The Galloping Ghost of Nostalgia

If there is a God somewhere and heaven does exists, I hope an acre or two looks like The Galloping Ghost arcade in Brookfield, Illinois.  If I am allowed, I will have my wedding reception and repass here as well.  Yes, this place is that awesome.

Myself and hecate117 took advantage one stormy Sunday.  Yes, it was a date, no I did not spend $200 and I did not have to beg.

See, doesn't she look happy?

Even with Mother Nature dumping what seemed like every ounce of moisture she had from above, the trip was brief.  The spot was an unassuming storefront next to a Chinese food restaurant, but on the inside lies memories of a golden age of gaming and a time machine that returns you to your child/teenage years.  I quickly glanced around, at the 250+ arcade games at my disposal, on the outside I am calm, but my insides feel like this. 










But you want to know what the 2nd best part is?  The value.  All games are set to free play, just $15 lets you game till your wrists hurt, and believe you me it will happen.   We blew off the limbs of the undead, saved numbers of children from Mr. Big and sucked at Killer Instinct till damn near closing time at 2 a.m.  We had a blast and will be going back again very soon.  I suggest, no matter what generation of gaming you come from, to make a stop at Galloping Ghost Arcade.



 

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Fantastic Damage

Frustration and anger are dangerous if not channeled correctly.  Melanin Brooks is usually chock full of chill.  You look up "stoic" in the dictionary and there's a picture of me holding a rum & Coke.  I hit my dougie on a glacier once, and a pillow once exploded in my presence because it did not feel it was cool enough for the kid.

Then something went wrong.  Something terrible.  That day was November 8, 2011.   Under the cover of darkness, a pox was released upon the Earth.  Slowly, men and women worldwide started to show symptoms of the sickness.  These include blind rage and anger, overaggressive behavior, loss of confidence, false confidence, explosive diarrhea and the fear of green network bars. No, we were not exposed intentionally.  A major corporation promised us improvement, refinement...evolution. Boy, were they way off.

In the beginning we believed we received the promise.  Wishful thinking? Perhaps, yet slowly and surely reports started to flow in.   Of course they were dismissed as heresy, lies, bullshit.  Even I wrote off the reports as baseless trolling.  Until it happened to me.

On an unseasonably warm day in March, I decided to take a "mental health" day.  You know, sit around in your drawers, watch some Maury, make a pinata you know regular off day stuff.  In between women being 110 million sure that Lil June was the daddy, I decide to indulge in some product.  Granted, I had initially ran it over the coals in a previous blog entry, I continued to use.  Did I enjoy it?  Sometimes, but a bulk of the time I felt filthy.  I felt like I needed to conquer it, but instead the flag was planted directly and squarely, with authority, into my spare time.

Then the cool completely left me.  I would not become one of "them."  Before my brain could process what was happening (lag comp,) my hand, with all the furor I could muster, hurled the product to the ground!



GIFSoup

 My intention was not to destroy.  Panic strikes.  I frantically hurried to check the damage, only to find out the wounds are fatal:

For a moment, I held the disc.  Thinking sixty bucks down the crapper.  Most importantly the hours I spent...no...WASTED with this substance.  My remorse was nil. I continued to build my pinata as if nothing happened.

Note: This is a work of fiction.  Well the pinata part is...

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The Pledge: An Update

2012 looks to be another great year for gamers. There will be plenty of quality releases throughout the year. Oh and something called the Vita dropped yesterday. I heard it is supposed to be a big deal.


And Melanin Brooks will not be a part of it.

No, this is not some boycott. I am not giving up all my worldly belongings to protest Wall Street in a public park. Also, I am not on drugs. The truth is I just have too many damned unfinished games. I touched on my backlog (heh heh heh, I said "log") in a previous entry and decided to finally do something about it.

Until my Playstation 3 queue is at zero, I will not purchase another video game in 2012.  Yes my friends, these are desperate times.  As I type this, I would estimate that I am at around 20 unfinished games (sports titles don't count) including Bayonetta, Fallout: New Vegas and Skyrim (FFFUUUUUU)  I was able to knock off Batman Arkham City and Limbo last week.

My problem was that I was building a collection, but not enjoying that collection.  Quality titles collecting dust at my expense.  Why spend the money, if I'm not going to invest the time?

I figure this is going to take me all year.  In between work/school/girlfriend my time to game has become severely limited, and with the sheer number and the length of titles, I better brew the coffee right now.

I will attempt to update this blog as I make progress on this journey.  God willing, I won't be updating this post in 2013.

Update May 2012: We're almost six months into the year and I'm still going strong.  No new purchases so far.  I'm getting the Pookie itch because of Ghost Recon: Future Solider and Max Payne 3, but I put my addiction on the cross and will push on through my queue.  Just wrapped up Saint's Row: The Third, started my run through Yakuza 3 and grinding through Skyrim (I'll beat that on my deathbed.)

My issue is I can't play one game for extended stretches of time anymore (age? ADD?)  The days of 8+ hours of non-stop gameplay are done.  2-4 broken up through the day is about all I can do at this point.  Trust me no one wants to get through this more than I, but other things take precedence. Right now I'm feeling like the kid who broke his arm, or Little Bill Thompson in "Boogie Nights."  Keeping up with the happenings isn't enough.  I need to be knee deep in the action, like someone NOT named Little Bill Thompson.

I miss being current and giving corporations my money for online passes.

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Damn!

Congratulations to Ron Simmons being inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame.

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