1.30.2008

HARD CHOICES FOR HARD PEOPLE: A GUIDE FOR HARDWARE LOYALISTS IN THE 2008 PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES

So I had this really bad idea after watching the Florida returns on the C-SPAN tonight. I was eating fajitas at the time; perhaps, so engrossed in those delicious mexican treats, I couldn't recognize a dumbass idea if it hit me with Rudy Guliani's derailed campaign.

Well, this was the idea: considering the utter nonsense I've seen on forums regarding this "console war," drivel, mayhaps these energetic, engrossed folks could use some political guidance! So I tried to come up with a voter's guide for those so engrossed in the console war they feel compelled to vote for the candidate that most exemplifies their chosen platform.

I haven't done a very good job so far, but if I keep sitting on unpublished blog drafts I'll never get anything up here. So fuck it, here's the first part. Hopefully it'll be done before Super Tuesday, but I'm incredibly busy this week. So. We'll see.





We know it's hard to follow the political landscape when you spend most of your time on NeoGAF accusing major publishing outlets of various biases and the rest of your time photoshoping despicable things to post on 4Chan. However, there's this upcoming thing that's much bigger than that Everybody Votes channel on Wii coming up: Super Tuesday.

Sadly, you haven't been following this race too closely: the holiday NPD's are fresh in your mind; some jackass named PlasterGearRaypist or whatever keeps posting bullshit, misleading lies about some hardware specs which proves definitively your console of choice is underpowered and maybe bi-curious; another guy started a thread postulating that the SaGa franchise is the greatest of all time; some troll keeps dismissing your favorite hardware platform as "st00pd lik teh Virtually Boyz." Alas, there are only so many hours in the day, and national politics could eat into the hours you spend getting into asinine arguments on message boards. So when you get to the polling booth, you may think it's alright to just go off your gut reaction when you slam your pencil though that punch card.

Watch out, though! If you vote for the wrong canidate, you're practically admitting... you bought the wrong system.



So, let's say say you're a member of the Sony Defense Force, but you're leaning towards Hilary Clinton in the upcoming Democratic Primary in your state. Are you sure Hilary is as feature complete and exciting as your 60 GB launch system?

And you, Nintendo fanboy, voting for Barack Obama? Are you sure he's a symbol of unfailing perfection, just like every Nintendo idea ever?

You over there, running Gary's Mod on your customized Linux box, who are you voting for? Romney? McCain? Joe Biden? Who? (Actually, we both know you're voting for Ron Paul. So never mind).

How can you know which candidate supports your system? Believe this: your favorite candidate is staring you in your pasty, blissfully unaware face already! See, in this year's primary campaign, every candidate shares many attributes with your preferred gameplaying machine, whichever it may be. You mightn't have realized this, either because you're a rational and well-rounded human being capable of compartmentalizing your political views from your fanboyism or (and this is far more likely) you haven't realized that your skill at spewing nonsensical, vitriolic hogwash is useful outside message boards.

Luckily, we are here to help you. We've spent like ten minutes thinking this though, and we can definitively tell you what candidate your fanboy bias will capture your heart.

SONY

Barack Obama is your cat, kittens. Much like St. Kutaragi, Obama is an inspirational figure, someone with a vision of a perfect, peaceful, beautiful future where everyone is united in common, cancer-destroying good.

The Cell processor is like a physical manifestation of the title of Obama's autobiography, the Audacity of Hope.

Although Obama pretty much offers an identical set of policy decisions with his main Democratic Party competitor, he's as interested in building a community of consensus and civility (just like Home will!) He is also a smoker, and the PS3 has a smoke filter accessory out there in Japan right now. So suck it, 360!

PSP fanboys should take a close gander at Fred Thompson, even though he dropped out of the race fairly recently (you can write in on these ballots, unlike those daily gameFAQs polls). Thompson was the presumed frontrunner before he even entered the race, based on his Q rating and penchant for saying inane things like "Well, you can't catch a catfish with a toothpook," while his supporters oohed and awed at his intellectual bravery [*note: Thompson almost certainly never said that catfish thing].

So was the PSP.

After entering the race, he kinda napped a lot and didn't do much of anything.

Sort of like the PSP.