Maybe working in the retail industry has marred my judgement, but I find it very hard now to look forward to a new release. I can't get excited about anything anymore without fear of disappointment. I looked to my childhood to remember when I last looked forward to something, and by looking forward to it I mean involving myself holistically with the hyperbole, I remember one tragic event, one that many of us share.

I remember seeing the trailer for Star Wars Episode One: The Phantom Menace, this trailer took me by the balls swung me around the cinema beating me senseless against the walls until all of my brain matter and head related sinew exploded all over the faces of my loved ones, this movie trailer was a sexual experience, the John Williams score reaching an ear battering climax while light saber duels blasted out of the screen as love goo directly into your face and a little bit in your eye so much it stung, and you loved it, Jar Jar Binks appearing popping his head up to say something really "funny" and "witty", momentarily ascending the coital haze in your nerd-lust trance (like that bit before a climax when you need to postpone it so you think of your gran nude, but you remember she's dead, and then that helps) but you think nothing of it, "oh its some crazy alien, Star Wars has crazy aliens, he doesn't seem THAT annoying, hes only in 2 seconds of the trailer maybe he's a minor character"
After such an amazing life changing experience of a trailer I was so pumped I bought anything remotely Star Wars related, poster, mugs, action figures, books, magazines, comics, home pregnancy tests...

Then I watched the film....

My childhood pretty much ended full stop after the closing credits of Episode One, George Lucas had pinned me down, spread me wide and raped me with a Jar Jar Binks shaped dildo until every orifice bled, beat me to death with it, raped me again then stole £5 for the privilege. Mere words cannot describe my disappointment in EP1, I think if I were to express my true feelings towards the film in any kind of noise it would be the noise of the Apocalypse, a sort of howling screeching nonsense that would cause the entire human race to collapse and lose control of all bodily functions shrieking in desperate pathetic agony as their brains exploded.

When new releases come into my shop we open masses of them, to shelve and price them, this very act of opening the games on mass has raped the ritual from me as a consumer, I think part of the "Newness" of a title is in the opening of it, taking this away from new games has de-mystified them, this is also a factor in my excitement castration. When you see thousands of copies of a big new title it completely shits on the idea of a game being special, or some kind of personal experience.

Then again, SF4 and Resi 5 are lookin' good ey?...
Kill me.

Cheers,

Rob