So here we are at Wintereenmas Mark III, and all is well. New consoles are appearing on the market and games
aplenty are available for sale or download, depending on your piratical habits. So go on, pull up a chair, grab a controller
and a drink, and join the game. What’s that, "just one drink", you say. Why not more? Lets face it, alcoholism is nearly
as popular as the most holy past time of gaming these days. And it’s true; getting drunk can lead to mighty fine times.
But when combined with gaming, it can only end in tragedy.
As you all know, gaming requires great feats of hand-eye co-ordination. Chances are if you have a few drinks, the faster
characters in Super Smash Bros. Melee will be much harder to control, and the next thing you know you’ll have more suicides
then that time you forgot to hit the pause button on Lemmings when you went out for lunch. And nothings more embarrassing
then getting both the ‘Master of Disaster’ award along with ‘Shameful Fall’.
Another thing to be cautious of when drinking and gaming is laughter. Sure, a good joke is always appreciated. But have
you ever tried to laugh with a mouthful of beer? No matter how creamy and delicious said beer is, it’s not going down
your throat now. Instead, it will be expelled in an alcoholic cloud of beer vapour. A tragedy, most assuredly, but that’s
not the worst bit. Imagine now that when this happens, you’re holding your brand new wave bird controller in your hands.
Now think where that beer cloud's going to land. *sigh*Even to this day, two years on, the X button still gets stuck down.
But what about the friendly LAN? Surely drinking would be at home there? I have to confess to drinking Jim Beam from the
bottle at one before, for lack of cups and coke to mix it with…well, they were there, but that would have involved walking
all the way to the house, and we all know that effort is the enemy. Back on track, the main point of LANs is not to beat your
friends, but to then utterly cripple them with your witticisms after the fact. And how do you propose to do that when drunk?
All attempts to out-english your opponents result in yelling the word ‘CHEESESTICKS!’ in a vaguely excited fashion.
Hell, I’m sure it made sense at the time.
But the worst thing about drink gaming is the propensity to pass out. The simple fact of the matter is, you can’t
game whilst unconscious. Unless of course you have an overdeveloped frontal lobe, but seriously, those things are completely
out of fashion. What’s more likely is you’ll wake up the next morning and take your computer home, only to find
that somebody’s replaced your wallpaper with pornography.
So remember, make this Wintereenmas one that you’ll remember, for all the right reasons. If you drink and game, you’re
a bloody idiot.
This has been a holiday safety and decency message written by A man who’s bitter that he has no alcohol on hand
and paid for by the Somebody else’s internet connection party Perth.
