The Winning Haiku

So I haven't posted in awhile, and it's due to the fact that I've been working on two longish articles. One on the Digital Games Research Association conference, which was cool, and one on the whole Hot Coffee dealio, which was less cool. But finally I've wised up and decided that just because I have these epics brewing in the back of my skull doesn't mean that all my one or two readers should have to wait to hear from me until I get around to posting these opuses (which at this rate could be never). So while I have been working on these articles, many other things have been swirling around my head and it's hard to know the best place to get re-jump-started. So I'll pontificate on my favorite online game: Puzzle Pirates. Yo Ho Ho! Puzzle Pirates is still my favorite online RPG ever, after maybe close to two years of playing. And I don't think I'm the only one. There is a very healthy fanbase around this glorious puzzling pirating masterpiece. My new favorite piratey obsession is Shanty Raid-io. This is an internet streaming radio program all centered around Puzzle Pirates, and it is all fan created and run. The show sponsors are all in-game shops, such as Shawn's Iron Mongering Stall. There's a sports-type show which gives you play by plays of current island blockades. There's even a politics show which covers politics in the game on the different servers. But my favorite Shanty Raid-io SJ? LeJerque. Every Mon, Weds and Fri after lunch, I gleefully tune in from work. LeJerque brightens my workday and makes my post-lunch dulldrums much less dull (Tuesdays and Thursdays I have to rely on copius amounts of caffiene). Wednesday afternoons are the height of Shanty Raid-io awesomeness as LeJerque pulls all the meta-bunnies out of the gaming hat and plays game-related songs and asks gaming trivia. Here we are (ok, not me cuz I'm working) playing a pirating game and simultaneuously wracking our brains about which games made by Midway used the 1 joystick to move, 1 joystick to direct your fire direction control scheme originally used by Williams's Robotron 2084. The grand contest finale is to write a haiku based around a particular game. My first attempt was for Leisure Suit Larry, which tied for third amongst the other Larry Haikus. But tonight I hit the jackpot with my winning haiku about Sly Cooper, which I will now re-produce here for your enjoyment: Sleek Sneaky Silent Who is that furry shadow Thieving from the thieves So for a haiku for a game that has nothing to do with the game I am playing, I won buceau virtual game bucks -- while I was at work working on a game no less. It left all my gaming pleasure-centers a-tingling. I can't mention Three Rings at the moment without bringing up their new up-coming game Bang! Howdy. This looks like it will be very different from Puzzle Pirates. It looks like more of a tactical game. It still has cute little characters, but this time they are cute little cowboys (and girls!). And Three Rings is this time going for a play-for-free, pay-for-junk model. They have been running one ocean (server) on Puzzle Pirates with a similar model and apparently it is doing well enough for them that they are confidently pushing forward with this for their new wild west adventure. And yes, I have signed up for the beta test.