repsode

04:06 pm: "..."
I know that i'm late with all of this, but it's importance demands to be represented at this site.

umm.. Where do I begin?


Ok. Earlier this month, tragedy befell the online community at www.metalgearsolid.org, otherwise known as TUS for The Unofficial Site. On 2nd January, long-time and well respected contributor kuja105 created a thread where he announced that he was considering taking his own life. Micthell Lee Steukerjuergen, a 21 year old journalism major at Western Illinois University cited continuing personal and financial reasons as the cause. He even mentioned the method he was going to use, a combination of antifreeze and painkillers. Obviously shocked, other forum members tried to coax him out of it. After failing to post for a number of days, many frantically scrambled to find contact details. A few were able to phone him to disuade him. Site moderater Nitroid eventually persuaded him to dial 911, but it was too late and he died shortly afterwards in hospital. As a memorial the site opened a special page and thread dedicated to his memory. If only that was the end of the matter.

Oh yes, it gets worse, much worse.

The newswire organisation AFP reported the story on an entirely different slant. The journalist in question wrote that Micthell broadcast his death over webcam to his online friends and that those posters made fun of him and encouraged the act. The story lead a US government agency to demand that the site be shut down. The AFP supply Yahoo! and CNN and the stories on those site have yet to be removed or updated. It is unclear whether the story was enhanced purposefully or the result of botched journalism.

It still disgusts me.

But wait there's more!

When Dennis McCauley of Gamepolitics(very good site) posted the story on his site, the community rallied together in rememberence and condolence. Some questioned whether the unethical Florida Anti-game lawyer Jack Thompson would stoop so low as to use the incident to further his laughable career. Most deem him to not even be THIS heartless.

Jack proved them wrong. All I'll do here is list his responses on the GP comments pages. While all have been posted anonymously, they have all been verified as Thompson's IP address.

"Too late. Jack Thompson"


"If it hits "close to home," then stop playing these idiotic masturbatory games and get a freaking life. Jack Thompson"

"Yes, he did it because his life was desperately empty... and the games didn't help, now did they? Jack Thompson"

"You offer your condolences. How they going to get them? Reading your post in this chatroom? Call them up or send flowers. Get into real reality, not virtual reality, you goofs. Jack Thompson"


"Dennis McCauley writes: May you find peace, gamer friend.
Dennis, he was much more than a gamer. He was a soul. And he wasn't your friend.
How in the world can you try and cash in at a for-profit site by trying to turn this tragedy into some sort of praise for gaming?
Gaming can lead to suicide. I guess you all missed the stories about.
You say I am trying to exploit this tragedy? Are you kidding. I'm trying to wake you up. Playing video games is a waste of time and a waste of your lives and a corrosion of your souls.
Put down the controllers and get a life. The life you save may be your own. Jack Thompson"

"I did not speak poorly of him. I spoke very poorly of you people who couldn't care less about why he did this. You just care about your little games and the poor performance of gamers in this situation. I posted at the site my attempts to help a lady whose gamer son killed himself. The game contributed to it. None of you could care less about the corrosive effects of these games. None of you."


C**T

Take from this what you will. I just thought it should be mentioned. Rest in Peace Mitch. Keep on pwnin'

11:12 pm: SUCCESS!
I now have a 360! and I can't touch it till next week. Oh well at least it's there! Just wanted to add(plug) another idea for my website. Unlike some of my other ideas it is in a VERY basic state and is open to radical changes.

2nd IDEA

CEL SHADED.

The story for this isn't completely set and may sound a little silly but bear with me. The underlying concept surrounds the idea of taking cute cartoon animals and placing them in a horrible urban landscape and see how they cope.

The aforementioned animals make up a group known as "The Good Guys"(I know, I know). So far I've only come up with the groups unoffical leader, Art. Art is a two foot rabbit and the rest of the group are two foot other animals. One day they are caught in a freak storm and are transported into the aforementioned urban nightmare. It is a world populated with thugs ruled by a heartless dictator, Deacon. The Good guys learn that they are the work of an underground group of rebels known as "The Optimists". This group aim to use creative media, like cartoons, to raise the morale of the general populace and to undermine the propaganda. The creator of the good guys is the leader of the optimists, Annie Englehorne, codenamed "The Cartoonist" or Toonie to her friends. The initial story arc would revolve around the mystery of how these cartoon characters could be warped into the story's reality.

As I say the idea is basic, possibly stupid, but feel free to comment on it.

I'll post my final entry on my ideas soon and get tose pictures up.
Final idea:

Tales of the Kindred Divine: Frag

09:12 am: Something different.
Time to ditch the games and try to plug my ideas for things like comics or books and other emtertainment(sic)meeja. I have several ideas for a website I'm developing, www.gerbilcurry.com.

1st Idea:

The Castle(comic strip or flash animation)

A weird one this one(aren't they all weird.) This revolves around the staff of a 24hr News Channel from hell, literally! The strip or cartoon would mix topical jokes with those revolving around the foibles to the main cast.

CHARACTERS

Emma Hunter: A tabloid journalist down on her luck, never able to hold down a job. After her latest sacking, she is run over by a truck after being distracted by a portal to hell. After waking up in a strange castle, she learns that she has been hired as the researcher for the earth correspondance team of the worst news network in the underworld, DNC.
She's a little moody and opinionated, but she's a big softy deep down.

Sullby Treguard III

Sullby is a demon who comes from a great line of photographers and cinematographers. Sullby broke that line. When he was a kid, he burned down his house the first time he lay his hands on a camcorder. Soon after, his family dumped him at DNC's front step and has worked there ever since as the earth team's camera...uh..demon?
Sullby is a bit of a simpleton with some serious self control problems. While he can be intelligent, these bouts are few and far between. He is a serious gamer, often to a fault.

Suther:

What can you say about Suther. Three words come to mind. Evil little git.A deposed Lord of the underworld, this mad "head on legs" was given one of the most embarrasing jobs in the underworld. Being DNC's earth correspondant. He was deposed for the infamous "Hot Magma" incident involving the Big S's missus.
A megalomaniacal "genius", he'll stop at noting to use the powerful media tools around him to rule all realms of heaven, eath and hell! Pity he's only two feet tall!

I'll provide links to artwork soon . It's kinda crappy though

11:22 am: The 360 is here... and I..uh..don't have one.
So here it is, the first week of the Xbox 360's launch. I don't have one, due to the "Security concerns" cited by the Gamestop man. Double checked the situation on Saturday. Expected this week apparently. Maybe I should just change my name to Thomas and be done with it. If I don't get mine soon, I go down to Dublin(where MS keeps all the Euro 360s) and cut out the middleman. Getting ever so closer to the HD dream. I need £800, I have raised..uh..£204. Still, I have a ton of games I don't play anymore and two PS2s. I think I can part with one of them. It's the nice Samsung one they have on the 360 kiosks. Read reviews by users and techie magazines and it's one of the better 26" LCDs out there. Even has a built in freeview box. Nice!

Oh well, I'll see what happens.

Random thought: DS is better than PSP, for games at least. PSP has too much ipod in it, and not enough Playstation. Lack of hard drive also makes it totally useless next to the ipod. Only good feature? Kick ass screen. GTA:LCS couldn't even get me excited bout it any more.

Into the hdTV fund it goes then.

11:15 pm: Gamestop a-callin'!
The phone rang at about 5:00pm this evening. It was the man from Gamestop. I had prepared myself for the worst. I was half right. I wasn't getting a 360 on launch day. I would be getting it 3 days later, apparently. The reason, the weirdly unbored employee told me, was because of a security risk in sending out the entire first shipment at once. He cited reports of thefts in england and so forth. Seeing as there can be a lot of dodgy dealings here, I could understand it. He said he would phone again when mine was ready, which he said was next tuesday by the latest.
I dunno about this, but seeing that I will not be allowed to touch it till the 25th(Parents pay for it, they lay down the rules), I can wait a few more days.

Anymore delays will not be tolerated, however!

At least I'M not the one paying for the package I went for. Heh heh.

I'd like to hear those stories but I can't find them. Hmm.

11:03 am: The good times are back again!
Life is sweeter now. The huge backlog of work is handed in and I'm feelin' fine.

More time for games! I hate the christmas season though because all the games I want are all out at the same time and I have no money for them. Damn.

Current recommendation at the moment is Sonic Rush. Man, that game is fast, has a kick ass soundtrack and is nails. Love the fact the characters are 3D. 3d is just more impressive on DS because you wouldn't think it could be that good on such an "underpowered" machine. The DS is getting a great library of games recently.

The european Xbox 360 launch is approaching fast. Only a bit more that a week to go! Got my preorder at Gamestop(the only one in the UK, I believe, most overseas branches are in Ireland). They say that they have the largest allocation in Northern Ireland and have said they can guarantee that Ill get one on Dec 2st(12.01am).

If you don't hear from me next week, Ill likey be in for murder. Please help me Jack. The 360 made me do it!

05:52 pm: ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHHHHH!!
Work, Work, WORK, Bloody work, I hate you. You cruel unforgiving mistress.
If you haven't realised, I've a ton of work to do for Uni. Two essays totalling 6,000 words for Monday and I can't think straight.

Nearly lost the plot when my broadband appeared to have imploded 5 minutes ago.

Gotta get back to it

See you next week at earliest.

Mr Vaz angers me! Go to gamepolitics to see what I mean

12:36 am: Hi there all you guys who stumbed upon me
Welcome to this sorry excuse for a Live Journal. Seeing as I joined to be able to comment on the gamepolitics journal, I thought I might as well use it. So.... Here I am. uh.. Love me?

Seriously, I'm a 21 year old genetics student from Belfast(yes good ol' Northern Ireland). I love games, anime, writing and doodling little comic strips. I might share some when I pluck up the courage.

I suppose this with become a repository for my thoughts on the world and maybe some of my writing, kinda sci-fi stuff with and anime edge to it, who knows...

I don't know how to do this stuff. Christ I come off as such a n00b.

HA HA HA.. L33t Speak