Letters to the Editor
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In the future
ESPN will cover people who watch people playing GH, as a sport.
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The 2nd-to-last panel...
...gives us a clue about a certain other character, I think.
And perhaps how he got that way?
Well, I *hope*, anyways.
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Guitar Hero...
I don't really like or play Guitar Hero. But those criticizing it should remember that it's not significantly different than any other game. Does playing Risk make you a great war strategist? Or chess? How about the card game, War? That one's pretty simple, yet I recall spending countless hours playing that game with my friends in elementary school. Or even football or basketball, which are all expressions of the physical violence and competition that no longer dominates our lives as it used to? Go Fish is pretty basic and doesn't teach you anything about the meaning of life, or about fishing. Even these days, I can get addicted to Solitaire or Spider Solitaire on my laptop if I have nothing better to do, and those don't do much for any of my basic life skills.
Guitar Hero does not make you a good guitar player, and no one playing it says it does. Playing Halo does not make you a genetically enhanced supersoldier. Playing Zelda does not make you a sword-swinging fairy boy. Playing Assassin's Creed does not make you a 12th century Palestinean killer. Playing Mario does not make you a shroom-popping Italian plumber.
Personally, I prefer to play games that are plot- and character-driven, or games so open-ended that I can make up the plot in my head. But someone who gets addicted to Guitar Hero because it is sort of mindlessly fun and challenging is no more mockable than someone who gets addicted to any of the thousands of other "games" humans have been playing since cards and dice and kickable balls were invented.
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At the risk of sounding like a grumpy old woman,
I am just about lost in the comics pages these days. The Post has taken away Shoe, then the Wizard of Id, and then Boondocks went away. Beetle Bailey can be cute - but never makes me think. Peanuts is a sad shadow of a once great cartoon. And then there are Opus and Doonesberry - like watching a once brilliant person, full of promise and talent, end up a homeless drunk.
About two months ago, I decided to read every comic in the Post everyday, until I found some new favorites. I lasted about four days. Ugh. Any recommendations from my fellow Salonistas? And I can't stand what has happened to Opus. I have NO idea what it is about. I wish he'd stick to politics.
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As A Call of Duty Man...
...I can't criticize anyone else's obsessions.
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My generation
Will call the up and coming generation the most boring effete and worthless ever in the history of people. Now everyone slap on their helmets and bubble wrap, take an Omega-3 tablet, burn some sex offenders at the stake and Green up something.
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"Peanuts is a sad shadow of a once great cartoon."
Umm--who feels like breaking the bad news to Moira Kelly?
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Didn't South Park do this topic a few months ago?
And do it much better (which is NOT necessarily true of every subject South Park treats).
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Would the gamers stop being so sensitive?
It's a cartoon, folks. Channel your energy into the election, willya? Besides, everyone knows comics have been on a downslide since Major Hoople stopped running.
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Zing!
Boy, there's nothing funnier than a cranky old man taking potshots at something he doesn't know the first thing about.
Bloom County was sheer genius. Outland had its moments. As far as I can tell, Opus is Berke's attempt to single-handedly undermine his entire legacy as a cartoonist and prove that Bill Watterson and Gary Larson had the right idea: quit before you start to suck.
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@ M Bromberg
Uh, sensitive? Don't give Opus too much credit. My feelings are not hurt by some cartoonist who thinks Guitar Hero, a game which I do not play, is silly or a waste of time.
Like any rational person, I was merely commenting that poking fun at Guitar Hero is not particularly funny or insightful, at least not in the way Berkeley has done it here. That's my $.02 not only as a gamer but as a person capable of telling the difference between clever humor and tired humor.
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graphics are effective!
I diagree... I like the graphics used in last frame! I've been an Opus fan for a long time and I think Breathed is using the different effects very effectively... not as a shortcut.
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Somebody check Garry's pulse
He just doesn't seem to be trying this week.
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Irony!!!!
C'mon, you guys! I myself am terrified that I will spend too much time on Salon, and never do anything real. So this cartoon, with www commentary by us, is the perfect storm.
1. Get a real guitar. It's cheaper and vastly more fun.
2. Join me for bowling and church and sailing. Do stuff. Do not defend this silly www addiction. Kick it. Smile.
3. "CG," in the cartoon was bad. (= Computer Graphics?) It made the thing hard to get.
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@ moira kelly
Any recommendations from my fellow Salonistas?
Comics are such an individual taste thing. Pearls Before Swine started out good; dunno if it's kept it up or not. www.comics.com/comics/pearls/ And maybe Get Fuzzy www.comics.com/comics/getfuzzy/
A friend got me hooked on XKCD.com. But you need to be nerdy/techy and/or 20-something for it to work, I think.
I've otherwise near-totally burned out on print comics in a been-there, seen-that sense. Seems to me you could take people's recurring comments here about Breathed phoning it in and apply it to most, maybe all, of the King Features Syndicate comic collection.
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I am a GALLEY SLAVE to nature
There are still 100 Meyer lemons left on my little backyard tree. I made ice cream. I candied peels. I made marmalade. I made lemonade. I gave to the homeless shelter and the food bank. I stuffed roast chickens up the wazoo. And I still have 100 freaking lemons left on that tree. Arrrgghh.
So, you know, it goes both ways.
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I'm surprised Breathed lets Opus stand on his lawn
Seriously, how many of these are going to be the same topic in a row? New technology is dehumanizing us, we get it, Berke. How insightful of you to notice and let us know. Good thing too, since no old man has ever disapproved of the amount of time young people played with new ideas and entertainment before and I'm sure it will revolutionize the world. I'll send you a written apology for viewing your comic strip on the harsh glow of a computer screen via either carrier pigeon or telegraph, your choice.
Above my comment I see both a reference to xkcd (a fine webcomic), and some curmudgeonly insistence that time spent playing Guitar Hero would be better spent playing a real guitar (funny how no one says time spent playing Rampage would be better spent climbing the sides of buildings and eating tanks, or that Pac-Man players really ought to run through a maze devouring marshmallows and avoiding ghosts instead of looking at a TV screen). I felt this strip really caught the feeling right.
http://www.xkcd.com/359/