When asked if it was true that the game would boast all of the weapons people are used to seeing in the horror stars’ hands, as well as a plethora of weapons from other horror films and real-life, like curling irons (Sleepaway Camp) and pencils (The Faculty) or bazookas and flame-throwers, Mr. Vorhees grunted loudly while nodding politely. The two men also hinted at the possible addition of other horror franchise characters and locations being added to the game when released or via DLC. The game has a tentative release date of Fall 2015.

The Art of Gaming
With Theodore Ipecac Effete III

Undubitably, the ebony ruminant of the Castlevania saga is Simon’s Quest. Wasted on an uncouth youth unprepared and unequipped to appreciate its finer and more nuanced qualities, this lapidary entry into the annals of video gamedom begins in a hamlet full of edifices and personages that bespeak of an eldritch horror that surely effervesces theredown. It immediately sets a tone that permeates the player’s being, granted they be sensitive enough to capture sense and meaning in a way only reserved for those fortunate enough to have been caressed by the gentle hand of Sapiencia.

The game puts you in a confusing world, one where not everyone in it is going to help you. Worse still, many of the parts not openly trying to kill you seem to be trying to hinder your progress or at least confuse you with irrelevant information. Philistines surely felt this was unjust, yet they missed the point (not surprisngly). Simon’s Quest was the first game (barring perhaps The Adventure of Link) to recreate man in the state of nature, or perhaps  more accurately, reverting to a state resembling the state of nature. What Thomas Hobbes says in Leviathan is equally true in this game:

“In such condition there is no place for industry, because the fruit thereof is uncertain, and consequently, not culture of the earth, no navigation, nor the use of commodities that may be imported by sea, no commodious building, no instruments of moving and removing such things as require much force, no knowledge of the face of the earth, no account of time, no arts, no letters, no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear and danger of violent death, and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”

As such, Simon’s Quest is without question one of gaming’s great works of art. Fusing programming and political philosophy decades before Bioshock’s feeble attempts. The music is also sublime.