QWOP is a "running game". But it's not. It's more like a brain injury simulator.
You have to make your character run by controlling.... his thighs and calves. Obviously. Attempting to run usually results in hilarious flapping about as the laws of physics simply don't apply in QWOP world. Marvel in wonder as your attempts to slowly place one leg in front of the other ends with what looks like a newborn giraffe attempting a bicycle kick.
It's atrocious. And yet, absolutely brilliant.
Don't bother unpacking the Xbox 360 you got for Christmas - here be all the gaming fun you need over the festive season. http://foddy.net/Athletics.html
I was on the bus in Dublin city centre the other evening. Saw a male hispter walking along the quays; early 20s, skinnier than Trevor Reznik, casually perfected Ladytron hairstyle, Buddy Wayfarer specs, flagpole-thin jeans, you know the score. What surprised me, or what shouldn't have surprised me really considering that there were several inches of snow and ice ground together by thousands of human feet in sub-zero conditions, is that his outermost layer of clothing was just a short sleeve shirt. And yes, the obligatory obscure film quote was present. Surely it dawns even on hipsters that they don't want to get hypothermia? Perhaps not this mindless fucktard. Now, I don't know if I made this happen with my animal-instinct thought patterns, but as soon as I willed the bastard to slip and fall, he obliged. Teeth and chin first. There were titters.
I sat down a couple of nights ago and watched a Channel 4 program called “100 Greatest Toys”. The “100 Greatest...” is a format that Channel Four regularly returns to and they usually provide a mostly inoffensive two hour trip down memory lane. It’s pretty much a TV show based on the kind of conversation you might have with friends of a similar age after a few drinks, as you forget about the stresses of adult life and wrap yourself up in a comforting blanket of reminiscence as you recall your childhood.
Unfortunately the main problem with these shows – aside from the fact that they often feature a plethora of C-list celebrities who are just glad to still be on television – is that these shows are built on the foundation of an internet poll. Anyone who has ever used the internet knows that the internet consists of about 5% normal decent people, 85% pornographic material and 10% assholes (non-pornographic). Any organisation who uses the internet as a means of gauging public opinion is asking for trouble and “100 Greatest Toys” was no different.
If the internet had its way, Lady Gaga would be president or some shit.
Unfortunately what should have been a nice bit of TV fluff was tainted – and the show even fleetingly acknowledged the fact itself – because the internet fanboys and their poll rigging ways were out in force again as DUNGEONS AND FUCKING DRAGONS came in at number three on the all-time great toy list. That’s a higher placing than Barbie. Higher than Action Man. Higher than Xbox, Teddy Bears, Rubik’s Cube, Plasticine, Star Wars and Transformers.
Sure there are plenty of people out there who probably genuinely think Dungeons and Dragons is the shit and while they’re wrong, they’re entirely entitled to their opinion so long as they keep it to themselves and never utter it within earshot of any normals.
“Hey let’s start a campaign to make the shit we like come top of this insignificant poll! That’ll blow peoples fucking minds.”
No, it won’t blow anyone’s fucking mind; it’ll just enforce the stereotype that you’ve got way too much time on your hands. Like some sad fucker who has a blog and...oh.
Christmas is upon us again. A period when we get to spend way too much time in the company of our loved ones, sacrifice a frighteningly large, genetically enhanced mega-chicken and most important of all - exchange presents. Christmas is a time for giving, a time for sharing. A time for advertising. That’s ok though – we live in a consumerist society and advertising has probably existed since the time of cave drawings.
Long gone are the days when the function of an advert was to simply sell us a car (for example) on the strength of it being safe and fuel efficient. We all know that the purpose of many adverts these days is sell us an image or an ideal – that by driving a particular car or using a particular mobile phone network we are aligning ourselves with the other awesome motherfuckers partaking in the same on our TV screen.
So yeah, plenty of adverts are shallow – nothing new there. However, alongside the usual adverts we see at pretty much any other time of the year, Christmas regularly unleashes a particular kind of advertising. The shit-chucking-monkey-fucking-crazy world of fragrance advertising.
Fragrance advertising falls into two categories. The first category is the sexy kind. But hey, we’ve grown up with sexy ladies fellating Cadburys Flakes, so no matter how much booty Beyonce shakes it’s not gonna be anything we’ve not seen before.
The second kind is the best kind, if best kind means completely fucking insane and absurdly intense kind. We’ve all seen them. They typically feature a Hollywood movie star, speaking dialogue that even the late great Leslie Nielsen would struggle to deliver with a straight face.
Hi, I’m James Franco and I’m burning up inside with the heat of a billion suns. Wanna sniff me?
These adverts are just so fucking intense. We’re not talking Hans Zimmer levels of intensity. We’re not even talking the look Christopher Walken might give you if you drunkenly violated his daughter and then hit her with your car. We’re talking "when worlds collide" levels of intensity. We’re talking about something so super intense and serious that everything else in the universe can just damned well go and fuck itself. Hostages in the Middle East, who have seen Omar enter the room, lay a big knife on the table and clumsily fiddle about with a webcam, have not experienced the same emotional intensity that James Franco feels while he walks down a corridor in slow motion.
I don't know who this bloke is, but he's almost certainly thinking about killing us all.
So if you want to smell like someone who seems to be struggling to suppress a murderous rampage, head to Boots or Brown Thomas for your Christmas shopping. Or yeah, you could do this.
