We had more bloodthirsty Gods

So it seems that somebody, let's call him "Genius" with air quotes, decided to go ahead and create an online computer game, involving Jesus and Mohammed slugging it out in hand-to-hand combat. Now, following an outcry from the "Islamophobia Observatory of the Organisation of the Islamic Conference" (try saying that fast while getting beheaded), the Italian company that developed the game is now withdrawing it.

It's actually a pity because the game itself is quite good fun. Along with a scrawny Jesus and a scrappy Mohammed, you can also fight as generic Old Man God, Buddha (which is historically inaccurate since he was an adherent of non-violence), or Lord Ganesha. Now speaking as a fundamentalist Hindu computer gamer, that last part really pissed me off. With the entire pantheon of one billion Hindu Gods at their disposal, why did this company choose Lord Ganesha to represent us Hindus in combat? That's like sending fucking Corporal Radar O'Reilly to represent the M*A*S*H 4077 in a drinking competition.

Look, I'm a Ganesha devotee. Huge, huge devotee. But let's be honest, the Guy's obviously ill-equipped for battle. True, a few of His biographers do claim that He's vanquished numerous demons in his lifetime, for example, the twin brothers Narantak and Devantak, and the hideously ruddy Sindoora (What, forgot your sunscreen? Again?). But you've got to take anything that comes out of His PR department with a grain of salt. Look at the evidence on the ground. Every picture of Ganesha in the press has him holding a lotus and a golden axe, which, by the way appears to be more endowed with aesthetic appeal than utilitarian value. In the age of the atom, what kinds of weapons are these? He might as well be holding a white flag. And in some highly incriminating photographs obtained through secret back channels, He is actually seen to be holding a plateful of fucking sweets and administering benevolence with His remaining hand. What kind of message does this send to enemy combatants? That ain't neither proper combat attire nor attitude, Homeslice.

But in my opinion, where Ganesha's battle-readiness suffers the most is in the area of transportation. When you are at war, your ability to mobilize quickly and reliably is paramount. That requirement goes largely unfulfilled if your preferred mode of transportation is on ratback. Come on now, how can My Man possibly compete in this area? You have Jesus, who can fucking walk on water, Mohammed, who surely owns a horse, or at least a mule, that's in all likelihood equipped with winged feet, Buddha who can fucking levitate in mid-air and then there's our Man Ganesha, crouching beside the hole in his wall with a piece of cheese in his hand, waiting for his battle-rat to get hungry and come out.

This is what bugs me. We have one billion Gods, out of which probably nine hundred and ninety-nine million are experienced demon-war-veterans with a well-documented history of bloodshed and violence. Why choose someone out of the remaining one million? You have Goddess Durga on her ferocious lion. Indra, the bloodthirsty redneck with his flying eight-trunked elephant. Or how about Kali? The mere sight of Kali, and those demon skulls flopping around on her neck and arms would have Jesus calling out his own name and Mohammed peeing vapor into the hot desert air. Buddha would stay calm, though. That's why he's the Buddha.

Look, our ancient Hindu holy-book writers had tremendous foresight. They designed most of our Gods, bearing in mind that at some point in the distant future, They would be called upon by the geeks of the world to duke it out in online fighting competitions and smartly, equipped Them with the requisite skills and gadgetry towards that purpose.

But Lord Ganesha wasn't one of them. He just wasn't.

How to

So this Bosnian guy tried unsuccessfully to kill his mother-in-law using an anti-tank missile. He probably doesn't play Call of Duty a lot because as an expert in the field, I could have told him that it is very difficult to kill infantry-in-law using an anti-tank missile. You have to aim really hard and cannot rely on the splash effect of the explosion like you would in case of a common grenade.

The best way to carry out the kill would have depended on the circumstances. If his target were to be running from room to room, a submachine gun like the mini-Uzi or the MP5 would have been perfect for the purpose. If he were to be at a longish distance, say encamped in her neighbor's garden or high atop a tree, an M16A4 rifle would have been great because it gives you both the range as well as the accuracy. If he had lots of time on his hands and wished the endeavor to be totally bereft of any danger, he could have used a Barrett .50 cal sniper rifle from, half a mile away. This rifle does make a loud noise, but that should be drowned out by the sound of your neighbor trying to kill his mother-in-law with an anti-tank missile.

As an aside, I like how the reporter sympathetically explains how "She cannot be killed be (sic) conventional weapons".

Disclaimer : This blog does not condone the actual killing of real human beings.

PETA makes a funny

PETA is pissed at Call of Duty : World @ War. PETA doesn't like the fact that players are forced to kill attack dogs that can be unleashed by their opponent once he or she achieves a killing streak of 7. In the interest of avoiding a cliched response, I will forego the act of wondering aloud what PETA's opinion is with regard to the brutal murder of human beings in the game. So now that's foregone, let us relish PETA's deliciously demented alternative vision of the concept, preferably to be implemented in the next Call of Duty sequel.

To help the folks at Activision Blizzard learn about the ethical treatment of animals (something we're sorta experts on) we're offering to let them take PETA's "Developing Empathy for Animals" seminar free of charge, and we're sending a package of dog-friendly Nintendogs games to their office.

With a little Nintendogs influence, perhaps the next Call of Duty game will have you unlock achievements for petting the dogs you encounter and going on walks or playing Frisbee with them.

The moment I read this, I knew it was a winner. Who wouldn't buy a war game where you could unleash a pack of vicious rottweilers on your enemy who, by rule, would be forced to place his gun aside for the moment and braving claws, fangs and the certain onset of rabies, pet those brutes and take them on a frisbee slinging walk while you take your time deciding which part of his anatomy you want to blow clean off his body? Heck, I sure would.

At this time, I would also like to offer my pre-emptive approval to the UN Human Rights Commision's future request that every subsequent war-based video game give the player an option to either stab his opponent in the back or cuddle with him while feeding him spoonfuls of warm scrumptious apple pie.

Video game taunting

There is currently an interesting discussion going on in the amazon.com video gaming forum on the best way to taunt someone whom you've just killed in an online gaming session. Taunting has always been an integral part of sports and gaming both offline and online and methods for doing so have varied. In real life, it is easy to taunt someone. You can just tell the guy that he sucks. Or you could pretend to hold him up in your arms and gently lower him onto your hips in an act of conjugation. Forcing a fellow member of your own gender to envision the scenario of sexual congress with yourself has traditionally been a pretty effective taunting tool for male competitors, both juvenile or otherwise.

However, taunting is much more complicated when you are playing online. I remember when I was an Unreal Tournament fanatic in my youth, I used to derive a lot more satisfaction from the celebration that accompanied the demise of my opponent than his death itself. In UT, taunting was easy. You had a fixed number of pre-programmed verbal taunts that could be applied at the click of a button. Many people favored the "You like that?" taunt, which I personally found a bit grating. Imagine the nerve, asking someone you've just killed if he liked it. Very discourteous. Some people were more blatant with the "Die Bitch" taunt. Again, that was not my style. Too primitive for a thinking man. The only time I employed it myself was when somebody killed me eight times in a row and then finally, I managed to kill him back. It was a good way to release all that pent-up homicidal fury. My favorite taunt in UT was "Neeeext". Now that is an intelligent taunt. Not only does it inform the deceased that a celebration of his demise is under way but that killing him was so bereft of any challenge whatsoever that I was immediately ready for my next victim with no need for respite. In UT, you could also do celebratory dance moves that were similarly pre-programmed into the keyboard. I seldom used them because for one, I suck at dancing even when I am in pixel form and the move is pre-programmed and two, I have been killed too many times while dancing and it is quite a humiliating way to go down.

So what I learnt from the forum discussion is that taunting is a big part of the Call of Duty 4 online experience, which I am currently addicted to. I have never indulged in any taunting in COD4 until now simply because I never knew how to do it and COD4 doesn't have any pre-programmed verbal taunts or dance moves. But apparently it can be done. A popular taunt in COD4 is what's known as "tea-bagging". Now I know what tea-bagging means in real life but I wasn't sure what it entailed in an online pseudo-environment. Fortunately, I was saved from the embarrassment of asking this question by someone else who asked it before I did. The reply was quite detailed and graphically informative.

"There are variations ... but its basically kneeling on top of a corpse's head so your genitals are obviously on his forehead. You can do one long kneel or a quick kneel-stand up motion a couple times to emphasis the tea-bag. I prefer the quick up and down motion ... I get better results. Sometimes it helps to say 'tea-bag - tea-bag - tea- bag' for each kneel down."

A less informative reply that was too cliched to be humorous was, "You fill a cup with hot water then pull out a bag of your favorite bag of tea, then commence on t-bagging." I could "groan" at this reply but that would be cliched as well.

A subsequent poster elaborated on a variation on tea-bagging that he claims to have developed himself in his spare time, which he calls "tuck and twist". It involves "T-Bagging the person whilst spinning in a 360 degree circle". It is an interesting approach and I can see how that would work with the tea-bagger and tea-baggee both spinning together in sweet harmony. I would have tried that one out but spinning makes me dizzy. A third poster brought up the point that he prefers his taunting to be pre-mortem in that he sneaks up on snipers and first humps them in their back before killing them, the advantage of this method being that the deceased is able to replay the entire sequence during the killcam clip (the short animation that plays back the player's death for his benefit).

Now that I've reviewed a bunch of people's taunt sequences, I've come up with one of my own. This is what it's gonna look like. I'm gonna do it to a sniper because I hate snipers and I think it is my duty to periodically remind them of how much they suck. So I sneak up behind a sniper and I sit beside him. Perform a few pushups. Then, when I am ready to see him die, I knife him. Then, I pick up the weapon he just dropped, shoot his corpse with it, fire it in the air till it runs out of bullets, throw it back onto the corpse and finally, yes, I'm gonna go with the flow here, tea-bag the corpse till it weeps in heaven.

I do no favors online.