Saturday, April 09, 2005

Doom 3 and The Ten Commandments

I've been playing Doom III. I'm probably a little older than id's target demographic, but hey - blowing the living shit out of stuff has always been a favorite past time. I've got to give credit to the boys and girls at id - the game scares the crap out of me. Seriously - I can't play it for more than 30 minutes at a time. After that, the intensity of fast little spiders running at me and making my guy go 'uhh' wears me out. I'll turn around and something will be there -aaaggh.

By design, one would not think a video game should cause fear. Still, the damn thing freaks me out. My goal is not getting to the end - my goal is surviving the 30 minute game playing experience without losing control of a bodily function. Corporate meetings, power negotiations, employee terminations - these are nothing. The guy you're going to fire is usually sitting still, in your field of view, and moving relatively slowly. I'm prepared for someone to jump out from a file cabinet and start throwing fireballs at my ass. In retrospect, Doom III is better preparing me for life.

The other night, I was watching "The Ten Commandments" on television. Now, before we go any further, a message to all those who are going to start inferring a lack of faith: I'm a faithful, believing Christian, not in need of saving. That said, there was a aspect of the movie that got me to thinking. After wandering in the wilderness for 40 years, don't you think they would have walked past the same point more than once? Wouldn't one of them said "Hey, this looks familiar - I think we've been here before." If you started walking for 40 years, I'm betting you could cover some pretty good distance. Given the fact that the wanderers didn't wind up on the other side of the globe, one would wonder if the same piece of ground was trod upon more than once.

Happens to me in Doom III all the time. I'm walking along, see a steam pipe and a red glow and think, "Hmmm, this looks familiar." Then a flaming skull zooms out of the sky and pummels me into a quivering blob of goo.

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