Premise

Hollywood screenwriters watch their nephews play Portal and ask themselves “How can I make this suck?”

Also there’s a computer, but it’s all evil.

Notes & Musings

Let no one say I never suffer for my craft.

Alright, there’s a defense supercomputer named Arial or Aria or Arianna. She’s GLaDOS as a Facebook stalker. I just work with what I’m given, okay? I’m going to make a lot of Portal references here. I’m not trying to — I’m trying not to — but God help me, that’s all this movie is. She even has the eye-pod-things. Anyway, she watches people and tells them what to do, and she’s evil and wants to kill the president. Oh yeah, spoiler alert: Shia LeBeouf doesn’t die.

The movie opens with /Aria(l|nna)?/ and Strike Force Awesome hunting terrorists. The guy they find might be a terrorist, but the computer doesn’t think so. SF Awesome nukes him anyway, and his village and their goats, but they were wrong! In the terrorist retaliations that follow dozens of Americans are killed. So the computer decides that people who endanger American lives by taking such ill-advised actions need to be killed. That sounds right.

Shia LeBeouf and his lady companion, whose forgettable character name I cannot recall and will hereby refer to as the Aperture Science Weighted Storage Cube, are ushered through a spectacularly choreographed series of fast-paced special effects sequences. You see, he’s a twin of his brother, who worked on the project and stopped GLa^H^H^HAria from killing the president, so she needs his biometric parameters to lift the encryption security block. Yeah, I thought it was pretty clever too. Anyway, using the power of Closed-Circuit Television and product placement, the computer frames him as a terrorist and kills a bunch of Americans so she can kill the people who get Americans killed. It’s all very zen. In the scenes that ensued, I have deduced several objects and systems that should never be connected to the internet:

• Cranes
• Trains
• Traffic lights
• Cars
• Junkyard machinery
• Fire suppression systems
• X-ray security machines
• Baggage conveyors
• Military aircraft

Trust me, we’ll all be safer for it. Shia get ushered from explosion to explosion, arriving at the computer and lifting the cryptographical access matrix or whatever which then allows the computer to actually start killing people it hates. Nothing has ever made more sense to me in my life. The movie crescendos with a carbon-copy take of the lip-reading scene from Space Odyssey — except with vibrations from a coffee cup! — and a carbon-copy take of the concert scene from The Man Who Knew Too Much — except with with explosive crystals! Then a bit character smashes in Aria with a chunk of rebar and we get to see Shia LeBeouf take four Secret Service hollowpoints. Unfortunately he lives and goes on to plow the Aperture Science Weighted Storage Cube. Credits.

Moral

I’m struggling for any sort of lesson this movie imparts. Usually there’s a message — our technological hubris will be our downfall, artificial intelligence may intuitively defy our expectations, something. Every CCTV is hooked up to the internet? Secret government computers will hijack your GPS and drive you off a pier? Anyone can read your Twitter feed? Really, I’m grasping at straws here. This shitty movie was too inane for a cogent message. I think the only thing I learned was this:

The Declaration of Independence is an insufficient substitute for Asimov’s Laws.

Be glad I suffered through to absorb this poignant warning so that you didn’t have to. Be GLaD. I’m done, I swear.

3-6 players, 120 minutes play time. Published 2008 by Fantasy Flight Games.

Core Gameplay

Players try to keep a spaceship from exploding, except two or three aren’t. So it’s like Shadows Over Camelot, except the traitors could have control over your entire nuclear arsenal and the presidential line of succession.

The game is all about resource management and teamwork. The significant dynamic is events, which usually require a skill check of some kind. Players must spend cards — the cards that let them take special actions — to pass these checks. On top of that, for every skill check two random cards are added, Cylons get to add their own, and cards that don’t match the check reduce its chance of success. So there can be a pretty good deal of suspicion and backstabbing.

Thoughts, Notes & Musings

Let me just get this out in the open: I have never won at this game. Not as Cylons, not as Colonials. So take all my notes here with that grain of salt.

The game is constructed very well. Really, I have no criticisms. Sometimes the tiny plastic Cylon raiders get a little warped, but they’re shaped so oddly you can hardly blame the producers.

Thematically the game is solid. Usually games-based-on-a-tv-show-stroke-movie-stroke-book meander down the ‘casual family game’ route — Indiana Jones Akator Temple Race Game!? Fuck yeah! I guess they sold the rights to Fantasy Flight when the producers realized nerds were their only demographic, and nerds love good board games too. Good call.

I guess my biggest gripe is that it seems to play the same way every time. The lost utility for falsely imprisoning a friendly player is pretty high, so it rarely occurs without total information of that player’s loyalty cards. So people wind up playing passively a whole lot, with the belief that active Cylon infiltrators would do less damage than neutralizing a potentially friendly player.

On the whole it’s still pretty fun, but man, it can be slow going, especially if your group has players who try to optimize their every move.

Cons

• Serial gameplay. See note about slow players. Also, what is it about cooperative games that compels people to provide input on others’ moves? I’m a fighter pilot battling Cylons in space, I’m not going to tell the deck chief to repair the small arms lockers.
• Stacked. Maybe just my opinion, but Cylons seem to win more often than not — and sometimes they don’t even have to do anything. Face it, that Battlestar just really wants to explode.

Pros

• Screw-you factor. It’s pretty easy to hose people once your loyalty has been discovered. “Vengeance is mine,” sayeth the Lord.
• Theme. Sometimes I felt like I was an insidious traitor to my adopted people.

What Makes It Fun

As an undeclared Cylon, using your human super-ability to screw over the other players.

Noobisms

Simple, effective strategies that might work against simple people:

• As a human, intentionally dropping one of your critical resources into the red. This prevents a Cylon sympathizer from joining the game on their side in a six-player game — pretty helpful.
• Everyone who plays a “Launch Scout” card is a Cylon. Hands down. They’ll look like they’re helping, but they’re probably burying the good event cards.

In this grand booze-soaked world of ours, you will find four main types of whiskey:

1. Scotch
2. Irish
3. Canadian
4. American

Of these types there are numerous subtypes — single malt, blended, rye, Islay, and so on. Of these subtypes, bourbon is my favorite. Bourbon’s home is indisputably Kentucky, and is highly regulated. From Wikipedia:

• Bourbon must be made of a grain mixture that is at least 51% corn^.
• Bourbon must be distilled to no more than 160 (U.S.) proof (80% alcohol by volume).
• Bourbon must be 100% natural (nothing other than water added to the mixture).
• Bourbon must be aged in new, charred oak barrels.
• Bourbon aged for a period less than four years must be labeled with the duration of its aging.

It’s a distinctive product of the United States, but unlike Bordeaux wine, it need not actually be distilled in Bourbon County, Kentucky. According to experts at Gourmet Magazine, bourbon is one of the few food products that actually benefits from mass production.

Also, bourbon is fucking delicious.

On that note, I present a beverage that is traditionally made with Scotch whisky. Now this is going to sound pretentious, especially for a guy who’s writing articles on how to make lazy half-assed cocktails, but I’m of the opinion that a good Scotch whiskey should never be mixed with anything. Bourbon, on the other hand, is delicious, cheap, and already kinda sweet, so mixing it with things isn’t much of a crime.

Godfather

• 2oz. Bourbon whiskey
• A splash of Amaretto. I’m fond of Disaronno myself.

Swirl in a rocks glass without ice or on the rocks.

Like I said, this drink is sweet, and it’s all wholesome, natural booze. You may find yourself in a situation where a friend would like a whiskey sour. Whiskey sour mix is a freak concoction of corn syrup and artificial flavors. Why would you punish good alcohol with that crap? Mix your friend a godfather instead. If he doesn’t like it, violence is appropriate, as he may well live on to commit more egregious acts of whiskey brutality.

At Hexeme we’re committed to bridging the gap between geeks and the rest of world. To that end, we offer up a few real-world griefers to use as examples in a segment we call “Griefers in History“.

Robert Mugabe

Grief: Duping

In the past year, Zimbabwe has removed a total of 18 zeros from its currency. The official inflation rate is 2.2 million percent. All you need to be a quintuple-fucking-brazillionaire in Zimbabwe is one US dollar, and Mugabe has locked down the exchange of foreign currency, so he has all of them. You vainglorious bastard.

Aaron Burr

Grief: Player killing

The dude shot one of the Founding Fathers. I can’t think of a way to be bigger asshole in this country than by shooting one of the Founding Fucking Fathers.

The British Museum

Grief: Ninja looting

The French invaded and conquered Egypt. The French discovered the Rosetta Stone. A French guy is credited as the primary translator of the stone. But the Rosetta Stone is in the British Museum. What the fuck?

1. Board games
2. Video games
3. Barbecuing

The discerning American knows the difference between grilling and barbecuing. For the foreign crowd, permit this distinction: Grilled meat is cooked over very high heat for a matter of minutes, barbecuing is done at low heat for hours and hours. I love barbecuing, and I suck at grilling.

Today I’ve invited some twenty-odd people to sample my spareribs. Spareribs come from the lower part of the pig nearer the sternum and are pretty big, while back ribs are nearer the spine and much shorter. The popularity of baby back ribs confuses me, since if I’m going to shell out $20 for a rack of ribs, I want as much meat as possible. That’s kinda the point of barbecue — you take a hunk of meat that’s usually inedible and cook the hell out of it until it falls off the bone. You do it right, you can’t tell the difference.

This past week I purchased a Weber Smoky Mountain smoker so this is the first trial run. You can smoke ribs plenty of ways, but I prefer them rubbed and with the brisket bones still on. (Some southeastern regions  apply the rub in the middle or end of cooking; St. Louis style ribs remove the brisket bones.) A good rub usually consists of salt, brown sugar, and spices. There’s plenty o’ sites out there than can walk you through the preparation.

They go in the smoker at 210-230°F for 7½ hours. Sometimes I’ll wrap them in foil and put them in the oven for the last hour and a half if the temperature gets inconsisent or they’re drying out — I seldom use a wet mop — but today I’m trying without.

Notes

• I’m using a spicier rub with more cayenne pepper than usual. I always have a good Oklahoma sauce on hand which is nice and sweet so it should balance out well.
• To fit four racks on the smoker I had to use a rib rack, which is basically designed for St. Louis ribs, so they might look a little wonky coming out if they get stuck together.
• I’m using the Minion method of cooking for the first time, where you start a few lit coals in a basket of unlit ones. This should mean I won’t have to add any more coals during the whole smoking process.

Results

• A few folks thought the rub was too spicy; others thought it was fine. The “others” routinely order vindaloo “Indian-spicy,” so take that as you will.
• The rib rack worked pretty well, but the racks of ribs on the outside of the rib rack were more well-done than the rib racks on the middle of the rib rack. Ha!
• I’m not sure whether I panicked or I haven’t done the Minion method properly, but I had to scrape coals/add fuel a couple times during the smoking process. Still, very consistent, very efficient heating method that required a minimum of fuss and interaction.

Overall: Epic Success.

Geekiness

So that brings us to the question: How could barbecuing possibly be geeky? After all, it’s a tradition held primarily in the south and midwestern U.S., where few other traditions could possibly be described as “geeky.” (Customary circus-related definitions accepted) Well, a few reasons:

1. Easy to learn, hard to master. The ribs came out good, but they won’t win competitions. And every true geek loves a challenge.
2. Delicious hands-off food. So it takes all day to smoke food. The thing is, you’re not slaving over it. The ribs were in the smoker for over seven hours — know what I did during that time? I griefed players on Left 4 Dead.
3. Sociality. You may find, after high school and college, people generate responsibilities. They find excuses not to piss away an evening playing D&D and HeroScape. For true geeks, that’s a goddamned shame. But barbecue, it binds us. Everyone — everyone — will capitalute for home-smoked barbecue. I find it a great way to unite Diplomacy players who would otherwise gouge each others’ eyes out upon meeting.

There you have it. Enjoy.

Vital Stats

3-6 players, 120 minutes play time. Published 2008 by Tablestar Games.

Core Gameplay

As near as I can tell, WoN is an American amalgamation of several Eurotrash economic games. The concept is simple; players build structures that provide resources on a hexagonal grid. The difficulty lies in maximizing the efficiency of your industrial grids, as structures can be validly placed in only a few different ways. Also, you have to develop carefully such that you don’t flood or inflate the market with particular goods, lest your value diminish or other players seek alternatives to purchasing from you.

Thoughts, Notes & Musings

There are six people in my weekly gaming group, so we’re always on the lookout for 6+ player games. The published capacity be damned; this game supports four players and no more. The game can take exceptionally long to play — or at least seem to — and adding more players makes things go that much slower.

The construction of the game leaves a little to be desired. The cardboard pieces are fine, but the quick-reference sheets are flimsy paper and the market boards tend to warp easily. On the plus side, the instructions are very thorough and well-organized.

Thematically the game is confused. It seems like the designer had an idea for a theme, and an idea for a game, but never realized they didn’t quite match up. At no point do you feel like you run the economy of an entire country; just a piece of a larger one.

So let’s get down to brass tacks. I always like to cover the bad news before the good, am I right?

Cons

• Serial gameplay. The game can take very, very long, and you have to wait while other players take their turn before you can do anything. It’s very similar to Settlers in this regard, except, somehow, even slower.
• Player-order dependent. Not so bad, just make sure that you’re to the right of your nemesis and the left of a patsy.

Pros

• Deterministic. Entirely. There’s no randomness in the game at all, which in my book is a good thing — players win on their laurels instead of luck.
• Varied and balanced strategies. There’s so many resources in the game it’s hard to generate a killer strategy when playing with experienced players.

What Makes It Fun

Building 2/3rds of a bank, having an opponent block its completion, then moving it into his cordoned-off territory as a counter-screw-you.

Noobisms

So you don’t know how to play. Your friends probably don’t either. What are some effective, simple strategies that just might pay off?

• Flagwhoring. The game ends when you plant all of your flags on the board. If you have academies and food, you can make this happen very quickly.
• Banks. $90 per turn isn’t insignificant, although the initial investment can be pretty steep. It’ll usually take several turns to pay off the debt you acrue to build them, but if you do it properly it’s a game-winner.

I’m also an avid drinker. Cocktails are the pinnacle of human creation. It has taken thousands of years of social, economic, and technological progress to develop an environment that fosters the marriage of gin and vermouth.

Here’s where the laziness comes in — cocktails are delicious delectations that I cannot be bothered to make properly. You need a shaker, a handy source of ice, their associated accoutrements, and finally, you need to clean all these things between uses. Cleaning is the bane of an enjoyable evening; the antithesis of the mood cocktails engender.

Hence bitch martinis.

What makes a bitch martini? Simple. Forget the shaker. Forget the strainer. Mix your drink right in the glass, on the rocks. It’s not perfect, but it’s still pretty damned good, and it saves so much time and effort. Purists will scorn leaving ice in the glass, melting into your ingredients, but this is a oft-debated topic anyway. Besides, some people — and I think this is crazy — don’t like the taste of liquor. (Don’t get me started on people who shoot whiskey — is nothing sacred!?) Leaving in the ice can take the edge off, which is a good argument to introduce tasty drinks to folks who don’t appreciate them.

So here I’ll present one of my favorite bitch martinis, with the promise of more in coming entries. I call it an “Ambassador” — if anyone recognizes it by another name, let me know.

Ambassador

• One shot of gin. I prefer regular old Bombay Dry Gin; Bombay Sapphire is a little overpowering for this drink. And never, never use cheap gin. Might as well just drink antifreeze.
• A splash of creme de menthe. Comes in green or clear, I always use the clear, but I doubt it matters much.
• One or two dashes of angostura bitters

Pour the above ingredients, in that order, in a rocks glass over a single ice cube, and mix. I usually just swirl it in my hand — no spoon to clean either.

It’s a good drink to get accustomed to the taste of gin if you’re not used to it; sort of a stepping-stone to the classic martini that noobs find unapproachable. And you have to like gin if you’re ever going to fully appreciate cocktails.

1. Bake 2 dozen cut and tipped wings at 400 degrees for 45 minutes.
2. While baking, mix a stick of butter, a 12oz jar of Frank’s buffalo sauce, an 8oz can of tomato sauce, a teaspoon of cayenne and 1.5 Tbsp of chili powder in a small saucepan and bring to a boil for five minutes.
3. Bring your oven down to 250 degrees, dunk the wings in the sauce, and put them on a clean tray. Bake another fifteen minutes.
4. Dunk the wings (or just spoon on sauce) again, bake another ten minutes.

Serve with bleu cheese dressing and celery.

Came out great. The spice was a bit front-heavy; didn’t taste quite as full-bodied buffalo as I’d hoped. Also, be sure to lightly grease the first cooking tray. Some of the wings stuck to it and I lost tender tender meat pulling them off to dunk them.

One question does come to mind — which is better, fried wings or baked wings? Only real argument I could come up with is fried wings can be crunchier, while baked wings get more cooked in flavor. I guess baked wings can be leaner if you use a wire rack to cook off the fat, but really, who gives a shit?

Also, I hate using an off-the-shelf product (Frank’s) in my food. Expect a few updates while I try to create a suitable — better, stronger, faster — replacement.