Tech writer Dean Takahashi - that would be Dean "Opening The Xbox/The Xbox 360 Uncloaked" Takahashi - mentioned an upcoming documentary on his blog. Entitled "Moral Kombat," the trailer for it is mostly a sensationalist sort of hook whose urgent piano strains to convey the unrelenting danger of the coming Cyber Game War. I sincerely doubt the tone of the piece matches this trailer, given some of the participants - for example, I don't think that Henry Jenkins would be party to a hysterical dialogue, even in an attempt to tame it.
I haven't seen it, though I would love to. We did, however, approach their trailer with our characteristic scorn as is required of us by the Penny Arcade Charter. There's a lot of strange quotes and received wisdom I don't especially have any use for, and to dredge up that fruity "9/11 Terrorists Trained On MS Flight Simulator" stuff to score rhetorical points in a completely unrelated discussion is (I have chosen to be polite) weak sauce. You'd better have a Goddamn good reason for invoking that day, and "so I can sound like a smart motherfucker on the teevee" ain't gonna cut it.
And there's ol' Jack, crankin' out them biblical allusions and praying for his teen apocalypse. I'm not sure he actually understands that if one of his demented fantasies comes true, that doesn't make him a prophet.
1up has chosen to report - via an anonymous source, at any rate - that EA's The White Council has been cancelled. You might wonder (or maybe you don't) why I am so hard on Electronic Arts - while they invite it at times with their tin-ear policies, grasping opportunism, or sloppy execution, the main reason is that I believe there is an amazing company in there. Whenever I hear that they're making moves internally to become that company, even as a professional skeptic I allow myself to expect the best. Their behemoth size warps space and helps to make odd things plausible. It's just a rumor I guess, this thing about White Council, but this isn't the type of rumor that gets started for no reason. There's no secret internal project called "The Flight Bouncil" that is getting somebody's shit confused.
It was a licensed game, sure, but they were digging deep in that revered body of material. I'm cording off the part of my brain where I once stored my high hopes and fond wishes, and I'm making a little shrine in there that people can visit. Presumably, these would be very small people.
(CW)TB out.
