Archive for the ‘Otaku’ Category

Things I Really, Really Wanted, But Never Ever Got

Friday, July 25th, 2008

1) A Green Machine

greenmachine.jpg < USA Version

Everyone that was ever a boy surely remembers these things? The low center of gravity allowed for crazy turns and the recumbent nature of the wheel allowed for crazy speed (for a 10 year old). They were just fun to ride, and I wanted one so badly for a few years in my youth (some of my friends had them). But, alas, it was not to be. Although I remember the yearning, it must have been short-lived because a few years later I had moved on to other pursuits.

These things are still very popular today incidentally, both here and in Australia. This next image I took from the Jindabyne tourist website!

jin_race.jpg < Green Machine racing!

2) A Corgi diecast Eagle

eagle.jpg < A toy

eagle-1.jpg < The ‘real’ thing

As a young boy, I used to peruse the Corgi diecast toy catalogues that you could get for free at toy departments of department stores (such as David Jones). I had a particular fascination with the military toys, but far and away the toy I wanted most was the Eagle from the TV show Space 1999. I recall it had lots of play action value, such as the drums you could snap on and off, pivoting thrusters and even a removable command capsule! Alas, it was never mine. Someone I knew had it (was it my cousins?) so I did once or twice get to play with it. But it’s never the same πŸ™

This particular toy is still available today (my interest has long declined though), even from the same manufacturer. The latest version is of course much more spectacular and expensive, but the lasting appeal of the design is obvious by the many different models made over the years (including some hyper-detailed, hyper-expensive Japanese versions).

3) Sword And The Sorceror for Colecovision

swordsorcerer_press.jpg < Proof!

We got a Colecovision shortly after it was released in Australia. For those unaware, this was a console of the same generation as the Atari 2600 and Intellivision. I loved the thing to death, and literally played some games for marathons of a full day or more (especially Donkey Kong and Pepper II). The system came with a catalogue of upcoming releases, which included the above gem, ‘Sword And The Sorceror’.

The game was based on the cheese-tastic film from 1982, which this 10 year old (of course) loved. Those were the days when my fantasy interests were flourishing (Fighting Fantasy had just started, D&D was thriving) and the thought of playing a game based on such a story was too much. I so badly wanted to kill that big green snake seen in the picture πŸ™‚

Alas, the game was never mine. In fact, it was never anyone’s. Sword And The Sorceror, to this day, remains one of the lost Colecovision games. It was never released.

4) A Barcode Battler

barcode1.jpg < Fantastic!

We jump forward a few years now, to 1993. Tomy, a Japanese company, created a handheld video game toy that used barcodes to generate the stats of monsters. Two players would each slide a barcode through a reader and then their beasts would fight it out. If you lost, just go find another barcode and try again πŸ™‚

It’s a simple idea, and I’m sure the execution is crap, but it hooked me and I wanted one. And yet, I never bought one, even when they were clearing out of local stores for a song. To this day I don’t know why I let this one pass?

Of course several years later my desire to own one just grew and grew, and I found myself looking for a used one in the stores of Akihabara, Japan. The technology hasn’t died over there, with various incarnations of the device continuing to be released year after year (usually licensed). But it was a flash-in-the-pan in America, and now tends to fetch a nice premium on ebay. Maybe one day I’ll pick this one up…

5) Michael Jackson’s Red ‘Beat It’ Jacket

I swear to God I’m being honest here.

Many, many years ago, I figure about 1983, there was a contest on Twisties (an Australian snack food) packets to win a replica of the red jacket Michael Jackson wore in the Beat It video (and in so many photos released during that era, often paired with the infamous glove). This is the jacket:

o_bired1.JPG < Still snappy!

In short: I wanted it badly. I actually, honestly believed I’d look good wearing it (to where??! I was 11!!!) and day-dreamed about showing it off to my friends.

I don’t remember the details of the contest, only you had to cut out an entry form from the chip packet and mail it in. This I did, more than once. Alas I never won, and the jacket was never mine.

Who can tell how differently I may have walked life’s path had I been wearing this jacket?

michaeljacksonredjacket.jpg

This post is, incidentally, the first of a related series.

Hancock

Thursday, July 10th, 2008

I went and saw Hancock today. The film, about a strung-out superhero in need of rehabilitation, has been maligned by critics. Ironically, this was the exact reason my interest had been piqued, and even more ironically it was exactly what critics seem to dislike about the story that I thought worked so well.

In short: I loved Hancock. The film seemed real and I very much enjoyed the fact that the story was (deliberately) obtuse and unpredictable. I was entertained from start to end.

Perhaps the true reason I felt so drawn to Hancock was the feeling I was watching something of my own creation. Some of you will recall that many years ago I used to scratch down voluminous amounts of prose. These were often in the form of snippets of stories, or very short self-contained tales. I have a book full of this somewhere. One of them was called Brando Pineapple, and was about superheroism in the Australian outback. The tale is still kicking around in my head (along with many others) today.

Someone made a movie based on this story, and called it Hancock!

I’ll skip the details, but I assure you the similarities are astounding. In my story Hancock was called Brando, and ‘the girl’ was called Jelly. The situations were different, but the key element (let’s call it, in the spirit of not spoiling the tale, the ‘inversely proportional conceit’) was the same. Even the endings were similar (even though my version of the story was never close to completed).

So you can imagine watching Hancock was, for me, an unexpectedly amusing and somewhat moving experience πŸ™‚

(As an addendum, one of the trailers before the film was for an apparent remake of The Day The Earth Stood Still, starring Keanu Reaves (as Gort?). I had no idea the film was coming, and no idea what the trailer was for until the very end. But my mind said The Color Out Of Space. Alas not. A true, big-budget Lovecraftian masterpiece is apparently still not in the near future…)

End Of Days

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

Cockfighting is legal in Puerto Rico, and since I had this morning free while KLS finished her seminar, I headed on over to the local arena to watch the birds. It was a rough crowd, which obviously meant I fit right in, so I wasn’t intimidated.

As luck would have it, I ventured into the arena on the day of an apocalyptic battle – the showdown between two (apparently) legendary birds: ‘El Diablo Pollo’ and ‘El Fuego de Jesus’.

Before the match I inspected both of these titans, and felt a deep connection with El Diablo himself. His grizzled face framed strangely sad eyes, which told of a life of last-minute comebacks against a legion of also-ran birds. Fuego may have had the more spectacular plumage, but my heart was with Diablo, and I truly hoped the match would be his.

The ref blew his whistle and the feathers flew. These birds wasted no time! Each alternately tested the others defenses with a few low jabs, before Fuego whipped out with his left wing and momentarily stunned Diablo. Fuego then flapped up on the turnbuckle and let lose with a Five Star Frogsplash! But Diablo’s experience served him well, and he rolled away just in time.

Diablo was then on the offense, ruthlessly pecking Fuego before he could rise, and effortlessly connecting with a mighty one-two combo of a Swantom Bomb followed by a Figure Four Leg Lock. Fuego was crowing in agony! My heart was racing: Had Diablo already won?

Unfortunately not, as was immediately evident when Fuego broke the lock and delivered a perfectly executed Spinerooni on the still prone Diablo. A hush fell over the crowd in that hot dusty room. Diablo was on the ground, gurgling sounds coming from his beak. Fuego stood over him triumphant, even flashing his fans a People’s Eyebrow. Could Diablo rise?

The seconds passed, with the only sound the referee’s count. Uno…dos…tres. The man next to me – clearly a fellow Diablo admirer – wiped away a tear. Cuatro…cinco…seis. He stirred! I bit my lip as Diablo wearily rose a battered wing! Siete. He was up on one foot! Ocho. Diablo fully stood and face Fuego! The crowd roared! The battle was not yet lost!

Or so I thought, for as quickly as my hopes had been raised, Fuego was back on the attack. Impossibly, Diablo managed to withstand an initial beating that would have felled any lesser bird, but Fuego was barely tired, and it was all Diablo could do to protect himself much less fight back.

El Fuego de Jesus delivered unto our hero a flurry of pecks, jabs, kicks, roundhouses and even the occasional eye-gouge. Diablo took it all. He knew he had lost and so did I. But his bravery in the face of certain defeat was a sort of victory of it’s own, and I like to think that the instant my eyes and his met, in that split second before Fuego finished him once and for all with a Stone Cold Stunner, we shared some sort of strange human-chicken telepathic link.

“Your bird may be cooked”, I imparted to El Diablo Pollo, “but your legend will live on in my heart for ever.”

Festive

Saturday, June 21st, 2008

The Midsummer Fire Festival began today in World Of Warcraft, and I played like a madman to get a certain reward item before our trip. The item is called the Brazier Of Dancing Flames, and it took me about 5 hours of wandering all over Azeroth and Outland to get enough blossoms to redeem for the brazier.

screenshot_062108_163003.jpeg screenshot_062108_163644.jpeg

When used, the brazier creates a dancing female drenai made of fire. What makes it great is you can target it and type /dance to turn into a dancing flaming drenai yourself. It created quite a stir in Shattrath when I used it.

It’s possible, although I can’t be sure, I may be the first person on the server to get this πŸ™‚

screenshot_062108_084702.jpeg < Lord Ahune (notice the druid in front of him)

I also had an attempt at the seasonal boss this morning, Lord Ahune. But he’s quite tough, and we failed repeatedly. I’ll get him when we return from Puerto Rico!

Here’s a couple of other recent WoW moments:

screenshot_061908_231917.jpeg screenshot_061408_144756.jpeg

That’s me (as a snowman) and Florence (in undead rocker disguise) on the left, and a scenic shot of Momomo on her Talbuk at right…

Two Meme’s

Friday, June 20th, 2008

First, Florence asked me what 3 things I’d bring to a desert island. My list is conditional: no people/pets and no electricity. Therefore, trying to be serious here:

1) A tent
2) A knife
3) A hand-cranked flashlight

With those three items, I’d be the master of my domain πŸ™‚

Incidentally, I forward this meme onto anyone else reading with a blog.

Secondly, AW proposed a new meme, and here goes:

“Poleaxed, she fell to the floor.”
– Sting Of The Zygons (2007), by Stephen Cole

“His long blond hair was whirling with the harsh whip of the wind, and he had to yell to make himself heard above the din.”
– Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest (1990) by F.X. Nine

F.X. Nine eh? Could that be Francis Xavier?