In my early days of gaming, it was all about beating my sister in Combat on the Atari 2600 or discovering the secret pattern for the final castle in Super Mario Bros. on Nintendo.

These days, there are professional gamers who make a great deal of money playing games like Halo, Unreal Tournament and Call of Duty at well-sponsored video game tournaments.

Local Woodland gaming den “Next Level” held a Call of Duty 4 tournament this past weekend. There weren’t any professionals, nor was a great deal of money in the purse. However, this was an opportunity for me to see what a game tournament is like.

Nerdy? Mantastic? Fartistic?

There were “classic” nerds present. Yes, I was one of them. My teammate was the other one.

Unlike the nerds of yore, today’s video game nerds look more like skaters and goths. Gone are the tucked in plaid shirts and Superhaircuts (except on my teammate). Instead, you might think you’re about to see a local punk band perform.

Twelve teams faced off in two vs. two contests, playing to 250 points per game. Each kill of one of your opponents is worth 10 points.

Most of the players were good to very good. A few were beginners looking to have fun (and getting subsequently demolished by the good to very good players). I’ve played a bit of Call of Duty 4, so I knew what to do in the game. But nothing prepared me for the sheer tension I would feel playing against formidable opponents with 30 people standing behind us.

My teammate and I played two games, both of which we won, before we bolted for the door.

We anticipated a failure of such decisiveness that we went into the tournament feeling relaxed and blasé (yes, I game and I use the word blasé, which puts me into a entirely different category of gamers who are rarely seen or married).

Both of our games were absolute nail-biters, and either team could have won. We came back both times from deficits and arrived at 240 to 240 in score, each team hunkered down trying to get that final kill for the win. The spectators cheered and groaned from behind us during the final moments in each game, adding to the overall tension I felt.

As I said earlier, we won two games and left the tournament instead of continuing on.

I looked at my teammate after the second game, and he felt just like I did. If we kept playing, it was likely that one of us would have a heart attack.

Rather than die, we chest bumped each other, and fled the building, congratulating ourselves on going undefeated.

I’m selling off my old video game consoles and games. Originally, I planned to build a video game shrine and encase each of my pretty machines in 3″ glass. Like many projects of mine, the shrine has yet to be built, and I’ve grown tired of moving the consoles from one place to another.

When I told my wife that I was abandoning my visionary plans, she nodded once and smiled, uttering only, “thank god.”

SO, in the process of putting these systems on ebay, I came across my original copy of Missile Command from 1981. I was so badass at this game that I wrote my high score on a piece of paper and taped it to the game cartridge (277,460, in case you can’t read it, or believe it).

I wonder what my intentions were when I scribbled that HUGE number down. No doubt I was pumped to have done so well, but why cement that moment in time?

Was it a love-letter to my future self? A proclamation of my awesomeness for my sister to read? Maybe a warning to all others who would dare play Missile Command?

Or was it just more undeniable proof that I never had a chance?

I’ve been playing Mass Effect, the acclaimed space RPG from BioWare, and I’ve had numerous problems with the game. It has serious frame-rate issues and disc read errors, and it freezes on occasion during loads and forces me to start long levels over again.

Getting up constantly to restart the Xbox or remove the disc is very frustrating. Luckily, it appears that Bioware is releasing a Mass Effected Edition of the game, which will solve these issues.

From the press release:

BioWare Corporation takes quality very seriously. When a product doesn’t meet expectations, it is a matter of honor with us to rectify the situation. In response to the flood of inquiries we’ve received about issues with Mass Effect, we will deliver a solution to gamers very soon: the “Mass Effected Edition” of the game. Purchase the “Mass Effected Edition” of the game, and you will receive a commemorative Mass Effect Action Shaft. The action shaft is easily assembled and can be used to restart the Xbox or eject the disc without leaving the comfort of your couch. The Mass Effected Edition will go on sale February 19 at select retailers.

I managed to find a copy of the action shaft using the Google Image Search.

Click here for full size image

I can’t wait to pick up a copy!

This morning I hustled down to the local Episcopalian Church to cast my votes (I’m liberal, so I get more than one) in this Presidential Primary.

I love voting. I love the booths, the punchers, the crazy codgers working the polling locations–I love it all. It SMELLS like democracy! Even if the votes are rigged, as long as I get the sense of an election, I’m a happy American.

I handed my completed ballot to the sk8er boi, the official stub ripper of this particular polling location, and he gave me an “I voted” sticker. Before I left the polling location, I decided to encourage some other voters to write-in a vote for Kucinich/Peltier on their ballots.

“Even if you’re voting Republican, do the right thing! Write-in a vote for Kucinich! Think of all the prescription drugs you won’t have to buy once heroin and pot are legalized!”

This argument really affected the elderly folks in the church, no doubt cotten-mouthed and hazy from their morning cocktails.

Suddenly, the front doors came crashing down and Matt Rexroad, Yolo County Supervisor, stormed in, bare-chested and in full John McCain facepaint.

“Stop right there commie!” He shouted, pointing his righteous finger at me.

“Is that the American flag adorned with tiny gems on your fingernails?” I asked.

He ignored my question and leaped towards me.

Seconds later I found myself pinned to the ground, clasped tightly by Matt’s legs in a perfectly executed “Supervisor Scissor-lock,” a wrestling move so deadly even Ron Paul would go to war with it.

“Let’s go, hippie,” Matt whispered into my ear.

He then began pulling the two of us out of the church with just the strength of his arms.

“Mr. Rexroad,” a codger yelled, coming towards us with a ballot and a permanent marker. “You haven’t voted!”

Matt grabbed the marker with his teeth and chewed it apart, swishing the contents around in his mouth with an awful slurping sound.

“Hold up the ballot,” he mumbled to the worker, black ink spilling from his lips.

She did, and he spat perfectly formed black gobs into all of the conservative squares on the ballot. The worker tore the stub off of the ballot and stuffed it between Matt’s heaving pecs.

He dragged us the rest of the way out of the church, releasing me only when we made it to the front lawn. My ribs made a crunching sound as they moved back into their normal alignment.

“Don’t let me catch you in this church again, blogger!” Matt shouted. He then dove into some nearby bushes and hid.

I got to my feet, put my sticker on my coat and walked to my car.

We took Hayden out for some park fun yesterday. I haven’t been to Fern’s Park since some vandals burned it down last year. Fern’s was the best park in town prior to its destruction, and I had high hopes that the park would be returned to its former glory.

They did an amazing job. Again, it is the best park in Woodland. The wooden structures are both creatively designed and full of fun. The colorful mix of painted and unpainted wood speaks to my inner carpenter, and the integration of traditional park elements, like slides and swings, is very well done.

Also, the addition of a recycled rubber ground, while detracting some from the wooden, hand-built feel of the park, makes the whole place feel a bit safer and cleaner (I hate to see a shard of glass sticking out of the sand at a park).

While admiring the structure, I noticed that vandals had already been busy with markers, defacing various spots. Over one of the entrances to the inner sanctum of the structure (see arrow above) was scrawled the following bit of hospitality.

Clearly, these vandals are in need of some art classes (as well as a good punching around to their collective necks). Not only are the letters poorly placed, the penmanship is horrifying. At first, I tried to understand what was meant by “Fucklard” before I realized “Fuckland” was the correct term.

I let the word “Fuckland” roll around in my mouth for a moment, trying it with an accent on “Fuck,” as in “FUCK!-land,” and saying the word as if it were a county, like “New Fuckland.”

Either way, I believe the sign would have been more apt if it read “Now Leaving Fuckland” since the playground is a place of joy and happiness, encouraging all who enter to leave behind their problems and petty grievances.

However, I’m not so prude as to miss what could have been the real point of the sign, and I spent a good portion of my remaining time at the park on the lookout for use prophylactics.