Tuesday, February 27, 2007

flOw

My game discovery of the week, perhaps of the month, is flOw, for the PS3. "But Peter," you may ask with a quizzical look on your countenance, "you don't have a PS3." True. This minor inconvenience shall not stop me, however, as flOw can be played online. Give it a try.

I've yet to look through his entire thesis, but there's a hefty amount of philosophy behind flOw, created by Jenova Chen, who I was sad to learn had a real Chinese first name that didn't somehow magically preempt Sephiroth's mom by fifteen years or so. The concept is basically that if you plot Challenge vs. Ability, there's a middle ground (between boredom and frustration) in which games should seek to "flow," and the namesake game seeks that balance. So, it's pretty, it's fun, it's free, and it has the kind of academic and serious thought behind it that I'd like to see more of in the gaming world.

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Coyote's Wager

It's a bit long, but here's one of the stories I've written for my Short Stories class. I'm hoping the class gets me a bit more disciplined in terms of creative writing so I can make some more progress on Garou, but so far comps has been interfering. But now that the draft of that is in, I can rest for a while! And possibly write. Anyway, here are the fruits of my labor so far.

Coyote's Wager

“So then, it’s agreed?” Coyote asked.

“Yesss,” hissed Snake. “We have a wager.” Somewhere deep in her coils, her rattle shook with anticipation.

“One day, eh?” Coyote shrugged. “You really think it’ll take that long? I mean, sure, you’re very confident about your venom and all. I know it’s your pride and joy. I hear your hissing, you thank the sun for it every day.” Coyote looked up to the hot, western sun overhead. “But the sun gave me gifts as well, and it seems to me like I’ll have cured myself within a few hours, and then, I get your rattler.” Coyote grinned, his teeth as white as the scales on Snake’s underbelly. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Snake’s eyes were as impassive as ever, black orbs as shiny as her scales. She began to move back and forth, her triangular head never breaking her stare at Coyote. “Enjoy your delusionsss. You won’t connive your way out of this bet, Coyote. I will win, and you will die. The people will forget you, and worship me as the one who laid low the crafty Coyote. A trickssster should never asssk to be bitten, fool.”

Coyote yelped as Snake suddenly stopped her seductive swaying and sunk her fangs deep into his neck. He was surprised; Snake was even faster than he’d thought. His reflexes told him to snap at the serpent, but the bet held him back. It was all part of the plan, he reminded himself. Snake let go and began uncoiling herself, sliding quickly away into the underbrush.

“Dammit!” Coyote yelled after Snake. “You didn’t say it was going to be in the neck!” He stumbled a bit, feeling the venom hit. The world swam before his eyes, and with great effort he lowered himself to the ground. Maybe, Coyote thought, this wasn’t such a good idea after all.
------
Max walked the length of the sharpened chain, making sure there were no twists in it. His last partner had missed a twist once, and the whole line had snapped. Max had fired him and hired his high school classmate Russell to fill in. Russell had shown himself to be careful about the job even if he didn’t seem to care about much else, but even so Max wasn’t going to take any chances. He crunched through the underbrush, ducking under gnarled pinyon pines and over prickly pear cacti that scratched at his boots. Finally he reached his tractor, snugged up the connection to the winch, and climbed up onto the tractor.

“You ready?” Max shouted across the lot. Russell gave him the thumbs up and climbed into his own tractor, tethered to Max’s by fifty feet of sharpened chain. Max gave the signal, and the two machines started moving forward, tearing through the underbrush and shearing off the scattered, scraggly trees at their stumps. The swath of destruction they left behind them would be cleared out later; Max just had to make sure they didn’t snag the chain on any rocks.

The tractors had cleared halfway across the lot when they reached a cluster of trees. The dry, gnarly pinyons were more troublesome than they looked, and the tractors strained to cut through the small copse. Finally, after nearly half an hour of backing up and taking swipe after swipe at the cluster of trees, they had all been shorn off or uprooted. The tractors pushed forward when something caught Max’s eye.

“Russell!” He shouted over the thrum of the diesel engines. Russell didn’t hear him. Max cut the ignition and stood up in his seat, waving his hat to the other driver. “Russell, stop yer damned engine!” Russell looked over, surprised, and stopped his tractor. Max started walking towards what he’d seen and met Russell in the middle of the chain, now swinging gently in place.

“Ho-lee sheet.” Russell looked down at the man lying face-down, just a few feet in front of the razor-sharp chain. “You got some good eyes on you there, I didn’t see anything.” Russell peered out from under the brim of his hat. “Weird place for a fella to be, don’t you think?”

Max glared at his partner, and knelt next to the man, looking him over. He wore a faded flannel shirt and stonewashed jeans, torn at the knees. The man’s skin was the same deep tan as Max’s, from long hours clearing brush in the hot Colorado sun. His face was hidden, pressed up against the gritty, dry earth. Not sure what to do, Max nudged him with the toe of his boot.

“You think he’s dead?” Russell did not look at all perturbed by this possibility.

“No, Russ,” Max sighed. “You can see him breathing.”

“Ah,” said Russell.

“I’m just not sure what to do with him…they always tell you that thing about how you’re not supposed to move someone if they’re injured, right? But I can see any marks on this guy, so…” Max trailed off, then shrugged at Russell and shook the man by his shoulders.

“Huhwasshappenin?” The man sputtered, pushing himself up and looking around in bewilderment. “Who’re you guys? Where am I? And what am I doing with dirt all over my face?” He brushed his hands over his face, knocking loose a cascade of dirt and pebbles from his bushy mustache.

“Easy there, mister,” Max said, backing away a few steps. “We just found you out here in the middle of the Kings’ property. Truth be told, we nearly cut you in half.” Max gestured back to the chain dangling a few feet from the man’s chest. “You alright?”

“Hmm, yes, I think so,” said the man. He brushed off the front of his shirt and jeans and twitched his mustache a few times, almost as if he were testing it out. “Yep, everything seems all right,” he nodded with an air of finality.

Max and Russell stared at him.

“Oh, how rude of me, fellas, I’m sorry. You might say the sun’s addled my brains a bit.” He stuck out his hand towards Max. “I’m Kai.”

Max shook his hand, looking slightly askance at the strange, very lean man who kept twitching his mustache at them. “My name’s Max, and this here is Russell.”

Russell stuck out his hand and shook the stranger’s. “Kai’s a weird name,” he said, pushing his hat back on his head.

“Japanese.” Kai bent down to touch his toes. He really was very skinny, Max thought. Almost undernourished. He wondered how long he had been stuck out here in the brush.

“You don’t look like any Japanese fella I’ve ever seen.” Russell scratched his head, then replaced his hat.

“Well, half-Japanese, actually,” said Kai. “My father was in the Navy, met my mom over there, and now I stand here before you.” Kai grinned, his big mouth showing brilliantly white teeth.

“Ah,” said Russell.

“How exactly did you get here, anyway?” Max crossed his arms. “This is private property, and you were out cold miles from the nearest county road. You’re lucky we found you before you got sunstroke or something. You don’t even have a hat, you must be parched.”

“Ah, nothing I’m not used to. I’m a wanderer, and the roads around here aren’t that interesting. I like taking the scenic route, if you follow me.” Max nodded slowly, and Russell continued to stare impassively. Kai continued. “So I was on a stroll through this fine property here when I got pretty light-headed. Then I think I remember lying down, and well, here we are!” Kai grinned again. “You don’t happen to have any water, do you? You were right about being parched.”

Max walked back to his tractor and tossed Kai a bottle of water from his pack. “Well, in any case, I think you should clear off the property before the Kings get back to check up on us. We need to clear three more chain-lengths before sundown, and that’s coming up fast.”

Kai took a long swig of water and smacked his lips together. “Thanks Max, that hit the spot.” He tossed the water back to Max, and stood with his hands clasped behind his head, surveying the scrubby land around them. “Tell you what, how about if I play scout for you folks, run ahead of the chain and check out that there aren’t any rocks or other vagrants such as myself hiding out there,” he winked. “Then do you think I could hitch a ride back to town with you? I’m still feeling a bit loopy, and I wouldn’t want to wake up again to a less alert crew of bushwhackers.”

“Well…” Max stalled by walking the water back to the tractor.

“C’mon,” Kai smiled. “I’ll buy you guys a round at the bar.”

“Better hurry then,” said Russell, moving to his tractor with a jump in his step. “It’s almost sundown.”
------

The pickup’s cab would have been cramped with three people, so Max asked Kai to ride in the back. The lean man nodded, hopped up into the pickup bed, and leaned with his back against the cab. The ride back to town was bumpy and dusty, but Max didn’t hear any complaints from their passenger. As dusk fell and Max switched on the truck’s headlights, Kai knocked on the rear window. “Russ, can you open that window?” Russell pulled his hat down over his eyes. “Dammit Russ, I’m trying to keep my eyes on the road. Damn near hit a deer last night.” Kai knocked again, and Russell just shrugged. Max sighed and twisted in his seat to open the sliding window. “What is it?”

“I’ve got a splitting headache, Max. Do you have any aspirin back here?”

Max looked back. Kai’s forehead was scrunched up, his eyes were closed, and he was grimacing in pain. “Yeah, yeah, in the box back there, top drawer. You all right? Sure you don’t have sunstroke after all?”

“Nah, nah, nothing a beer won’t cure, right?” Kai’s voice was accompanied by rummaging noises. “Ah, found it.” Max heard the rattling of a pill bottle, and Kai gulped down the pills. A few minutes later, he said, “Ah, thanks, that’s helping already. You have some interesting stuff in the box back here, Max. Nice Remington, and I appreciate a man who knows how to stock his toolbox.” The rummaging sound stopped, and Kai’s mustachioed face poked through the window. His brown eyes glinted in the cabin’s light. He held up a small glass vial filled with liquid. “What’s this for?”

Max glanced over his shoulder. “You be careful, that stuff’s expensive. It’s rattler anti-venom. It’s good to keep on hand, and can save you a limb if you’re far enough out from a doctor. Russ here was bit once, and all he’s got to show for it is a scar, thanks to that stuff.” Russell grunted from the passenger seat. Max smirked at his partner. “Anyway, that’s for rattlers and the like. My Remy’s for the other pests, mountain lions and coyotes and whatnot.”

“Coyotes, eh?” Kai’s head disappeared from the rear window. “You see them often?”

“More than I’d like, little bastards. If the wife packs me any meat, half the time I get back to the truck for lunch and find one of them munching on it. They’re quick though, most of ‘em get away before I can put a round into their thieving hide.”

“Is that so? They don’t sound that bad to me, just hungry.” There were more rummaging sounds, then a quiet snap of metal.

“You sure aren’t from around here, are you, Kai?” Max was focused on the darkened road.

“Nope. Like I said, just a wanderer.”
------
Max leaned heavily against the countertop, rubbing his eyes and stretching his legs from atop the barstool. Russell leaned with his back to the bar, elbows propped on the countertop, surveying the night’s turnout of girls. Russell’s eyes rested upon a tall brunette leaning over a pool table, lining up a shot and obviously showing off in her tight, stars-and-stripes-patterned shirt and cutoff jeans. He elbowed Max. “There’s one who doesn’t look like she’s taken.”

Max looked back over his shoulder at the one crowded pool table in the room of otherwise empty ones. “She’s got five guys around her, Russ. And they don’t look like they’re just there for a game of pool.”

“Yeah, but she’s beatin’ the pants off all of them.” Russell sounded slightly awed by this.

“Don’t they wish,” Max muttered.

“I bet she’s just waiting for someone to come along who can match her. Maybe that’s what she’s waiting for.”

“She probably just wants to play pool without being bothered, Russ.”

Russell ignored him. “Well, let’s see how she does against the Russ-inator!” He strutted off towards the table.

Max turned back to the bar. “Why can’t he be this enthusiastic on the job?” Max asked to no one in particular. He looked over to the men’s room, which Kai had disappeared into several minutes ago, complaining of another headache. He wondered if he should take the man to the hospital. Max sighed. “I need a drink.”

“What’ll you have, Max?” The bartender’s pockmarked face smiled down at him as he threw a towel over his shoulder and reached for a pint glass. “The usual?”

“Nah, I think I’ll spring for a Red Hook, Bill. Especially on account of this being on Kai’s dime tonight.” Max gestured vaguely towards the men’s room.
Bill poured a pint and slid it to Max. “Oh yeah, the scrawny guy you and Russ brought in? I don’t know, he didn’t exactly look like he was the type to make good on his tab, if you don’t mind my saying. You watch out for him, don’t let him stick you with anything.” Max nodded. “Kai, huh? Weird name.”

“He’s half-Japanese, apparently.” Max drained half the pint and heard a shout from over by the men’s room. He turned to see Kai apologizing to a large man. They had a brief argument, then Kai said something that seemed to calm down the larger man, who disappeared into the restroom.

Kai walked over, flashing his brilliant smile, and produced a fat wallet, seemingly out of nowhere. Max thought the ID picture on the back looked far too well-fed to be Kai, but forgot about it when the skinny man slapped a fresh-looking fifty-dollar bill down on the bar. “I see Max has already ordered. Barkeep, I’ll have the same for me, and another for Russell, who seems to be in dire need of rescue from an ass-kicking at the hands of that lovely lady.” Kai grabbed the two pints Bill rapidly poured, and headed over to the pool table.

“Well, better follow the excitement,” Max said to Bill, who nodded and went back to wiping down the bar. Max slid down off the barstool and towards the smoke-wreathed pool table, surrounded by anxious men milling about in the dim light. Something else was in the air as well, Max noticed, some dry, cool scent, almost lost in the heady stink of the men’s sweat. As the woman in the American flag shirt moved around the table towards him, lining up a shot, the smell got stronger, and Max heard a faint tinkling noise as the woman moved her hips slowly from side to side as she aimed and sank two striped balls into the table’s worn pockets. He saw a miniature rain-stick hanging from her belt.

She straightened up and turned towards Max, leaning on her pool cue. “See something you like, stranger?” She smirked, and Max frowned. When she said ‘see’ and ‘stranger,’ she said it with a low, seductive hiss. He knew she was mocking him.

“Not really,” he said, taking what he hoped was a nonchalant pull from his glass. The other men were grinning at him. A few laughed. “Nope, just looking at that rain stick. Odd thing to have.”

“Yes, well, the boys here think it’s my good luck charm.”

“Angelise hasn’t lost a game yet!” said one of the men, looking slightly smitten.

“Care to try your luck, stranger?” She walked towards Max, the rain stick tinkling.

“I don’t know about him, but I wouldn’t mind a game.” Kai slid smoothly between Max and Angelise. “In fact, would you like to make a wager on it?”

Angelise stopped sharply, and for a split second her beautiful smile dissolved into anger. Then, just a quickly, it was back to a blithe smile. “Sounds good to me. What did you have in mind?”

“How about this fifty against that rain stick of yours?”

Angelise smiled demurely. “That’s not worth fifty dollars. Here,” she reached into her pocket and pulled out a bill. “Fifty of my own.”

Kai shrugged, twitched his mustache, and laid his fifty down on the table next to hers. “Fair enough. You break. You’ll need the leg up.”

“Oh-ho-ho, we’ll see where that kind of talk gets you.”

The first game didn’t even last ten minutes. Angelise cleaned up, and took Kai’s fifty. Kai laid down another, and fifteen minutes later had earned his first fifty back. He bought the entire group shots of whiskey. Even Russell was entranced at this point, and he, Max, and the other men all huddled around the pool table, watching Angelise’s quick, solid strikes with the cue and Kai’s playful, roundabout way of sneaking around intervening balls and sinking only his own. The two dueled back and forth for at least a dozen games, no one could remember how many, and after each of Kai’s victories, he bought a round of shots. Angelise matched them round for round, and she and Kai seemed clear-headed and steady long after Max’s head had descended into a pleasant fuzziness.

Somewhere after midnight and at least six shots of Bill’s best whiskey for the congregation at the pool table, Angelise had run out of money.

“You want to keep playing?” asked Kai. “You can always back out.”

Angelise snorted. “You’re no better than I am, Kai,” she hissed.

“Is that so?” Kai laid another fifty on the table. “Then you won’t mind putting that rain stick of yours on the table, will you?”

Angelise glared, but hesitated. The cheering of the crowd around them seemed to eat at her pride, though, and she finally unclipped the rain stick from her belt. “Last game,” she said, sneering. “I break.” She leaned over the table, and the final game began.

As everyone stared intently at the clacking, rebounding balls on the table, the large man arose from his corner table and shuffled slowly up to the bar. Bill brought up his tab, and the large man reached into his pocket.

“Hey!” the large man shouted, stumbling a little as he turned to address the rest of the bar. “Where’sh my wallet!”

Everyone turned to look at the sudden outburst, the game momentarily forgotten. Russell chuckled a little, and then Angelise screamed. Through the haze of whiskey, Max saw Kai running out of the bar into the street, and slowly realized that the rain stick was gone from the table. The large man was shouting something about a scrawny pick-pocket, and Bill was yelling for them all to go catch the thief before he got away. Max found himself in the middle of the crowd, all trying to get out the door at once.

“Maxsh, we’ll try to catch him, you fire a warning shot to try an’ shtartle him or something,” Russell slurred. He turned and started lumbering down the street with the others. Max could make out the figure of Kai, sprinting down the street, his lean form blurring in the streetlights.

Max reached into the back of his truck and pulled out the Remington. Even drunk, his practiced fingers loaded the rifle smoothly. He cocked the gun, pointed the barrel towards the sky, and squeezed the trigger.

Nothing.

Max squinted at the gun in the glow of the streetlight. The firing pin had been snapped completely off.

“That son of a…”
------
Coyote grinned at Snake, who coiled protectively around her wounded tail. She hissed at him. “We never talked about bringing the humansss into thisss. I even had to follow you to that ssstinking place to make sssure you wouldn’t cheat. And you did,” she said, her powerful coils quivering with anger.

“Hardly,” said Coyote, holding up the rain stick and the empty glass vial. “The humans are fools, I admit, but they have some wonderful toys.” He turned the rain stick upside down, and Snake shrank back from the gentle tinkling noise, baring her fangs at Coyote. “Oh, don’t worry. I’ll give you a chance to win back your rattler. Some day.” Coyote turned and walked towards the rising sun, whistling happily as he shook his new rattle.