My last article, I centered my topic around the young gamers bedtime. A fear most of us know, but not related to everyone and its not in-game. This week I'm going to cover something much more sinister. The fear of plants!

You are walking along, minding your own business and you see something from the corner of your eye, but its just a bush. Probably nothing you say to yourself, right before you are made into a human pincushion by a volley of arrows.

Not all enemies are strong (and stupid) enough to charge at you headstrong. Many wait silently hidden in the bushes and trees eager for you to turn your back and teach you a lesson. Some of them can't even be touched until you pass them. They're a real pain and the scourge of any forest levels due to their nature to blend in. A recent example is in Castle Crashers, the Thieves forest hides many sinister enemies waiting for the right time to pounce.



To make it worse, some enemies ARE vegetation! I don't know if they evolved that way or are in the middle of their college hazing, but a bush trying to give me a hug scares the crap out of me. The entire first area of any Zelda game (kokori forest or something rather woods) is hellbent on sending you to an early grave. Flowers try to take a bite out of you, Dekus spit nuts at you, and spiders loom above just waiting for you to casually walk towards the seemingly safe paths.

Countless times in Pokemon, I've been ill-prepared, struggling toward the next town. One poisoned, another sleeping and two other pokemon are knocked out. Trudging through the route, I try to avoid the grass at the expense of Charmeleons health. A fight and critical hit just knocked out my Kadabra, time to run away! On top of that, Charmeleon faints from the poison. Last two and one more long patch of grass. An odd matchup of a wild gloom against my diglett ends in failure and he wont let me run away! Down to the sleeping Seaking. I grind my teeth as he wittles away at the last if his HP. Blacked out and back to the last town, my gameboy sits embedded in the drywall plaster of the wall.

Best part is you can hardly use the power to your own advantage due to most NPCs having eagle eyes or bad game application. FPS? Only works on other players and even then, theres a handful of tells. RPG? Would you rather have a steel sword or a big leaf? Let me reword that, are you trying to kill something or fan them? Action or adventure? Why can't you get some badass vine-whips for arms? I'm sick of using pollen and flowers and crap to bore enemies to death.



In summary, industrialize the rainforests, throw that cigarette but out the car window and kick Smoky the bear right between his furry legs cause you might just save some poor schmuck not watching his back.