ME: So the federal budget got announced –
FLAPJACKS: Oh, god, are we going to have the boring budget conversation? Stimulus infrastructure spending jobs jobs jobs. There. I said everything we could ever say about the budget. Can we talk about Left 4 Dead now?
ME: What is there to talk about? It’s a good game.
FLAPJACKS: I have moral issues with it.
ME: About a game where you shoot zombies.
FLAPJACKS: Yes.
ME: I somehow know I’m going to regret asking why you have moral issues with it.
FLAPJACKS: Well, technically they are not “zombies.” They are “infected.” Which is why they can run fast like in 28 Days Later, see. So that means that these are simply poor diseased people.
ME: But in the game society has completely broken down as a result of there being so many zombies, and as a result of their proclivity to murder anything living.
FLAPJACKS: But isn’t that breakdown our failure? Why are we punishing the poor, sick people who, were they in their right non-zombified minds, would be horrified by their actions, and also not very likely to chase after a pipebomb like they were cats pouncing on yarn?
ME: The pipebomb thing is weird, isn’t it?
FLAPJACKS: The game seems to say that zombies will chase after anything that beeps. So that begs the question: why don’t you get more things that beep? Screw the guns, I’m gonna go find me some battery-operated clock-radios. They’ll keep me alive longer. You don’t go to the gun shop; you find yourself a Radio Shack and you’re ready for any undead zombie swarm.
ME: But the superior zombies, the ones with powers – they ignore the beeping. So you need guns to take care of the big bad undead.
FLAPJACKS: Clearly second-stage undeath gives one eardrums of steel.
ME: I don’t think that’s right.
FLAPJACKS: And another thing. How come you can only carry one grenade in this game? Is that even remotely realistic?
ME: Sure it is.
FLAPJACKS: How is that realistic? Grenades are small.
ME: Think about it. Say you are wearing pants with pockets, a shirt, and shoes –
FLAPJACKS: And socks.
ME: All right, and socks.
FLAPJACKS: I don’t want my shoes to smell like feet in the zombie apocalypse.
ME: Yes. Okay. Socks. Anyway, my point is this: you wear the medpack like it is a backpack. You have your pistols in holsters. You have your primary gun slung over your shoulder when you don’t use it. This leaves you two pockets: one can hold your pain-pills, and the other holds a grenade. You don’t have room to carry a second grenade. Especially when you consider that your options are either a Molotov cocktail or a pipebomb, neither of which is exactly compact.
FLAPJACKS: Firstly, where are all the real grenades? I mean, you find dead Army guys all over the place in this game, and frequently you find huge piles of ammunition and assault rifles and combat shotguns just, like, lying around. They didn’t bring any grenades?
ME: What good would real grenades be, though? They don’t beep and they don’t set zombies on fire. Maybe the soldiers used all the real grenades and found out the hard way that grenades aren’t that useful against a zombie swarm.
FLAPJACKS: Actually, that makes sense.
ME: Of course it does.
FLAPJACKS: All right, I withdraw my complaint about the lack of proper grenades. But that doesn’t address my other issue, which is “why don’t I get, like, a fanny pack or something in which I could store extra Molotovs or pipebombs.”
ME: Well, you’d need the fanny-pack to be front-slung, right? For easy grenade access.
FLAPJACKS: Yes.
ME: So do you really want that much gunpowder and/or kerosene right up against your crotch?
FLAPJACKS: …point.
ME: There we go.
FLAPJACKS: Still, I would like to press the development team to include some of my ideas for the next patch.
ME: Oh, Christ, not the elephant stampede again.
FLAPJACKS: Come on. It would be the ultimate powerup. There is no problem an elephant stampede cannot potentially solve.
ME: Putting aside the question of why there would be enough elephants to stampede the zombies in the first place, and the question of how one could realistically summon a herd of elephants in this post-apocalyptic scenario, wouldn’t summoning the elephants be problematic?
FLAPJACKS: Why?
ME: Ever think that maybe the elephant stampede might be counterproductive?
FLAPJACKS: No.
ME: Well, what if you got caught in the elephant stampede? Or a teammate?
FLAPJACKS: Or Nelson Mandela?
ME: …what is Nelson Mandela doing in the zombie apocalypse?
FLAPJACKS: He survived brutal imprisonment for thirty years. He’d be able to handle some lousy zombies.
ME: Anyway, that’s my point. The elephant stampede – quite apart from being ridiculous – would be counterproductive.
FLAPJACKS: But that is exactly why it has to be included. It demands a greater degree of playskill to use effectively. It is not a bludgeon, but a scalpel.
ME: A scalpel that is made of maddened elephants.
FLAPJACKS: Exactly so.
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At first I was going to ask what drugs you were on and if I could have some, but then I scrolled down a bit further and saw that whatever it was, it also makes you fantasize about “Saved By the Bell” reunions. I think I’ll just say no. 🙂
I think it would be unfortunate to find out that this infection can be cured, and the people in L4D that I’ve mercilessly gunned down could have been saved.
Or, like what this crazy guy thinks:
http://objectiveministries.org/zounds/gaming.html
The undead or in fact the resurrected bodies of the Saved, and I’m doing the Devil’s work by slaughtering God’s children.
chenry: Yes, because God’s plan all along has been to set up the ultimate zombie movie for himself by using the Apocalypse to turn the dead into flesh hungry zombies. Religious nuts, I tell ya.
And now my mind is thinking that that could make an interesting plot twist in a zombie story. “Why are there zombies?” “God.”
You know, I always figured they went with “infected” instead of Zombie because the infected go down without headshots (fast zombies already having been established in the Dawn of the Dead remake). But the “mutated” infected do suggest some sort of supernatural agent.
Anyway, isn’t the beeping thing used already in Land of the Dead when the zombies are distracted by fireworks? The infected in the game are attracted to the gun flashlights, so maybe it’s actually the flashing lights on the pipebomb, not the beeping.
(For an extensive discussion on what military weapons are effective against the undead see Max Brooks’ books on the subjects. Explosives are counterproductive because they 1. don’t produce hydrostatic shock in dead flesh 2. are unlikely to result in a brain-destroying injury and 3. might emit contaminated shrapnel that could possibly infect friendlies.)
If voodoo economics works for Team Mexico:
http://fullbodytransplant.wordpress.com/2009/01/28/team-mexico-employs-voodoo-doll-in-quest-for-victory-against-united-states-soccer-team/
It should be good enough for you.
I’ll remember if I ever get around to making a video game to include the Elephant Stampede powerup.
You and Flapjacks have the most interesting conversations, MGK.
chenry: I think objectiveministries.org is a spoof site. (objective.jesussaves.us definitely was.)
I’ll buy Left 4 Dead if they give me stampeding elephants.
And you know, Sage is right. You guys need to put one of them on YouTube or something.
So, are you guys dating yet?
I think Brooks was underestimating the degree of damage capable of being caused by a grenade or – better still – a mortar or RPG. Against singular individuals a shotgun or crowbar is decidedly more productive. But explosives can take out limbs with ease. And you don’t necessarily have to kill the undead/infected adversaries. Simply rendering them unable to walk is often sufficient if you just plan to run away anyway.
There is definitely an issue concerning propelled body matter, but that’s an ongoing risk whether or not you use explosives. You think caving a zombie’s head in with a fireman’s axe isn’t going to toss around a little blood and infected brain matter?
Damn it, if I hadn’t already put my Yearbook quotes in, I’d use something from this article. I wish I had awesome conversations like this with my friends.
Unable to walk is meh, but unable to walk, but still able to crawl is very bad. Heck, still able to chomp is bad. I mean, standing Zeds are an obvious target. Crawling and downed Zeds…
Worse than land mines.
Gah! Like those frakking crawling zombies in Resident Evil that chomp me every single gol darn time I go by them — EVEN IF I KNOW THEY ARE THERE!!
(Mainly because the controls in RE are ass, but that’s a different rant.)
See! Mr. Jacks is the ball and MGK is wall off which he may bounce…
But what if the elephants became infected? Then what, smart guy?
Then you get the mice.
And if the mice get infected: Who cares. They can’t do uch anyway.
This is one of the funniest things I have ever read. I do not regret reading this instead of doing last minute cramming for my test in 44 minutes.
I wouldn’t mind seeing Nelson Mandela take on a Zombie horde. Someone could edit the L4D models and skins and make a celebrity edition; Nelson Mandela, Bruce Campbell, Mr. T and… er, damn, what woman do you think would thrive in a Zombie Invasion?
Margaret Thatcher
As to explosives being dangerous in a zombie apocalypse.
in l4d it is established that the characters are immune to the infection, so getting some shrapnel with blood on it isn’t going to turn them into zeds.
other than that it was a decent post.
collin