The Escapist: Now with 20 percent more horsepower, a 30-percent wider blast radius and 50 percent more nipple!
Each week we publish letters sent to us regarding previous issues and highlight particularly interesting forum posts. If you'd like to comment on an article directly, send your letter to editor@escapistmag.com.
"Digital boobs are the unsung heroes of the graphical arms race. They're the harbinger of new technology as well as the most abused part of any physics engine. Boobs brighten our day, make us chuckle as they swing with ludicrous motion and on occasion arouse us in ways we would never admit - especially to our significant others."
"It's true that racing games by definition simulate the exact type of behavior that drivers are supposed to avoid, like resisting arrest by nudging pursuing police into oncoming traffic. Even serious racing sims like Papyrus' IndyCar Racing seem to have little relevance to someone whose primary automotive ambition was to borrow Mom's car for a trip to the mall. That said, the driving experience I racked up on the computer was worth a great deal more than any time I spent in a classroom or out on practice drives."
"In the 1960s, researchers from the Pennsylvania State University discovered they could easily trick male turkeys into mating with the stuffed dummy of a female turkey. More surprisingly, and somewhat pathetically, the males performed the same behavior even as the researchers disassembled the dummy. It got to the point where if the researchers held up a fake female head on a stick, the males would still try to hump the spot of air where the nonexistent female's backside should have been.
"Male turkeys getting turned on by fake females sounds silly, but what about men getting turned on by fake women - say, female videogame characters?"
"Myths usually die slowly; their original form eroded by eras and changing cultural landscapes. The gun as a myth looked to fade in this way. Once attached to the Western, a genre that has lately taken on the qualities of a requiem, I thought the gun as a mythic icon might follow a similar trajectory. Instead, its death has been rapid and ignominious. Images of the gun are still prevalent, but the power once associated with them no longer exists. Nowhere is this more evident than in videogames. The gun has become an inert symbol: full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
"Uwe Boll was supposed to act like a raving lunatic, a spittle-spewing madman as convinced of his own creative genius as he was of everyone else's stupidity. After all, this was the guy who told one reviewer, 'Go to your mum and fuck her,' challenged others to fight him in a boxing match and assured the world that he's 'not a fucking retard like Michael Bay.' Gentility, subtlety and grace did not seem likely to be on the day's agenda. I was expecting a firebrand hack. What I got instead was a passionate and thoughtful would-be artist."
