All's Fair In War

"Got any ciggies...?" He asked. I shook my head. "Shite." He said. The wind was biting at my fingers as I'd forgotten my gloves, and the rain was making holding onto my rifle some hell of difficult. I'd stepped in a huge puddle on the trek over, and my right foot was drenched right up to my bindings with brown water and mud. The grass felt like tiny icicles, and I dared not touch my trigger in case my hand froze.
                        "This is fuckin' shite." I observed, peering over the verge and onto the empty road. Nothing was coming either way, so I popped my head back down. Water was streaming off the peak of my cap, dripping down my front all over my coat, which had long since lost its wax. I checked my rifle again; the bolt was forward, ready.
                        "Rory..." he started "...when did he say they'd be here?"
                        I checked my watch. Eleven fourty-seven PM.
                        "Quarter to." I said, peering back over the verge. Still I could see nothing.
                        "There's still nothing." I said.
                        "Right. I'm off for a piss." He said, standing up and making his way behind a nearby bush. Whenever they turned up, I remember thinking, I was gonna slot that cunt O'Rourke. I knew he'd be at the front, with his daft mustache and his shiny Webley. It was him first, and then his boys. After all, this was war. No time for remorse.
                        I took another quick look over the verge. I could see lights away in the distance. "Seamus!" I hissed, as he came round the corner doing up his britches. I nodded down the road, and his eyes flicked toward the lights. We both lowered ourselves until our chests were resting in the sodden lumps of turf on the verge.
                        "Check your rifle." I ordered. He checked it, and the bolt was forward and the sight zeroed. We were ready. The horses approached, and we could hear the clop of hooves as they neared. We looked at each other for a moment and then back at the road.
                        "Here," I whispered, "the fucker with the tea strainer's mine." Seamus nodded, and we lay still and silent. I'd counted three horses, one pulling a Vickers. They couldn't have been more than fifty feet away now. I crossed myself for protection, and gripped my rifle. Twenty feet. Fifteen. Ten...
                        I tapped Seamus, and we finally stood to meet them, shouldering our rifles. They didn't even have time to draw sidearms. With a crack of gunfire and a couple of shouts, all three were unhorsed. Seamus ran to calm down the steed pulling the machine gun, and I made my way into the road to make sure they were dead. Shiny boots. Clean weapons. Badges and medals. Typical Regulars. They knew everything apart from how to win a war. O'Rourke was still alive, hacking his lifeblood all over the road.
                        "F...f...Fuckin' cowards!" he spat through a blood-stained mustache. "You'll swing for this, Murphy! Mark my words, you'll fucking swing, you hear?" I stood over him and put a foot on his chest as it wheezed in and out. I drew his bayonet from his belt, and looked him dead in the eye.
                         "This is for me brother." I said, through gritted teeth. I leaned in, and he braced his arms against me, pushing away in a pathetic attempt to save himself. I pinned one down with my knees, and the other with my free hand. I stuck him with the bayonet, pushed it right through his neck. His gaze never left mine until the last of the life deserted him. I stood once more when he'd stopped twitching, and spat on the corpse.
                         "Have that, you murderin' fucker." I took his prized Webley out of its holster, and pocketed the heavy piece. Seamus was stood next to me afterward.
                         "By God..." He said, the blood from the bayonet dripping onto the road. "I'll get the horses sorted." He finished, turning and briskly walking back to the transport. An evil bastard and godless heathen had died this night, and the Regulars had lost a commander. I'd even say it was easy.
                         I got onto O'Rourke's horse, and dumped his saddlebags at the side of the road, before spurring the horse onward into the blackness. It'd be a long ride home, but the deed was done.
                         "Rory..." Seamus said.
                         "Hmm?" I replied.
                         "...nothin'." He said.

The Origin of The Dark One

“...pornographic...” they called it. “... a travesty...” They said it would spoil children; rot their brains. I had a hard time explaining that it was neither for children, nor would it rot their brains. My creation was simple, a book that wasn't limited just by the story that it had in it, one in which the reader could observe the true original picture that the writer had imagined through brightly coloured illustration and cinema-style posturing of characters. They told me in all honesty,

“Mr Trebeck, your work (The Dark One) cannot be printed with the facility that even the world's finest publishers possess, as the presses will not allow it, and, truth be told, neither would I.

Good luck in future endeavours, although, don't give up your day job.

Regrettably, John C. Peter”

Well, I'll show them. Ten years work. A decade of my life. My family, gone without me, driven mad by my constant whinings that the work would never be finished, that we would have again to move to somewhere more prosperous where I could try again. Oh no, I am not by any means done. I have, in the midst of all of my writings and my drawings, become somewhat adept with the machinery used to wage war, of which I researched thoroughly whilst in London for the book. I have designed a number of devices intended only to show the publishers that what happens in my book is plausible; even realistic. They would not even take receipt of my full manuscript, nor even briefly scan upon the machinery. So, I put it to them, all those that have refused me, all those that have doubted and have fought against me, that I will have vengeance. I shall bide my time, wait until they are at their weakest, and then when the moment is right, I shall swoop from the shadows.

They have doubted for the last time. Tonight, I become what I have created, and tomorrow morning, I shall wake as “The Dark One”.

Woe be tied to he who stands in my way.

It livesssss!

Recently fixed my PC by replacing the utterly shit-canned motherboard (we're fans of silly overclocks like Bono is a fan of being a wanker, so quite fervently) and got back to playing old games, stuff that comes out on the cheap on Steam, and my enormous back-catalogue of neglected AAA tripe. I quickly realised that I was very happy with not playing on an xbox, not realising before how convenient it was to not have to drop out of my game even for a second to send a few quick messages and stick on another tune on youtube, and it occurred to me; I felt like an ass for being mean to my xbox. My first one was a present, I didn't even get a memory card with it. I played "Prey" from start to finish on day two, after realising the day before it had no hard drive and therefore no way of saving, and I loved it. I came home from school at dinner time just to spend 10 minutes on a bit of it I'd saved from the morning. Suffice it to say, I have happy memories.
            But then, it broke. Red ring of death. Whilst the towels kept it circling the drain a little while, (giving me enough time to do three missions on the first Assassin's Creed and one pitifully bad run through of Slowride on Guitar Hero 3) it eventually succumbed to its wounds, and drifted off into console heaven to join my tea-covered original PS2 and my gameboy colour which had fought a grand battle with the stairs and lost. I was pissed off, so I saved up from my job, and got my first PC, and the rest is history. Or so I thought, until I realised that the most complete racing game in current circulation was a console exclusive, and whilst I couldn't enjoy it with my steering wheel (like most things, not limited to cake and shagging), I had to have it. So I bought one for about £50 and played the shit out of Forza 3 and 4. It was good, so good in fact that rFactor and other racing sims in my life took a back seat. I was having a great time on a console that I thought had turned into an entertainment device for prepubescent whiners with a chronic masturbation problem and an addiction to shitty annual releases of sports/burly-white-dude-shooter-games. It hadn't, and even had a few 60fps adventures in store for me before I put the old girl out to pasture. I recently played (and had a good time playing) Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, Injustice, Batman Arkham City, Forza Horizon and a bunch more stuff I wouldn't have bothered with otherwise  (seriously though guys, revengeance?! HA!)
                And so, after enjoying Assassins Creed 4 (notably at 19-24fps, grrrrrrr) on my xbox, and after unplugging it to make way for my newly-refurbished monster rig, I'll place it with warm fondness into a safe place in the cupboard, and I doubt that this will be the last that we'll see of her.

Unless it turns out I can trade it for its weight in marzipan or something... God that'd be good wouldn't it? Marzipan or an xbox... I'm going to leave this decision til I can figure out whether it's a fictional one I've made up in my head (again) or one of those supposedly 'important' real ones. Court order my arse...

Game of the Year 2013

My game of the year 2013 is Half Life 2. Yeah, I know, I'm several years out if date. How, I hear you (not) ask? Well.... My friend Philip and I are collectively in possession of both an Oculus Rift headset (kindly purchased as a gift by my wonderful missus) and a Razer Hydra motion controller. It has made First Person shooters into something else. Another friend of mine, who doesn't play too much in terms of FPS was making reflex-shots to the heads of Civil Protection at 50ft for fun, consecutively. I thought it was a fluke until Phil and myself tried, and achieved the same results. Now, I'm not a huge Half Life 2 fan, I played it when it came out, and I played it again when everyone insisted upon it, and it did nothing for me. I stopped playing after about an hour both times; bored of sub par graphics and what I considered to be a melodramatic and corny story. Yes, some of you will hate me for saying it, but I thought I'd have more fun attempting to determine the Ph of my stomach acid with a piece of 2x4 and a flannel made of litmus paper. But, alas, we hooked up the Oculus and the Hydra, and it was jaw dropping. Every kill, every movement of the hand, and every lean round a corner makes you feel like a cross between James Bond and Jason Bourne, but sexier and better in bed and able to drink more mead and have a better beard and such. It's all personal and relative I suppose. Anyway, of topped everything I've played this year, even with the hit and miss hand tracking and crap resolution. I mean, you check the back of your hand to see your health! And you check the side of your gun to see your ammunition! And it's in augmented reality! And it's awesome!

Ok, I admit, I may have gotten a little over enthusiastic and nearly broken my mate's monitor/chairs/floor with that over enthusiasm, but it was fucking amazing. It straight up pisses on any FPS this year, including PS4/Xbone stuff. And this is coning from ME about a game I DON'T EVEN LIKE. Bare that in mind when you consider the future of what you're planning to have in your living room/games room/rape dungeon. (You might have to have enough space to beat a friendly vortigaunt to death with a crowbar, and don't forget, you need to NOT melt a hole in the bottom of your Oculus with a lit joint you've been passed to smoke. It'll devalue it and you won't be able to sell it at Christmas. You as in 'one'; the collective term. Not me personally. I wouldn't know anything about that. Especially the joint part)

Racism. How boring.

What need has anyone got of actually being a racist? By all means hate something because it's shit, but tarring everything with the same brush because it's all one colour is like hating steak as well as hating Ferraris and also hating blood, cherries and roses.

Racial discrimination is fucking ridiculous. Why discriminate against somebody because they're brown or whatever, when there are so many fucking cunts that it'd be perfectly acceptable to discriminate against because THEY'RE A FUCKING CUNT? People, wake the fuck up. It isn't foreigners or Asian dudes or any other minority ruining this country, it is simply THE CUNTS.

And trust me, they are NOT a fucking minority.

Console Wars. (Sigh, fucking stupid name)

So, I'm just concerning myself currently with the fact that my crushingly-powerful mega PC's motherboard has died, and that this week, there are new things in videogames; namely the new consoles. Times like this don't come around very often, so I'm just sort of checking GameSpot/IGN and other news outlets like Kotaku on a dozen-a-day basis in the hopes that PEOPLE WILL NOW STOP ARGUING ABOUT WHICH IS BETTER BECAUSE WE KNOW THAT THEY'RE BOTH RUBBISH. Well, not rubbish in the traditional sense, as in rubbish for the foreseeable future, oh no, I mean just a bit rubbish now in that there's nothing to play on them. A bit like having a cannon installed into ones' chest but realising that the ammunition for it hasn't been properly developed yet, so you just sort of sit uncomfortably at social events answering awkwardly probing questions about its calibre/muzzle velocity/future potential (which you can't answer because you don't know). Anyway, my point is that this is how the launches have gone down:

PS4 launch lineup - couple of interesting bits and bobs, user interface seems nice, online works. Mostly bob games really though.

Xbone launch lineup - couple of interesting bits and bobs, mostly marketing crap like Ryse, but already has the best racing game in existence. Most of the other stuff is bob though, and it can't play mp3s (my mums PC can).

Which one should we buy, I hear you (read:absolutely no one) say? Fucking neither. Wait until April when the good games are out, you dickheads.

And for anyone not from Rochdale, 'bob' means 'sub-par even with potential'. If it's capitalised, it may also be short for Robert, I've been lead to believe.

Hello. Again.

It's that time of year again people! The time of year when I pretend that I'm going to actually write things on my blog, and actually do effort and whatnot. I shall probably have forgotten in two or three hours that this is what I was supposed to do today.

But, alas, I jest. I have actually got nothing better to do whilst at home. I have no job, no money, and a number of videogames that I should be playing, but a computer with an exploded motherboard. Where then does the desperate nerd turn in an effort to relieve day-to-day boredom? The internet, of course. I intend to actually put things up here now; I've finished university, with a good grade I might add, and I have got TONS of crap that I can just put on the internet to gauge whether people will be inclined to read it. (On second thoughts, 'crap' might not be the right word... Erm... Let's try 'genius, hand-crafted wonder-literature'. Yeah, that cuts the mustard. Like a fucking chainsaw.)

So, stick about. Read something. If you like it, let me know. If not, shove your comments up your arse and fuck off back to Reddit or whatever.