Congratulations on Fixing the World Economy!

You’re a crazy, tiny troll of a man who we love none the less, and you’re going to make your mark on history today when finally, after years of shouting “Goooooooold” at the top of your lungs hoping that someone will listen to you, someone’s finally gonna do it. And it’ll just happen to be a wealthy tycoon who, shockingly enough, will have sacks upon sacks of gold to throw at the perceived problem of the fiscal world at large.

Turns out that once he throws gold at the idea of the global economy everything will be, as you’ve recommended will occur, be instantly fixed. Which is good, because we’re running out of money and we could really use jobs all around. So thanks for that, and don’t take your inevitable departure from the Republican presidential ticket too harshly!

Congratulations on Fixing the World Economy!

Congratulations on Re-Interpreting the Dead Sea Scrolls!

Plenty of people have looked at the Dead Sea Scrolls and come up with all sorts of batshit crazy ideas. Jerry who works in HR told us that his uncle looked at a photo of a guy looking at them once and that it “turned him gay,” and Jerry believed him, which just goes to show that even thrice removed they have the power to make someone an idiot.

But tomorrow you’re going to get a chance to look at the Dead Sea Scrolls directly, in person, in your filthy little hands. And unlike most people, who lose their fucking minds because they speak Sanscrit or some shit and as a result can comprehend the wisdom of the scrolls, you’ll be cushioned by a nice big old layer of ignorance, and the scrolls won’t have any effect on you.

This means you’ll get a chance to turn the scroll over and find a totally sweet Pink Floyd album poster on the back. It’ll be a bunch of naked chicks with various Floyd cover art painted on their tits, and it’ll be totally sweet. It’ll also constitute proof positive of the aura of pseudo-mysticism which Floyd has been surrounding itself with since its inception. Apparently they weren’t just dickheads: they were spiritual representatives of a higher power, or at the very least an older power.

You won’t do anything with that, lucky for everyone involved (knowledge of the true nature of Floyd could potentially shatter the earth) but you will make a poster using the art you find on the back of the Dead Sea Scrolls which will, we all agree, look pretty fucking sweet and will finally give you the capital you need to move out of your parent’s basement and start that surf shop you constantly blather about at parties.

Congratulations on Re-Interpreting the Dead Sea Scrolls!

Congratulations on Completing Your Taks with Great Enthusiasm!

A lot of people would start what you’re about to do and quit halfway when the full gravity of the situation dawns on them. But not you. Today you’re going to kiss that girl on the mouth, haul her drunkenly into the back seat of your Toyota Camry, slip your hand awkwardly into her pants and start going to town, and you’re not going to stop no matter what.

You won’t stop when you hear hoots from the street. You won’t stop when you spaz out while making out with her, slamming your head into the ceiling of the car painfully. You won’t stop when she says “Yeah daddy” when you enter her with your finger. And you won’t stop when you realize, quite suddenly and profoundly, that you’re finger fucking your cousin in the backseat of your Camry in front of your best friend’s house.

This will be for two reasons, really. First off, you’re kind of in to incest play, and you don’t think it’s that weird to fuck a cousin (you normally make love to women, but as we all know, when it’s a blood relative you can never make love to them, you can only fuck them). Hell, you sort of prefer it, and even when you’re not fucking someone you’re related to you sometimes like to imagine them as a family member, or imagine them talking to you about your extended family, what they’ve been up to, how their health issues have been developing or declining. That sort of thing. You even pay prostitutes to talk like this, when you visit them.

The second, and far more relatable reason, will be that you are a gentleman, and a gentleman does not stop what he’s started, especially when a lady’s orgasm is on the line. So even though you’ll feel a little lukewarm at the prospect of publically showcasing your fetish, you’ll feel that your embarrassment is less important than your cousin’s sexual fulfillment. So even as the hoots turn to scandalized whispers as people slowly realize just what’s going on you’ll continue finger banging away, until your cousin finally spasms against your hand, grinding herself into you, crushing your palm between her crotch and the fabric of jean and car seat underneath her.

Only then will you pull out your hand, delicately wipe it on a towel you keep in the backseat for this purpose and whisper into her ear as she pants against your collarbone.

“I think we should go back inside. People might be wondering where we are.”

Congratulations on Completing Your Task with Great Enthusiasm!

Super Nerd Sunday Presents: Portal, Continued!

In Portal, there is most definitely a lady in charge. GlaDOS, the villain of Portal who has taken over the Aperture Science Facility from its (presumably male) former owners. GlaDOS isn’t just a lady in charge, however. She’s a lady in charge who compulsively creates, teaches and nurtures. She’s the embodiment of maternal instinct run amok: she is compelled to free Chell, to provide her with the portal gun and run her through a series of tests. GlaDOS just can’t help herself, even though she knows that Chell’s continued existence threatens her.

And GlaDOS works hard to keep house: we can see what the areas of the Aperture Facility that she doesn’t constantly clean look like, and it’s not pretty. Raw sewage abounds, ugly, undulating pistons replace austere hazards like bouncing white balls and cute little egg-shaped turrets. We can also see that GlaDOS was never intended to run Aperture Science on her own: she’s an emotional wreck, unstable, self-destructive and erratic. She’s essentially playing the role of a single mom, abandoned, in a sense, to her current situation by the scientists she murdered.

In her attempt to resolve the conflicting desires of running Aperture Science and nurture Chell and to free herself from her own bondage, GlaDOS not only liberates Chell, who was formerly harmlessly imprisoned, but also provides Chell with the means to defeat her. Chell, after all, has no weapons of her own aside from the portal gun. The only way she can ever actualize violence against her oppressors is by cleverly using their violence against them, in this case GlaDOS’ missiles which, to be fair, aren’t as phallic as some unfamiliar readers might assume.

All of this girl-on-girl action is accompanied by some of the pithiest writing to grace the halls of video gamedom. If brilliant minds could conceive of this new feminine paradigm, a means by which to both invert the traditional structures of a genre and power dynamics, it only seems reasonable that those same brilliant minds could put the effort into writing a fantastic story, though, I will say that Portal’s story is an extremely linear affair.

It’s aware of this fact, however. Whereas the Path is ideally built to its meandering design and approach to telling a story, Portal is possessed of a parsimonious, angular, heavily designed story, one that does all it can to draw a player’s eye to where it’d like it without ever making it clear that that’s what it’s doing. It’s a conventional narrative built around theme and wonderful dialogue, short and sweet and not a word or object out of place. Like Komunyakaa’s Grenade, there isn’t a single element out of place, and these elements form something decidedly more than the sum of their parts thanks to the adroitness of their assembly.

The sequel to Portal, the unexpectedly named Portal 2, continues this tradition of terse, atmospheric and environmental storytelling, relying on linear progression and environments, meticulously arranged to evoke specific responses from players at specific times in specific manners which, most of the time, work quite well. But Portal 2 stretches its wings, and the length of the game itself, by adding a number of new characters to the stage, including two men: the bumbling, initially affable Webley and the recorded voice of Aperture Science’s wonderfully absurd, long dead founder, Cave Johnson.

Portal 2 does little to actually change up the gameplay of the first game, and does less to introduce new themes to this gameplay that improve the feminine parallels which, all things considered, would be pretty difficult to do. Think about it: Portal gives you a gun that shoots vaginas and forces you to re-direct force and violence in order to accomplish your goals. There’s really no way it could more explicitly subvert the traditionally masculine context of the shooting genre without leaving it. But what Portal 2 fails to do in mechanics it achieves in spades with its characters.

By introducing both a former male figurehead to Aperture’s history and a bumbling, hapless male caretaker to its present (who eventually becomes the new master of the Aperture facility) and placing them alongside and at odds with GlaDOS over generations, a more complicated image of gender politics at Aperture emerges. As Webley inadvertently wakes GlaDOS then, with, and only with, the player’s help, unseats her from her role as the master of the Aperture testing facility, he showcases a distinctly male aggression, as well as a considerably less maternal approach to testing than GlaDOS’.

Webley is aggressive about his testing, his testing chambers malformed and ill-conceived. And his aggression, his temper and his vindictiveness all flare in ways that GlaDOS, while undeniably a psychotic, could never equal. Webley places GlaDOS in a potato, casts her and Chell into the ruins of Aperture science of old and has absolutely no idea how to run the Aperture facility. When he is inevitably unseated and defeated by Chell, who of course plays his own violent methods against him, he is literally castrated, cut off from his seat in Aperture and left to drift in orbit near the moon.

Webley is foil and fop, and his manner of acting as author for the player’s experiences showcases that a male touch is not necessarily a good thing: he lacks focus, organization, and he showcases how clumsily men fit into Portal’s world. His reign is so barbaric and ill conceived that when GlaDOS usurps him and returns to her rightful place ruling over Aperture Science’s testing grounds the adorable, egg shaped turrets cease their firing and lift up their voices in song. And the Webley dominated sections of play are disorganized, confused and a little bit haphazard: GlaDOS is organized, skilled at manipulation and sharp. Webley is none of these things.

Of course, Cave Johnson, Aperture’s former owner (voiced by the wonderfully committed J.K. Simmons), has a far more organized view to the testing process. If Webley is an idiot son, Cave Johnson is a father figure who established the framework by which Aperture’s future testing chambers would be crafted. And the gameplay of his sections reinforces this: art deco design reminiscent of a bygone era, direct puzzles that utilize new dynamics in familiar ways and a constant, masculine air of camaraderie which both the player and GlaDOS (entombed in a potato for Cave Johnson’s sections) cannot participate in, both in the past (as we learn that GlaDOS was once Cave’s fiercely loyal assistant) and the future, where the testing grounds are in ruins and devoid of life.

A bluntness surrounds both Cave’s dialogue and the paces through which he puts players, but in the end subversion of this system, which, like Cave’s status as an authority figure, has decayed severely, is what allows the players to progress through the game’s story. By overcoming a series of structures invented and presented by a masculine power structure, players restore a female leader figure to her authority. Granted, that authority was given to her by Cave Johnson, not just a man but THE man in Portal 2, but within the context of the gameplay no assistance is rendered: players must run through the hoops of the male-dominated Aperture Labs and step over its ruins in order to achieve their goal of realizing girl-power once again.

And while a great deal of this gameplay is shown through dialogue, just as much of it emerges through gameplay, and the gameplay is arguably more feminist than the dialogue: of the three speaking characters in Portal 2, two are male, whereas all actions in the game are, with a handful of exceptions, performed by a lone woman with a gun that makes wall vaginas. So strong female characters, established through dialogue and design, are upheld and reinforced by a gameplay design which encourages a feminist mindset and forces players to become a feminist agent in order to reach the game’s end.

Just as Tennyson’s In Memoriam takes on a sort of grueling countenance which demands the reader figure’s participation and personal connection, Portal and its sequel utilize a sort of participatory loop to reinforce a distinctly feminine domination which, in the end, isn’t even particularly dominant: players do not come to power in Portal, they merely survive, seek freedom and, if they’re good enough at aligning themselves with Chell and, in Portal 2, GlaDOS, attain it.

And there’s no shortage of critical praise for Portal 2. I’m going to slap a bunch of praise for its writing into the text at this point in the paper, along with some great stuff about its dialogue specifically. The feminism at the root of Portal 2 is great, but it’s simply part of a greater delivery system: a refined system of storytelling that utilizes both conventional narrative features and highly developed gameplay to convey what could have been a clumsy or ordinary narrative in an extraordinary way. And it’s all about girl-power to boot!

Congratulations on Wasting a Day!

Today you’re going to wake up and think about going out and buying a bunch of home organizing shit at Target. You’ll think really hard about rolling over, getting your keys from the nightstand and sitting up. Then you’d have to put on some real clothes, which would involve putting the keys back down, removing your pajamas, realizing how bad you smell, taking a shower, then opening your closet and removing an outfit. After the outfit is removed you’ll still have to figure out how to get those clothes on your body, which will involve a staggering array of buckles, holes and buttons. There might even be a zipper or two involved with the process, just to add a little bit of extra “fuck you” to the whole affair.

After that you’d have to drive to Target, which would involve walking to your car (UGH), starting it, and manipulating the various levers and wheels inside it to get you to your destination. Then after you arrive there you’ll have to find a parking space, get out of your car, shamble into the horrible pocket plane that is Target and then navigate its various awful tribulations in a fashion that allows you to get what you need.

Then you’ll have to get into an extremely long line, hop from foot to foot as you wait, drop the thing you wanted to buy, bend over and pick it up, get cussed out by the lady behind you for showing your butt to the world, then figure out how to pay the Target cashier, who will refuse to speak loud enough or in a cadence recognizable as English even. After all that you’ll still have to carry all the home organizing supplies back to your car, load them, repeat the driving process to get back to your house, and then unload your car, drag all that shit to your house WITHOUT THE AID OF THE CART YOU USED AT TARGET and then actually unpack it and use it to “organize your life.”

Fuck that!

After thinking of all that you’re gonna roll over, put your hand between your legs and rub yourself lazily until you fall asleep without cumming. You’ll dream of someone who you used to see a long time ago, someone who made you really happy and broke your heart, but did it so far back that all you can remember now is that warm feeling in the pit of your belly whenever you imagine them naked.

Congratulations on Wasting a Day!

Congratulations on Building a Robot Capable of Being Convicted of Sexual Harassment!

The culmination of years of effort, nearly a decade, will arrive today. You’ll flip a switch, grimace as electricity arcs wildly about and then cackle as the robot roars to life and stumbles off of the platform upon which it was constructed.

“IT LIVES!” you’ll shout for copyright reasons.

The robot will shudder to life and step inch by menacing inch towards you and your assistant. It’ll be clear what’s going on: it’s learning, learning who you are and who your assistant is, and what it should do to appropriate react to each of you.

Halfway across the room the shamble will turn to a rush and the robot will careen towards you and your assistant. It’ll be unclear just what he’s doing until the last moment, when he pushes you out of the way with two of his cold metal arms and grabs your assistant in his pincers. He’ll begin vibrating steadily as he presses her body uncomfortably against his own and pinches, with his claws, her breasts and ass as configuration allows.

“HEY BABY,” he’ll drone in a monotone voice. “COME HOME WITH ME.”

“Inappropriate!” your assistant will scream as she wriggles against the robot, trying to escape its advances. She’ll start kicking and biting after around a minute of non-stop pinching, at which point the robot will give her butt one last squeeze and then drone at her.

“TEASE,” it’ll say before turning to you and winking with one of its brilliant red eyes. “WOMEN, RIGHT?”

You’ll shrug and laugh nervously in response, and the robot will do the same, laughing, making a sound that resembles a saw attempting to, and failing to, cut metal. You’ll make some marks on a chart and nod to your assistant, who will be rubbing her sore secondary sex characteristics.

“I think we’ve done it,” you’ll whisper to her after the robot distracts itself from the two of you, fiercely rubbing the part of its body where, were it a person, its groin would be.

Congratulations on Building a Robot Capable of Being Convicted of Sexual Harassment!

Congratulations on Finding Out What Her Asshole Tastes Like!

Today you’re going to lick your roommate’s asshole on her request. She’ll want to know if it tastes funny and, since you’re the only one around, you’ll acquiesce.

“Nope, taste like a normal butt,” you’ll tell her. She’ll wriggle it up towards your face and won’t take that for an answer.

“Try it again,” she’ll moan.

You’ll lap at it for a few seconds, then back off.

“Nope, still tastes like butt.”

She’ll rear her ass up towards your face, but you won’t get the hint. You’ll back away quickly and grab her bare thighs, holding her up.

“Are you okay?” you’ll ask her. “It looked like you were slipping.”

“ARRRGH,” she’ll groan before getting off of all fours, putting her underpants back on and slapping you in the face. Then she’ll go into her room, we assume to masturbate furiously.

“Let me know if you need anything else!” you’ll shout to her through the closed door. If you were more perceptive you’d actually be able to hear her giving you the middle finger which, in this case, qualifies as a double entendre.

Congratulations on Finding Out What Her Asshole Tastes Like!