I want to open this piece with a bit of honesty. I feel that this will be more effective if I can first establish my background in the subject matter - or lack thereof, to use the cliché. Also, I don't want you to think I'm a dork.
I am not a "gamer." I had an Atari as a child; my brother kept the PlayStation 2 in his room. I think the first, and maybe last, video game I bought was "StarCraft" in sixth grade. I can't say that my young adult life was totally devoid of cartridges and joysticks, but I am, at most, a casual gamer.
I played a lot of "Minesweeper" and "Spider Solitaire." I definitely enjoyed playing N64 and, later, Xbox at friends' houses, and going to the giant arcade in Florida when I went to visit my grandmother, but video games have never been one of my main interests. "First-person shooter" and "RPG" were not part of my vocabulary.
Until my housemate bought a refurbished Xbox 360 and a copy of the new "Halo 3," released earlier this month.
I admit, I was excited for the game, having played a fair amount of the original "Halo" in high school, so when I heard that Juan was spending his hard-earned cash on "Halo 3," I was almost as anxious to get it as he was.
I think it's been a week and a half since it arrived. The Xbox hasn't been turned off for eight days. (This isn't entirely because we've been playing nonstop; some of it is because the hard drive broke, and we can't save). The system only came with one controller, but after playing for an hour and passing the controller back and forth after each death, I drove to the Meadow Glen Mall and bought my own - for $50.
I don't know what I'm going to do with it after graduation, but I'm thinking of asking Juan's parents if I can move in with them for a little while.
Because I love "Halo 3." I'm not ashamed. I'm not going to sit in the living room and play by myself for hours on our 55-inch, high-definition TV - I haven't brought myself to that level yet.
But if I'm in my room on the third floor, hear the sound of the front door opening, and feel the vibrations of footsteps walking across the soggy, beer-soaked carpet in the front hallway, I stop what I'm doing and greet my roommate before he can enter the room. And then we're sniping aliens.
When I close my eyes, I see "Halo." I see Covenant Grunts running in circles around my flak grenade. I see Spartan armor, vibrant purple and green jungles and impossibly blue balls of energy coming right at me. Warning sirens tell me my shields are down when I'm reading or watching TV.
When I take a shower and go to soap my leg, my thigh turns into the curved butt of a Brute Shot. I look at my hands, and I'm duel-wielding assault rifles. I have to blast jazz while doing work to mute the sound of dying aliens. I read in bed so my heart rate slows down enough to fall asleep. It's almost too much. Almost.
On Wednesday, my housemate Greg told me he had had a dream about "Halo." I did, too.
Luckily, Halo hasn't interfered with my work too much. So far, we've all been good about stopping ourselves if we have studying to do. Except when one of my papers got written a little later than it should have and when Greg missed the Career Fair, but there weren't any jobs he was interested in anyway.
Oh, and I wanted to write this piece four days ago.
But really, the only side effect has been the lack of sleep. This semester, I have a 9:30 a.m. class every day, and I'm still playing Halo a little later than I should be. But I used to find ways to stay up too late before Xbox 360 - they were just less fun.
I'm not sure if this piece is supposed to be a review, a confession or whatever. I guess I just wanted to let people know.
Take it as you will. Maybe it's just supposed to serve as an explanation. If I'm not around when you need me, or if someone you know is spending a little too much time with a wireless controller in his or her hand, don't blame them - or me. "Halo" is hard to beat.
The first step of overcoming an addiction is admitting you have a problem. The second step is beating the game in Legendary Mode.
Daniel Tovrov is a senior majoring in English.
