66) Just A Shot Away

As the conflict in the Middle East wages on, gamers are anticipating a new war from the past. With the video game industry drying out ideas from America's past, present, and future wars, there is still one pinnacle of horror mainstream developers have not yet canonized.

Vietnam.

Treyarch's Call of Duty: Black Ops, dumps the player in America's misunderstood war, taking place in the dense jungles of Vietnam. There are shots of other levels on snowy mountains, presumed to be in Russia. We are in the Cold War era, after all.

Treyarch might not be doing it intentionally, but them seem to be triggering the video gamer generation's fascination with two unpopular and confounding wars. In the sixties, the youth were in full revolt with the old class, trying to end the seemingly pointless war in Vietnam. Today, youth protests no longer hold the weight they once did, if they exist at all. It's a important thing to understand.

The parallels are staggering. Not since The Forever War have the similarities been presented in such a popular and addicting manner. Both eras in American history were marked by internal strife of rights, dead-end wars, unpopular governments, and ailing economies. It was civil rights then, gay marriage now. Vietnam and Iraq. Nixon and Bush. Recession of 69' and Great Recession now.

Point is, both wars past and present serve to link together an experience current fathers and grandfathers can describe as a chilling echo of their youth. More importantly, this all helps shed more light on the veterans of an almost forgotten war. In Vietnam, soldiers went, fought, and came back. But there were no parades for them waiting at home. There were no instantaneous monuments. Heroes were forgotten.

If anything, Black Ops serves as a history lesson for those not old enough to understand the past, even if it's only a guidebook on weapons and machines of war. We get to see the differences and similarities that transcend leaders and borders. We get to see human nature in its glorious and destructive form:

The Rolling Stones' Gimme Shelter serves as a nice touch.

Perhaps the most special thing about Black Ops is its easter egg. You see, Treyarch's last game was Call of Duty: World at War, which depicted the Russian and Pacific Fronts of World War Two. The easter egg in that game was Nacht der Untoten, a game mode where you and three other friends play as Marines stuck inside a house being assaulted by Nazi zombies.

By popular demand, Treyarch reintroduced this in Black Ops, except this time you're fighting in the Pentagon. It's still just you and three friends, but you're not playing Marines anymore.

From left to right: Robert McNamara, John F. Kennedy, Fidel Castro, Richard Nixon

I really couldn't think of a better way to insert a president into a video game. It's not crazy, it's just politics:

Alternate links here and here. Nice to see Nixon's as grouchy as ever.

Maybe that's the best solution for world wars. Stick the leaders in a room with zombies and have them fight as allies. You could make them friends pretty damn quickly. Plus, it's always nice to hear Kennedy shout: "Can you dig it?"

So get the game when it comes out November 9. I promise you won't be disappointed. And above all else, walk away from it knowing this simple rule:

War is always just a shot away.

65) Crossing Horizon One

As Halloween rolls around, my childhood fears of monsters have turned into a legitimate fear of adulthood and life in general. It doesn't take a well educated person in the United States to figure out that the prospect for a happy future is a bit pessimistic right now.

Swamped by college applications and questions about my future, it's hard to think about what I should do. It's often a shock to your system when you discover that your parents have finally let go and given you command of your own destiny.

At the nexus of crossroads, you gain the ability to understand that you have to choose who you are and what you're going to do, then standing by that choice as long as you deem necessary. Some people can't conform to this ideology, finding it easier to live their lives in relative entropy.

For a person who hates mirrors, this is the hardest thing I could ever do. Core beliefs are hard to solidify on the spot. I believe it's a process that never ends. This is why we place such focus on education and growth. As we learn more about the world and its mysteries, we also learn about how it changes and impacts us individually. It shows us what we should do.

But where does this learning stop? As a rule, it probably never ends. As an old man we can look back on our lives and learn more revelations about humanity in general.

But perhaps a few of the things we should all learn before leaving school is that life is about respecting the will of others and believing in your own. That a person is as much valid in their beliefs as in their actions. That the different values and ideas defining us make us friends rather than enemies. That we are all created equal in our ability to live and to die.

Perhaps I'll never know what I want to be, but with morals and values, it's hard to imagine how I can realistically get anywhere. The entire world does not play by the same rules that designate our destinies.

So I guess part of growing up is understanding that none of it really matters in the long run. You live, you die, you laugh, you cry. The things you do define one small measure of a much bigger picture that cannot be easily changed. You will succeed, you will fail, and most of the time it's not fair.

I once came up with an internal quote:

"When most people are near old age, they wonder whether they've done enough to change the fabric of the world. They wonder if they've made a dent in anything. When I die, I never want to have that problem."

I just hope that my life actions will be for the better. However, I know that I plan to tread the world with conviction and fearlessness, dabbled with a healthy sense of hope and sacrifice. And if all goes well, I can accomplish a transcendence that can withstand the invincible destroyer that is time.

And perhaps, the one virtue I am proudest of:

"You, too...immortal?"
"No. I just don't fear death."

-Vamp and Raiden in MGS4

64) Talks With The Archon

Taken from Archive 18, memory cluster 89.37.82.

"...Because we conform to lives we know hold no meaning, to obtain a measure of peace we all seek, but few rarely find.

So you can't tell me what I should do? What you want me to do?

Just because I'm your father doesn't mean I guide your life. I tell you how to get to the junction, but I can't tell you which path to take. Join the military, go to college, get married, pump out kids? I can't force you to do that.

You're a damn good father, you know that?

Only because you understand that I don't love you because I have to. I love you because I can. I've come to respect you as an individual. Son or not, I learned early on to see past these petty differences.

Aimless and wondering in the ocean. Would you love a child who turned into a monster?

Would you?

What kind of question is that?

You asked. Look, it's not about making me proud, or proving anything to anybody. You will make mistakes. You will live. You will die. How happy you are in life depends on whether or not you can accept the truths you set out for yourself.

Cryptic, as always.

If you were coming to me because of my age, I'm afraid I can't impart on you the boundaries of my infinite wisdom.

For I am much too young to know...

You're never to young too live..."

63) Dying's Easy, Living's Hard

After four measly hours of sleep and a retake attempt on the SAT today, I started thinking about how hard life really was for students before me. And while I wouldn't like to imagine nuns with rulers, I really don't know what it used to be like.

Both my parents never went to college, so I never hear old-timey school stories. In their native Hong Kong, college was a luxury afforded to those who had the time and money, for public education isn't free over there. It's easy for my parents to take education for granted, seeing as they were hired for work when they were of 'legal' age. They started earning paychecks at sixteen.

From what I could remember as a toddler before I immigrated to the U.S., school in China is a studious mind rape of hell, where you have to learn rudimentary algebra before you learn how to tie your shoes. Ask any student immigrant from Hong Kong and they'll tell you how much more relaxed it is over here in America.

It's not just the subjects and the assigned work. It's the school ethic the kids learn. They realize early on that failure is not an option, lest your teacher display your academic shortcomings in front of the class. They are trained from day one to do what they are supposed to when they are supposed to. Work comes before fun, if they understand the concept of fun at all. Whatever free time remains is devoted to personal research in another academic discipline.

It's this kind of atmosphere that brings up children into productive members of society. And now I wonder what my life would've been like had I stayed in Hong Kong. Would I be more successful? Would I have started working at the ripe age of sixteen? Or would I be valedictorian?

Schooling reflections aside, it's just another aspect of my life that makes things hard. We all deal with it in our own ways. The pressure, the pain, and all the mental and physical harm has made so very tired. Life doesn't get any easier.

Pessimism aside, the point of this reflection was to share my common mantras for living life, no matter how hard it may be. Since I remember them so often everyday:

- Don't speak unless it improves the silence.
- An open mind means being kind.
- It's only illegal if you get caught.
- Sometimes you don't have the luxury of ethics.
- Bend them or modify them, but never go over your limits.
- Everything and nothing are infinite.
- When in doubt, frag out.
- Never fear death; have it fear you.
- No use crying over spilt milk; it could've been beer.
- It's better to have people you know inside pissing out than outside pissing in.
- Nothing is impossible, only improbable.
- Humility saves lives.
- A cornered fox will fight with the ferocity of a tiger.
- Vanity knows karma better than you do.
- Truth is relative.
- One man's war is another person's peace.
- There are times and places for everything...which means you never have that luxury.
- You're not ready to live if you're not ready to die.
- There are more meaningful things in life than complaining about what you can't have.
- Nobody will remember you in a thousand years. Deal with it.
- The meaning of life often involves trying not to think about the meaning of life.

So take out a list and write down your mantras today! You never know; it might make your life easier.

62) Wolverines!

Damn it THQ. You and your creative minds stealing my video game ideas. Or maybe we're just both that good at predicting the future.

Their newest project in development is a game based on current political headlines. It's about the North Korean Army invading U.S. soil after things go bad. The title of this new game, Homefront, pretty much says it all. Check out the trailer:

As this article so clearly states (Alt video link in there too), the game is turning heads because it's based on today's political troubles. People often forget that North Korea likes to play with nukes. Or as my friends love to deflect: "If it ever happened, we'd nuke their asses."

And so hypotheticals are becoming eerily true. With the ailing Kin Jong-il standing down, it seems that his successor, Kim Jong-un, couldn't possibly make things worse. Or at the very least, he couldn't make things any better.

But as our fictional trailer illustrates, America is more than likely to tread a hard path in the future. Not to say that the U.S. is actually going to get invaded, but then again, North Korea has the capacity to copy American foreign policy: "Bullets solve problems."

If it happens, let's hope they don't crack open the nukes.

At the very least, this game is some delightful political commentary, if not just an excuse to switch public enemy number one from Nazis to Communists. Gamers are so tired of shooting Nazis in their favorite World War 2 video game that they've even explored the next best option: Nazi Zombies.

Thing is, I could actually see the United States starting this entire thing. I stick to my motto: "When the shit hits the fan, and the U.S. is involved, it suddenly becomes life, liberty, and the pursuit of crappiness."

Which brings me to my next question: How many wars will be fought in my lifetime? Scratch that. It's how many wars I will help fight in my lifetime.

And so if it starts with the sinking of the ROKS Cheonan and ends in North Korean control of the world, is that really such a bad thing?

Think about it: an entire world united in peace and prosperity, with the only real war coming from civil unrest, which could only help fuel improvement. Everyone's happy, and we advance as a society that got past that ugly thing called war. Problem is, you can't make a utopia without killing alot of people.

Sure they say that democracy is the best, but more than two hundred years of American policy has produced ALOT of wars, at a frequency, ferocity, and aimlessness the human race hasn't see since the Crusades.

And while the U.S. wastes away in the Middle East causing more and more deaths, we're still arguing over whether we should allow gays to serve openly. If I showed you a picture of three caskets and told you one of them was gay, could you tell me which one it is?

But back to our Korean point. With North Korea supposedly having free: housing, food rations, healthcare, and an educational system sporting a 99% literacy rate, some might argue that personal liberties are worth giving up for this society. Just don't ask too many questions if your neighbor suddenly disappears one day.

They also make some damn nice music:

At least the citizenry can act happy. I'm guessing if they believe it hard enough, it'll become true. I've seen enough of American democracy to want to know what it's like on the other side. Only for perspective, of course. Wouldn't want to be labeled any kind of traitor. That would be the worst.

But don't take my word for it, go watch The Vice Guide to North Korea. Once in a lifetime show:

And if there is indeed no heaven on earth, then we can all just wait to die. Sit back and watch the world destroy itself in a fallout shelter.

61) United

Remember when I told you about that speck of light in that new technological monument? You know, that Halo: Reach thingy?

Now that the game's been out for awhile, the monument has finally shut down (a personal Facebook message told me so), so let's take a look back on what was accomplished here.

Over the course of about a month, 118,422 people used their Facebook pages to post a contribution to the memorial. That's not counting the people who visited the site and didn't have an Facebook to contribute. (Rare these days, no?)

The dots came from all over the world, stretching from Milan to Osaka. Hell, they made a video about it:

In that earlier post, I talked about being united, having a sense of belonging. It all becomes much more satisfying once you know the numbers and statistics behind this little advertising campaign. People all over the world, many of whom will never meet each other, used the internet to share a single common passion. It's difficult to grasp that something like this, especially for a video game, could've happened just little over a decade ago.

That's what the internet revolution has done for us. If the new Facebook movie is any indication, it's that the internet plays a vital role in our lives. Instead of us mastering it, it now has the ability to master us.

It has the potential to bring us to tears, make us laugh, do stupid things, etc. Next to that, you've got the cultivation of a new online language as legal as ebonics, pictures of cats and their witty captions, or Youtube videos of morons hurting themselves.

I admit even I feel a bit internet incompetent sometimes. Coming from a seventeen-year old that spends 50% of his time on a computer, this might seem blasphemous. But then again, you don't see alot of seventeen year-olds these days convey information in readable grammar and spelling. (I try, anyway) Some of my peers would find this revulsive, just as their English teachers would cry tears over their texts.

Even a youngster like me can't help but feel a little slow when it comes to texting, Twittering, etc. I don't do texting or Twittering, but the fear exists in me that someday I might be forced to do it for some job or something.

Technology is indeed growing more generational by the day. Why a couple of days ago, I had a good laugh when my English teacher couldn't make his projector connect to his laptop. I sensed that he could feel our snickering eyes follow his every action, but when he finally got it to work, there was a loud and clear "Ha!" directed right back at us.

So there exists the possibility that when I'm old enough to be a sagacious teacher, I won't be able to keep up with technological trends. Who knows? By then paper books might be extinct, or they've perfected installing whole computers into a chip that can plug into your head.

At least I won't go it alone. As a generation, we can be united. Not necessarily to control the world with technology, but rather provide a voice of reason against technology controlling us.

For now, I can settle for being number 81,361 out of 118,422 little dots, all soldiers of an online generation.

60) Running Too Fast

Alot of the discussions in my AP government class are often spontaneous. A group of well rounded students interested in politics have the capacity to go off on some glorious tangent. On top of that, they also have the remarkable capability to listen to each other with respect.

It's proof that the thirst for education and the truth is not dead. Even though everybody in that class would like to be elsewhere, it's an alluring atmosphere of clever jokes, valid points of argument, and never-ending rounds of discussion. It is in itself very representative of American government.

But there is a large difference between this group of students and the politicians in Washington D.C.

That difference is electronic competency.

This post made me laugh hysterically. In a way, it's sad to see the older generation try and catch up with current times. Some people are beautifully adept at it, streamlining their opinions using new fads of technology.

But in this case, a Senator trying to be discreet has no idea what he's doing. Spraying evil hate is difficult when people can trace it back to the origin. D.C. has changed.

But my lack of faith in our government is not the focus of this post.

More and more recently, I've come to believe that human innovation has outpaced it's own capacity to understand it as a whole.

To be fair, this is applicable to any idea or concept like war or weapons. It is arguable that humans in their thousand year history still haven't mastered the wheel.

Look at it this way: radio's been around for a century, and we're still using it today even though it's slowly dying. T.V.'s been around for more than half a century, and your grandfather remembers when their image was still black and white. Less than a decade ago, computers suddenly became available for personal use.

Our period of acclimation is growing shorter and shorter as innovations are coming faster and faster.

My point here is that we're struggling to understand the newest technologies that will fade away before we have sufficient knowledge to use them properly. It allows for carelessness. This is why people are blasting Facebook as a degenerate group that encourages stupidity and conformity. Failbook can attest to this.

Eventually we'll invent some new technology that can solve our problems. But before we're able to understand how to use it, the world is destroyed in some nuclear firestorm.

Perhaps that's the truth behind the 2012 apocalypse.

59) Willow

A long time gone, in rolling fields,
Only once I came upon a willow tree,
In its shade sat an old man,
Who eagered me down for his story.

He gave tales of his heartbreak youth,
Of a time before I was born,
Of failed endeavors and greatest success,
Of old age and wonder of death.

Finally, he asked for my tale,
And I could not find the words,
So I told him in kindest respect:

For I am too young to know,
Much to convey my life in words,
As you have seen the sights I have not,
And hear the sounds I have not heard.

He closed his gray eyes and smiled,
Set upon a frail hand on me,
Faded away into whispering wind,
No longer alive could he be.

Echoes lost in the quiet wind,
A long time gone in the fields,
I once knew a man who told me,
Under the shade of a willow tree.

58) Aftershock

With over nine years gone from that fateful day in New York, people still cringe at 9/11 and its repercussions. Everybody remembers where they were that day. More importantly, they remember the years afterward.

I was in elementary school when it happened, and I can still remember the absence of cartoons after school that day. I realized all the channels were filled with Bush's face, speaking in words I could barely grasp.

My teacher could barely understand it himself when we asked him about it. We were huddled in a circle, and he spent the entire period fielding questions with a shock I was not old enough to understand.

How long we've all come since then.

A failing economy, a war nobody wants, and the very ideals of an American constitution strained. Life does go on, but nobody is willing to admit that things are alright. They're not. Everything is quickly spiraling out of control, and the prospect of recovery seems nearly impossible.

So when we look back on 9/11, it is much more than just casualties and suicide bombers. It is a symbol of a united America, a justification for all that we have done in the past decade. It is the origin for most national issues we harbor today, and will foreshadow what the next decade we live in.

Such a symbol will never die. The innocent victims have become martyrs of American ideals, and people will accept no less. A national holiday has been designated for 9/11, simply known as Patriot Day.

Let's get one thing clear: people die everyday. There are only two reasons why we remember select individuals:

1) They accomplished something life-changing/memorable in their lifetime.

2) They died for a memorable cause.

What did the victims of 9/11 die for? A war fought in their honor? A ravaged economy? A divided America?

What would they think of America today?

57) Forbidden Logic

When you're in a class like AP Computer Science and work with Java, most people have no idea what you're talking about. It falls a bit close to being a racial stereotype in which you only expect one kind of person to understand what the self proclaimed elites call "serious business".

When I tell people about the class, I don't blame them for saying out loud their mental image of a good little nerd pushing their glasses back up and talking in that lisp. We sit quiet and conetnt, even exited as we punch in zeros and ones.

Were it so easy.

One or the other is not how any life works. There are gray areas we understandably avoid for various reasons. The older I get, the more I see ways to creep into gray areas.

My AP Comp Sci teacher told us on day one that the stuff we learned in his class could be used to cause alot of computer harm. Destroy a school network and the like. He made a simple rule:

Use your powers only for good, not for evil.

Me being my military self, its easy to give into my aggressive tendencies for destruction and brute force. I've already thought about doing computer evil a good dozen times already.

Thus we delve into the realm of self-control. One of the few things that separates the old from the young. Can't say that for all people, but everyone knows how easy it is to lose control, especially when you're a young child.

Losing control at school is not a good thing. I've done it before. We all have. It's an outlet for all those raging emotions. I keep telling myself to find an outlet.

My poetry's been on the fritz, as is my writing. I have more time than anybody else I know, and I can't bring myself to produce something more meaningful. If you have the time, get out there and express yourself for a little while in any way you know how. It's good for the soul.

There's this new guitar class at my school that I'm in. Nothing fancy, but I already broke the damn b-string. We all gotta start somewhere. School isn't as bad as it used to be. But then again:

Were it so easy.