Things That Make Me Feel Old, Vol. 23

Wassup Hepcats.
Sometime in the near future, some beavershit crazy wacko will go on a shooting spree, and some uptight politico who's up for re-election will get his BVDs in a bunch and blame popular culture. Specifically, video games. And you can bet you'll see this clip on the news (from the new game Modern Warfare 2, black screen for first 15 seconds or so):


Now, that is some fucked up, repugnant shit. And it's supposed to be. Chris Suellentrop has an article on Slate.com this week about Modern Warfare 2, and makes an excellent case as to why this game is meaningful (namely, that mowing down civilians in an airport in the first mission puts you in a frame of mind unlike any other war game). But my point isn't so much about the content of the game, I just wanted to post that footage. It was cool, right?


My point is that I would have no idea how to play that game, and I would suck at it something horrid.
I used to be awesome at video games, but at some point (probably December 26, 2005), the whole thing just whooshed right past me. I think I was playing NCAA Football 2004 on my PlayStation2 at that exact moment, in fact.

Fast forward four years, and I am currently playing NCAA Football 2004, and Madden 2005 on my PlayStation2 (hooray for Dynasty and Franchise modes).
There have been occasional forays. I do love me some Civilization IV on the PC, but the one time I tried to play it online I was so bad that a 15 year old kid carpet bombed me in such a way that he spelled out the word "NOOB" in explosions around my capital city. 

Asshole.

So while I watch the commercials for today's games, and think about how awesome they look and wonder what it would be like to play on an XBox 360 or PS3, I know it's not in the cards. I'm just a 33 year old noob.
(And don't get me started on Second Life.)