STILL. NOT. AT. LEVEL. TEN. 

seriously, 

i'm stuck at eight. 

Some things i've noticed as i'm attempting to play to ten is a. the escalation in weaponry, not just fighting skills, and b. the fact that the game almost becomes more fun when the player is allowed to kill other people or those quite resembling people rather than animals or other bizarre creature. the thing that's striking to me about this though is it makes me think-- what is this saying about our society or the people that play this game? obviously the killing of animals doesn't last very long, and even though, that's the way to get places in the game, so the killing of other people, etc in order to complete quests becomes the main goal. is this saying something about the players-- is there some untapped will or want to kills others that this game fulfills? 

further though, the question for me becomes are the people creating this game the messed up ones, or is it being created because there is something wrong with american society that makes us all want to kill-kill-kill? like, i could think the people that play are weird because they enjoy artificial killing, often with violent weapons, but i could say the same for the makers. like, who are these people that are coming up with these plots, and these weapons, and these quests? it's the same thing i always bring up about the saw franchise-- is eli roth really that sick, or did he go into that franchise knowing that his audience would be that sick? 

for my player made media tonight, i've found this video that is interesting to me both as a fan of monty python and the holy grail, but also as someone who is observing the world of WoW and its subculture. here is the link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8455484922324998664

this is a fun idea for players of the game, i think-- to carry out a scene from a favorite movie, if possible. obviously there are visual and thematic similarities between holy grail and WoW, such as the costuming and the idea of being on a quest. additionally, i think this really speaks to how far reaching WoW culture has become. obviously people want to show videos of them going on quests, etc for validation from other players, or as a way to publicize a guild, but the fact that this group of people took a famous film, one that is of cult status, a reproduced in within the game is especially cool to me. it's a fascinating look at a cross-section of subcultures-- hardcore video gamers, and cult fans of a classic film. the amount of work that must have gone in to that is crazy.