[WEEKEND OPEN BAR: The one-stop ramble-about-anything weekend post at OL. Comment on the topic at hand. Tell us how drunk you are. Describe a comic you bought. This is your chance to bring the party.]

The day is almost upon us my friends.  Here we have two juggernaut titans ready to do battle on the gridiron.  You know what, I can’t do it.  I can’t fake it.  I just don’t give a shit about this Sunday’s game.  Sure, you can say that because my team got eliminated a fortnight ago that I’m bitter.  And maybe I am a little.  But I have a reason to be.  It’s not my fault that my team’s legendary quarterback (Who shall remain Bradyless … I mean nameless) can no longer function in the second half of big games.  And I don’t see why I shouldn’t be bitter that my amazing head coach (Who’s Belickick I won’t mention … I mean name) can no longer design a defense to fool a mouth breather like Joe Flacco.

Anyway, I digress.  That’s not why we’re here today.  I don’t want to talk about real sports.

I don’t give a shit what that groundhog says, winter is almost over.  Soon we’ll all be thrust from our cozy dwellings to enjoy the world once more.  What will we do for fun then?  My question this Open Bar is what is your favorite fake sport?  What is a fake sport?  Well it’s one of those sports that people will mention when mentioning sports they like, but it’s not actually a real sport.  It’s in that in-between category.  Not as stationary as a hobby, and more skill than an activity.

So I ask, what is your favorite fake sport?

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I feel like I haven’t done a video game themed High 5 in forever.  For those of you who are on my XBL friend’s list, you’ve no doubt noticed me delving back into the land of Skyrim.  With other games out on the market, what has me constantly going back to the world of the Elder Scrolls?  Well, in short, I love RPGs.  They have forever been my favorite genre of game to play.  So submitted for your approval, I present my favorite old school RPGs.

(Old school will be understood to be games originally released for the SNES/Genesis and previous)

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Truth be told, I have spent more time searching for the header image for this column than I will end up spending writing it. Whatever. The really juicy nougats come from the give and take inside the comments section, right? My part is to serve as but the catalyst for the gals and guys of OL to begin their weekly wanking. I settled on an image by my good friend Brian Galiano. A couple years back, homeboy drummed up countless works (well, you could count them, but I’m lazy) to accompany Rendar’s novella DEFEAT. If you’ve never read the son of a bitch, start here. Anyways, this is Monday Morning Commute. The column where we elaborate on the distractions coating existence just enough on a given week to give us through the malaise.

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Video games are great and all, I don’t want you to get me wrong, but sometimes you just have to disconnect, you know? Really take a look at your surroundings and the people closest to you: learn to appreciate the real things in your life.

Of course I’m kidding, we all know that other human beings are fuckers and that reality is a hugely overrated series of crushing failures and missed opportunities. Let’s get virtual.

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The concept of identical twins fascinates me.  No, not the Schwarzenegger/DeVito movie from the 80’s.  Actually having a duplicate of you walking around, interacting with the world is cool as hell.  It’s also great that twins are common enough that they aren’t treated like freaks … that’s reserved for sextuplets and the like.  What does my pointless drivel have to do with anything?  Well, today’s High 5 deals with actors pulling double duty, playing two or more parts in a movie.  When it done right, it’s impressive as hell.  Hit the jump for more.

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…and a good day to you too, folks. For those of you here in the Empire, I hope your long weekend was rather enjoyable. Me? Oh, I had myself a blast. Took one off the chin in the world of sporting events (hint), but what the fuck can you do. This weekend also saw the frozen ice guys back on the prowl, with Rendar and myself enjoying a jaunt to the ice chest today ourselves. Local team won, we ate something like ninety-three hot dogs. By the end of the day I was able to smile again, thanks to a little salve on the nips. This is Monday Morning Commute, a column which a list of coping mechanisms we use to get ourselves through the doldrums. Coping mechanisms (video games) for when coping mechanisms (sports teams) fail. System redundancies.

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There’s a pain in your stomach that can only be cured with Russian magic.

Go ahead, clench the side of your abdomen. C’mon, admit it already! Y’know that you feel an inflammation somewhere in your gut! In the darkest recesses of your tummy! Maybe it feels like a itch at the bottom of your cecum. Or maybe it throbs like a patch of warts in your large intestine. Hell, some of you might even have a burning in the colon, and you’d damn well better pray that it doesn’t keep runnin’ down your digestive tract.

The truth is that you’re afflicted with a goddamn existential bezoar.

Fortunately, the Russians have been attacking these motherfuckers for years. Although Rasputin’s mystical sojourns are well-documented, it’s not often mentioned that he was simply trying to remedy the bezoar ailing Russia’s collective unconscious. Later, during the dark days of the Soviet Empire, the mystic arts would be forfeited in favor of science. But even with the root of these explorations being the same desire to destroy all that ailed, these efforts would also fall short. As such, Mother Russia, proud and noble and willing to die trying, would forge ahead in search of a new solution. And it would be found.

The solution? Beer.

To be precise, tonight’s curative elixir is Raspberry Russian Imperial Stout `12.

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It’s perhaps only in retrospect that we can see just how contemporary Devil May Cry was upon its release in 2001. The frantic, accelerated combat mechanics represented an industry pushing hardware to have games play as we’d so often wished they would. It was fast, brutal and responsive. It also introduced the series’ main protagonist, Dante, into the gaming public’s consciousness. This smart-assed, pizza-loving, sharp-dressing demon hunter went on to become the archetypical ‘cool’ video game hero. Fuelled by perceptions of the contemporary taken directly from the worlds of Anime and perceived notions of western ‘cool’: Dante was a product of his time and being contemporary was his nature. So, what happens when your contemporary character isn’t quite so cutting edge any longer? You reinvent him, of course.

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Hey there cool cats and pretty kitties of the Starship Omega! Pleasure to make your digital acquaintances. I am Nico The Intern. Some of you may know me from such things as, well, the comments section of this blog. Keep Reading »

I used to love cartoons.  What happened?  Did I grow up?  Did I turn into a fun hating ogre?  I just think that most cartoons today suck. There’s a few here and there that I love (Venture Brothers, South Park), but for the most part, I don’t like them. My friends always joke that I never had a childhood.  They make assumptions that I was always the cynical dick that I present myself as.  Well, to throw a wrench in their plans, here are my favorite 5 cartoon shows from when I was a child.

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