The Yellow Peril

So two weeks ago my PS3 decided to take a shit on me. Cruelly, right in the beginning of Armory DLC for Borderlands. Much, much more cruel, it was a week before the release of DC Universe Online; something I've been planning on playing with a large group for months now. For those not in the know, your game will freeze on you briefly before the machine shuts itself down, followed by the fuck-you of a blinking red light. When you try to turn the thing back on (because you can delude yourself into thinking that it simply overheated), you'll be greeted with something of a bitter rainbow of blinking lights as it cycles from green to yellow to red. See, the yellow is the writing on the wall; you get that and you may as well chuck the thing out the window and into traffic. If you plan on sending it back to Sony to fix, though, then a cat will do.

Shitty as this happens to be, it's hardly a surprise. Between my own gaming habits and my main squeeze's use of Netflix, the thing is basically on at any given moment when either of us are home. I'm (usually) pretty good about keeping it tidy and vacuuming the air vents, but this was bound to happen eventually. It isn't exactly a precedent, either. I sent my PS2 back to Sony twice for repairs back in the day, but at least they didn't charge me. It's $140 to fix a 60 gig backward compatible model. Do you know how many Snickers bars you can get for 140 clams? Well, none in your case. You just broke off a chunk of your soul that could be refilled with caramel and peanuts and handed it over to Sony via your credit card.

Now, as one of those nuts (there it is again!) that found the need to own all three of the current consoles, you would think that I would naturally just shift over to my 360, especially since the thing's only about 6 months old and I haven't gotten a ton of use out of it. However, maybe it's because I played it so much when I got it that I became burned out quickly. Or maybe that since I played all of the exclusive games for it right off the bat that I feel that there really isn't that much left. Maybe I'm spoiled by not having to pay for internet play with the PS3 and am still disgusted at the notion of it. Maybe I feel especially gun shy about it Red Ringing on me given what just happened. So I decided to play the Wii.

Sit down, because this is going to sound stupid: it was weirdly liberating to turn on my Wii and play it. Sure I'll occasionally flip the thing on when other people come over, but anybody that even comes close to reading about this stuff on the internet will agree that this is becoming an exceedingly rare occurrence. In fact, I'm not that far off in saying that the Wii takes its share of shit on the intertron almost daily. This always bugged me a little bit in that I'm pretty good about being impartial in my love for my console children. But since I never really play my Wii either, I can't help but to agree a little bit deep down in the cockles. Hitting the power button and seeing a field of downloaded games (good ones. I don't buy shit) after a pretty long stretch gave me an oddly warm feeling, though. Kind of like when you first buy a system and realize the scope of games you can pay now that you have one. Sure, it wasn't exactly like that, but still kind of close.

Outside of the normal "lose a little weight/ drink less beer/ stop getting into bar fights" bullshit resolutions, I think I finally found one to stick with: This year, I will rekindle the love affair between myself and my long-dormant Nintendo Wii. For the cynical, we can say that this year, I will rejustify having it hooked into my TV. As with all resolutions, we'll see how long this actually lasts, but I think I'm off to a pretty good start. I'll tell you all about it later.