Random Madness: Deviated Septum

It’s not uncommon for two or even several games, and even games and movies to share sound effects.

One of the first times I came across this sort of thing was back in the 1990’s. It was Duke Nukem 3D, and one of the more infamous enemies in the game caught my attention – the pig cop. Literally mutated police officers of the LAPD (or LARD in-game), they looked quite comical in their stocky build, but you wouldn’t mess with them all the same. They packed shotguns that could rip you a new one with a single blast up close.

They also made grunting noises one would almost certainly expect from pigs. The most telling sound effect was when a pig cop actually sighted you and let out a roar that has since been proven to belong to a cougar or something similar. I know this from hearing the same sound when watching documentaries and the animal channels on DSTV.

How coincidental it was then to play Quake, released later the same year, and see (or more accurately, hear) that the same sound effect was used – this time when one of the ogres with a chainsaw and a grenade launcher saw you. He too grunted and made a noise that made it easy to tell when he was around.

So imagine the horror I experienced as a young boy when I lived at home with my eldest brother. He also grunted a lot and made noises that reminded me so much of these two videogame characters. Especially when he was in the shower – he would roar and clear his throat loudly. I even had dreams that I was living with one of those ogres from Quake. One of those dreams involved going into the kitchen and being confronted by this ogre who then chopped me up into pieces with his chainsaw and served my head up on a plate with peas and carrots. I’m sure I’ve written about that before in the Keen Dreams ® series though…

*goes off to check*

Nope, hasn’t been published as far as I can tell, but I could have sworn I wrote about it. Anyway.

In any case, I think I know the common problem that these characters all share. It’s a deviated septum. My brother has it and makes all these grunting and throat clearing noises to this day that are most annoying, to be honest. He refuses to have surgery to have it fixed. Luckily it’s rather easy to get rid of the irritating grunting and carrying on with the pig cop and the ogre – just blow them to bits with a rocket launcher.

This has been yet another instalment in the weird and wacky series known as Random Madness ®. It didn’t make sense to you, and it wasn’t supposed to either. If you read it and shook your head – that’s good. That was the ultimate goal.

Random Madness: Deviated Septum

Keen Dreams: Duke Nukem Forever

 

It actually happened. Last night, for the first time ever, I dreamt about Duke Nukem Forever.

And it was probably one of the best dreams I’d had in recent memory – not just because it was about DNF, but because it was one of the most emotion-fuelled ones I think I’ve ever had.

It started with me playing DNF, and walking around some building, which felt like some sort of top secret facility, or lab (it could have been the IMF: Impossible Mission Facility, from Duke Nukem 3D). And as you can imagine, there I was, picking things up, throwing them around; enjoying the interactivity that is said to be in the game.

As I made my way down the storeys of the building, I was talking to people, and one of these individuals sounded like Isaac Kleiner from Half-Life 2. “They’ve really gone all out on this!” I thought to myself, as I even caught myself shedding a tear or two every now and again. I was finally, actually playing the game of my dreams (no pun intended).

Then I reached a point where I had to get down on my belly and crawl under some part of the structure, all the while being careful to avoid shooting myself with my duel M1911s. That’s right, DUEL, as in TWO Golden Colts. I think this made it in there after playing a lot of Duke 3D with the DukePlus mod.

As I was crawling (and feeling that this was a scene straight out of Metal Gear Solid), and nearly getting Duke’s huge body stuck under the floorboards, the action picked up. Through an opening ahead, I saw a van ram some kid right up against the wall in an alley. Then I heard voices, like they were questioning the kid’s friend, whose name happened to be Christian. For every question he hesitated on, the van rammed the other guy against the wall again (might have been Yatta). Maybe they wanted to desperately know what playing DNF was like.

Then the dream skipped ahead for a bit. I must have exited the game for some ludicrous reason, and there I was, reading an issue of some gaming magazine down by the pool. It looked like it might have been NAG due to the familiar reviews and scoring system. I skipped all the way down to the bottom and read the last paragraph, while simultaneously, my other eye caught the final score and pros and cons down at the bottom of the page.

There was a big round, solid score of 80. Not bad, but not as great as some might have wanted. And when I looked to see what the pros and cons were, I noticed something rather ironic under “plus”. It was one word: “pretty”. And this is after so many people have criticised the game for not being graphically up to snuff. I could only chuckle at that. Under “minus”, there was nothing; just a blank space. Once again, I found this kind of hard to believe, as critics who have played the game and previewed it have had a lot of nasty stuff to say about it – particularly the Xbox 360 version of the game, with persistent framerate issues and the like.

I think this was likely the reason I dreamt about DNF last night, after going through all my RSS feeds, picking up on the latest chicken scratch, and sh!t-talking on DNF. Whether the game does suck or not, I know that I’m going to get it and play it. I have to, since it’s really the only game that I’ve ever truly wanted for half my life (Half-Life? Get it?).

Keen Dreams: Duke Nukem Forever

Keen Dreams: The Doom Effect

              You wouldn’t see a pretty boy like Shepard taking on the Cyberdemon

I usually note down some of the dreams I have, and keep the ones that are more original or intriguing to myself for use in one of my fiction efforts. Then you get the ones that are more clichéd and have been done to death. The events in this dream probably fall into this category.

It all started with me being the commander on a tank, possibly the Mako, rolling down streets and through buildings, taking out enemy troops. As we reached the crossroads of a section in the neighbourhood however, we were overwhelmed by soldiers who were taking cover behind the bushes, and they flanked us, taking out the vehicle – probably with some heavy weaponry.

Then we were led alongside the road, past all the prisoners of war that had been captured by the enemy, as they sat looking miserable on the grassy banks between the trees. The crew of the tank and I walked along this rode which was lined with ropes hanging from the trees – probably to execute those were unlucky enough to have been caught; to set an example.

But as we crossed the field, through the woods, and left the POWs behind, we came upon a cliff that had a cove of sorts within. We all jumped in to the water below and went inside. Ahead there was a portal of sorts.

We foolishly entered in to it and were swept off to another dimension where we saw the most horrific events unfolding. People being tortured, victimized, and impish creatures playing devilish pranks on unsuspecting inhabitants.

We’d stumbled into a hell of sorts. Not just a hell; the Hell.

Some of the group were captured, while the rest of us ran as fast as we could, trying to find a way out of this place. An undead creature of some sort got a hold of me and pulled me back as I tried to wrestle free from his clutches. Then it went black.

I woke up and I was back in the water again. Somehow what was left of the group had managed to escape and I assumed I had been rescued and was now back in the cove, on the other side of the portal this time, where we first entered.

I was treading water and trying to make my way to a ladder of sorts that was hanging from the cliff. I started to climb my way up, struggling all the while, only to reach the top, and see the ladder start to slip, and come loose. I fell back in the water, and it was a frantic, terrified effort to get to another ladder that was on the cliffside further down. I climbed up and this time I reached the top. We were safe – for now.

There was some machinery and equipment lying around in the cove, and it looked as though a small base of operations had been established there. There was a map* on a screen which clearly had the word “Contra” written on it and a diagram showing the portal. But we knew that in whatever language this was, it might as well have been a synonym for Hell. We knew firsthand because we’d seen the other side.

We’d gone in the @sshole of Hell, and come back out again… somehow alive.

Footnotes

* The map was similar to that of the Mass Effect map used in the game to travel to different planets and so on.

The Keen Dreams series is a AAA original, and is all about video games in dreams, and dreams in video games… and dream which involve stuff about video games.

Keen Dreams: The Doom Effect

Study: Gamers Have Control Over Their Dreams

I’ve sometimes had stuff on here under the “Keen Dreams” title, which goes in to how I often dream about video games as well as going into detail about what the dream was about.

I’ve read several posts over the past week talking about some study that was undertaken which apparently came to the conclusion that gamers have some of the best dreams – mainly because they are able to have some sort of control over what happens in them.

They claim that gamers can control events that happen in the dream or nightmare, and in the case of being chased or hunted by something, they can even “turn the tables” and assume control and start directing and even dictating what happens. This is because we’re actually more aware that we are dreaming, and perhaps lose some of our fear and fight back. Apparently spending hours in a virtual world, playing games, is like preparation. We’ve been labelled the “dream warriors” and excel in what is called “lucid dreaming”.

And the chances of you dreaming about games increase if you do it just before bed, so they say.

I have noticed this myself over the years. When I was young I would often flee in my dreams and fly up into the air and away. But nowadays, when I occasionally do dream or have nightmares, especially during a bad night’s sleep and waking up every few hours or so [more chance of REM which induces dreams, I reckon], I’ve found that I not only dream about games, but that I can also take control and act more like I would in a game I suppose.

You can’t always run away.

At any rate, it’s a refreshing thing to see after having seen so many “studies” and theories that suggest that gaming is bad. Now you know what to do when your kid has nightmares or complains about a monster under the bed: get them to a PC or video game console post-haste, and fire up a game.

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Sources: Video gamers can control dreams, study hints [MSNBC]

Study: Gamers Have Control Over Their Dreams

Theory: Sleep Helps you Learn, Beat Games

I read an article by Jamie Madigan, who popped up on the scene not too long ago when he/she wrote and article on Duke Nukem Forever last year. Anyway, there’s another article on there talking about sleep and games.

Here's just a few excerpts:

“And while we’re at it, why is it that I spent an entire controller-crushing hour trying to figure out that one level in the puzzle game Braid before giving up and then nailing it on the first try after a good night’s sleep?”

“Actually, both these questions have a related answer. Sleep, it turns out, is integral to learning… This is one possible reason why babies sleep so much: they literally have to shut down to assimilate what they’ve taken in.”

“And in addition to generally refreshing you and “resharpening” your reflexes, sleep seems to have a similar effect on learning tasks that involve precise, manual finger movements... researchers found that those who had gotten a full night of rest saw dramatic improvements in their performance while those who had just taken a 15 minute break saw no such increase.”

“But that’s not where the benefits of sleep on task performance end. Other research has shown that sleep also increases creativity and problem solving. So the next time you’re enraged your inability to time a series of jumps or figure out how to make a moustache out of a piece of tape and a cat, try sleeping on it.”

I can vouch for this myself. There was one game I played a long time ago, just some Doom clone - and not a very good one – called Assassin 2015. There was one point in the game where I was stuck for days. Then one night while I was asleep, I had a thought or dream which showed me the way – the way to get past this mech in a hallways that kept bursting through the door and wasting me over and over again.

The next day I started the game, loaded up the checkpoint savegame, and tried out what the dream had shown me… and low and behold, it worked. I was able to get past this obstacle, and I went on toe finish the game many times.

I even have a series on this blog where I write about video games and dreams and so on, called “Keen Dreams”.

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Source: To Sleep, Perchance to Pwn [psychologyofgames.com]

Theory: Sleep Helps you Learn, Beat Games

Keen Dreams: Finger Bang You

The Keen Dreams series is all about video games in dreams, or video games and dreams, or dreams in video games. You get the picture.

I’ve noticed something that is a recurring element in all my dreams involving violence of some sort. I always shoot with my hand. You remember when you were a kid, and you would run around shouting “Phew, Phew!” and “Bang, you’re dead!” while holding your hand in the shape of a pistol with your finger extended, sometimes simulating the squeeze of the trigger?

That’s exactly what I mean. And it frustrates me, even during the dream. I’m like, where the hell is my gun? Why the hell am I shooting with my finger? Damn it, man!
Sometimes it’s even worse when the baddies in my dreams have guns of some sort, and here I am with my finger, shouting “Bang!”, “Kapow!”, and so on, while they have a big rifle. It’s very emasculating and makes you feel so very small.

It’s even worse when your squad all have guns, and they’re like “Take point!”, while sniggering to themselves. Very funny. Just wait until I get a gun and blow your head off for that! But I eventually have to settle for poking him in the eye.

But maybe it’s a representation of what it’s like in video games, if you think about it. When I sit there on my PC, playing Duke Nukem 3D [yes, I still play that game, and yes I still play PC games], I’m using my finger on the mouse to shoot the gun in-game.

I have held a real gun several times, though. Years ago my dad had a .22 target pistol, which was a rare one, seeing as it was a nine shot revolver instead of an eight or ten, which were more common. That got stolen. Then there was the big Webley& Scott .45 revolver, an antique heirloom, nearly one hundred years old, which he ended up handing in to the police at the pig sty. That pissed me off no end.
I even have several air rifles, and paint ball guns, and some model shotguns and pistols. Hell, I’ve still got some plastic pistols modelled on a Colt 1911 .45 hanging around.

And yet, my mind chooses to place me in a dangerous situation, surrounded by mean men with big guns, and I have my bloody finger.

You know what? I think it was because I watched that movie Race to Witch Mountain recently, and some guy was always in some situation where he would be saying “Gun? a Gun please.” But even that guy got a gun in the end.

Isn’t it ironic? Don’t you think?

/\\/ |\|\

Keen Dreams: Finger Bang You

Keen Dreams: Assassin’s Creed, and Resident Thief – Starring Samuel L. Jackson

The Keen Dreams series is all about video games in dreams.
There we were, on the first floor of a dirty, dishevelled apartment building. Me, and Samuel L. Jackson, or someone who looked and sounded just like him. We were on the run, and we headed down the stairs to the ground floor. But it was too late to make our escape that way, seeing as they had all ready driven up to the parking lot outside.
So it was back up the stairs, up to the top floor where we navigated a series of obstacles as fast as we could. Sam led the way and I followed, doing exactly what he did so to minimise the chances of screwing up and getting lost or something. Then at the worst possible moment, as Sam was climbing up a ladder or scaffolding, part of it broke, and he came crashing down on to the floor boards below, unable to get back up. He must have been seriously hurt, but he urged me to carry on.
“In here?” I asked him as I climbed up the structure.
“No, in there!” he responded, pointing to a narrow little passage way that looked like it would be difficult to get through. But I did, and as I was climbing along the platform which hung above the room on the other side, the platform gave way, and I too fell down to the floor below. What luck.
What luck indeed – seeing as during the fall, glints of gold twinkling in the darkness caught my eye, as well as the unmistakeable Nazi symbol, emblazoned on a flag in the corner.
I lay still though, although not as seriously injured as Sam was, because the group of thugs at that moment came waltzing in to the room I had been in only seconds ago. They immediately walked over to Sam, who lay on the ground. He made no effort to try and get away. He only yelled, “Happy New Year!” as the thugs got nearer. I watched them through the holes in the wall where bricks were missing, and lay still, waiting for the gunshot.
Then it came, and Sam was gone.
To be Continued?…

Keen Dreams: Assassin’s Creed, and Resident Thief – Starring Samuel L. Jackson

Keen Dreams: S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

The Keen Dreams series is all about video games in dreams. 

The other night I had one massive dream based on the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. series of games (probably because Call of Pripyat is due out soon, for the US and other countries, and I want it badly).

So, this is how it went. I was sitting around a campfire along with some other stalkers, most of whom looked like regular people, sans kerchiefs and guns. They were more civilian in appearance and included women.

We got around to talking about my grandfather, Strelok, and how once he and his group (which included Ghost and Fang, and another name that I don’t recall hearing about before: Moronin) possessed a sled of sorts, except it was on wheels (more like a skateboard), which allowed a person to move around the Zone in a manner besides walking or running. I had a similar sort of craft, and I had arrived on it before meeting up with the others, but it just wasn’t the same.

So the story continued. I went in to detail about how there had been a massive explosion somewhere in the Zone and how Strelok had supposedly died atop a hill or mountain.

We set off to try and find the remains of Strelok, and find clues as to where the craft was kept; the vehicle which would allow speedy transport across the Zone’s vast landscape.

We got to the point where the explosion was said to have taken place, and where Strelok’s body, or what was left of it, most likely was. However, one of the group called me over and pointed to a collection of objects lying by a rock. These included the skull of what we thought must have been Strelok’s. And so we realized that he must have survived the explosion, made it down to the ground below, and possibly died later on, maybe due to his wounds.

It was then, that two rival groups pitched up, led by a stalker who looked a hell of a lot like Joseph Stalin. And they were also after what we had come for, and so we all ended up in a massive firefight, as we fell back, covering one another as the bullets flew all around us.

I peaked out from behind a structure at one point and opened fire on someone running towards us, killing him instantly. It was then I realized that he was one of us. I’d accidentally shot a friendly. I hit the quick load button.

We were back at the beginning, before discovering the objects and Strelok’s skull. We went through the same scene of events, but this time, instead of opening fire on anybody, I grabbed the remains and trinkets and stashed them on my person while running for a boat in a river nearby. We all got in and started down the river.

That river must have been the river Styx or something, straight out of Greek mythology, because next thing I knew, it seemed as though I was in hell. There were flames all around, and stalkers, possibly zombified stalkers, and other creatures surrounded me, waiting at every corner, as I tried to find my way out of that place, all the while, cutting them all down with a hail of bullets from my assault rifle, lining up the shots, trying to execute them all with well-placed head shots…

And that was all a dream. I know. It sucks to end right there doesn’t it? That was one detailed dream I had, and they’re the best ones.

Keen Dreams: S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

Keen Dreams: Call of Duty, Blackadder, and Married With Children

A look inside my mind…

  

It’s been a while since I’ve done one of these posts. If you don’t know what it’s about, Keen Dreams is about dreams I have that involve video games. Of course, Keen Dreams is also a title of a Commander Keen title. Clever, huh?

So, the other night, I dreamt that I was in a room looking for something with non other than Peggy Bundy and her daughter Kelly – the blonde bimbo. Probably from watching reruns of Married With Children.

Then after that it was off to the trenches with explosions going off and wounded people all over the place. It was like a scene out of a Call of Duty game. In fact, I even saw Griggs there (from Modern Warfare), sitting atop a barrel, screaming in agony. He had a serious injury – very serious. An explosion had blown off his foreskin. Ouch.

After the battle there we all were – running through the snow towards a double story building where we all crowded around. And it was time for the medals to be handed out, as Hugh Laurie from Blackadder, covered in bandoliers and bandages, approached the stairs to receive his commendation.

But then, the small ceremony was interrupted by someone – a traitor in our midst – perhaps a German Spy. The name tag above his head read something like “Nolvus” or “Nolvilius”, as he drew his sword and attacked. Then everyone else predictably cut him down, as I drew my pistol and aimed at his head…

No, I don't do drugs. This was all a dream. Weird, huh?

Keen Dreams: Call of Duty, Blackadder, and Married With Children

Keen Dreams: Redneck Rampage, Doom, Thief, and stuff

This is a new feature that I’m debuting here on AAA, and you might think it’s weird, but it’s kind of cool too. And you watch others copy me, because I’ve all ready seen that happen before. Okay, so I’m not the first to have a dream about games and so on, but it’s something I never if rarely ever see on any blogs about gaming. So, you know I haven’t copied it from any place.

It’s about video games in dreams- my dreams to be exact. Yeah, I get a few hours sleep from the early hours of the morning onwards. How do I know they are about video games? Well, because they usually feature guns and other stuff that you would only find in games, like treasure and stuff falling off a bad guy after he’s been killed.

This morning I dreamed about an FPS game that saw me using an AK47 (I’ve been playing Redneck Rampage a lot lately) to gun down some creature. It looked like one of those zombies from Thief (if only you could use guns in Thief!). But he kept getting back up again, because he's undead and bullets don't affect him, and so I had to blow him up like in those aforementioned games (in Thief you can use fire arrows, and RR you use dynamite). After that the skeleton dropped some treasure and an MP5, which I scooped up, kind of like in Hellgate: London, or something, and then I heard a noise, as a door opened, unlocking other parts of the level, and all these big mofos came running out. So I opened fire with my gun, and after that, I don't know, it went blank.

Then it was revealed that this game was actually the new Doom, Doom 4, and that the doomguy actually does have a name. He has these initials: L.B.A., which actually stands for Lawrence (or Larry) Bambus Anderson. That’s weird, because I always thought that doomguy had a bit of hick or hillbilly in him.

Too much playing Redneck Rampage. Although, I haven’t touched it in a few days now…

Keen Dreams: Redneck Rampage, Doom, Thief, and stuff