Fight your way out; only scrubs and mashers jump out of the corner
The zombie apocalypse is upon us. Most of humanity has already fallen to the hordes of flesh-eaters. You have survived because of your ingenuity, cat-like reflexes, and dashing good looks. As you travel in search of food, you find a grizzled old man who offers to give you a powerful weapon. Now is your chance to make a difference in this battle against the undead. You can choose any one weapon, real or fictional. What do you choose and why?
Type II Phasers from Star Trek - specifically the design used in Voyager and newer. They have range, destructive power, the ability to control the width of the beam, and a nasty overload capability. In addition to roasting or vaporizing zombies, they could also be used as survival tools; starting fires, warming rocks for heat, or even blasting through solid rock for shelter.
The design used in Voyager and the TNG movies, aside from being more aesthetically pleasing, are better designed ergonomically, and would result in less hand or wrist fatigue after extended use.
How and when did you first fall in love with Halo?
I started playing Halo around my senior year in high school, which coincided with the launch of the XBox and Halo. The gameplay and story were a lot of fun, so Halo quickly replaced Goldeneye as the deathmatch game of choice between my best friend and me. I'd say I was pretty infatuated with the game by this point, but the defining moment that put me over the edge was a random event that got me into exploring the sandbox.
During a co-op campaign session, I had thrown a plasma grenade at an Elite, just as the Elite was attempting to melee strike my friend. The plasma grenade was deflected off the Elite's plasma rifle, stuck to my friend, then killed him. After we finished laughing hysterically, we decided to start exploring what was possible in the game, and the boundaries of the sandbox. In doing so, we explored the depth of mechanics the game was built on top of, and began to appreciate the scale of the game outside the size of the environments.
This also opened up whole new Slayer tactics to us; you'd be surprised how easy it is to disguise a plasma grenade using a plasma rifle :)
Do you think the game community could be doing more to cut down on harassment or unsporting behavior in general?
See my answer to "If you could easily teach a thousand people one idea, what would it be?"
Seriously though, I don't think "more" is necessarily what's required, but maybe a change in tactics. Discouraging negative behavior is like treating a symptom, rather than the disease. Instead, I think the game community should focus its efforts on encouraging positive behavior. You can tell a person "don't do this or that" and they may comply to avoid the consequences of their actions, but they aren't inherently different.
I suppose on some level I'm discussing semantics here, but there seems to be a clear difference between the two tactics, from my point of view.
If you could easily teach a thousand people one idea, what would it be?[quote]
Half for one's own happiness, and half for the happiness of others ( Doshin So ). While this sounds an awful lot like the Golden Rule, the meaning goes a bit deeper for me. The Golden Rule asks us to "treat others the way we would like to be treated," which can be superficially interpreted. For example, the Golden Rule allows room for undue selfishness and hatred, as long as you outwardly appear to be a decent person. Not good enough.
Half for one's own happiness, and half for the happiness of others, on the other hand, advocates a deeper sense of consideration and respect for others as part of your being, rather than simply how you behave in public.
[quote]Is there one game (other than Halo) that you can point to that really hooked you and turned you into a gamer? What was it and why?
The Legend of Zelda on NES. It was the very first video game that belonged to me, rather than my family. It was thrilling to solve the puzzles in each dungeon and defeat the boss, without aid from my parents. It had everything; adventure, exploration, action, puzzles, and was just broken enough to exploit in a fun way without totally breaking gameplay.
[Edited on 09.18.2012 11:04 AM PDT]