While reports of my death may be a little premature, it would not be complete hyperbole to say that I have been fairly unwell in the last week or so. Suffice it to say that my recent blogging hiatus was not in fact due to a busy schedule or the usual bouts of extreme laziness but could be directly attributed to a not so nice condition which those in the medical fraternity term — and I must say it has a certain lilting rhythm to it — appendicitis. In my youth I theorised that the appendix, that small tube attached to the side of the small intestine and floats around the lower right side of your abdomen, may have been the primary organ involved in that mysterious ailment known as Spontaneous Human Combustion. My reasoning behind this was that no one knew what function the appendix served and no one knew what caused SHC — a strong link if ever there was one. You can imagine then my grief when I felt that tell-tale pain in the general vicinity of my appendix, after having suffered some nasty stomach cramping and red-hot fever the previous day. I am pleased to say that despite my concern I did not ignite in some towering inferno in which only my teeth, feet and hands survived and accordingly I actually still retain all of my worm-like appendages. These two truths are certainly surprising to me; it was my belief before this episode that any mention of the word appendicitis around any doctor would immediately result is some sort of intestinal excavation being conducted on the spot. This was compounded by the nature of my family GP who often walks into her surgery excitedly inquiring “Where is something I can cut?” — usually to my utter chagrin. My knowledge of medical practices must be somewhat antiquated however as I was simply issued a course of antibiotics along with a caveat that they would give me a fifty percent chance of avoiding having any of my appendices removed. My luck, for a change, has held and my current hobby is poking myself in the stomach just to revel in the delightful feeling of knowing that my appendix may continue to happily excrete its delicious fluids into my lower digestive tract. Oh yeah.
In other news, Metroid Prime was released in Australia last Thursday (although I was lucky enough to receive it on Wednesday, even while bed ridden, thanks to the efforts of a very dear friend) and I must say the wait has been well worth it. You may recall that I generated a bit of a rant on the PAL Metroid delay on these very pages not that long ago and as usual when I open my mouth, it’s usually to take my feet out. Not more than one hour after I posted the entry in question I read a news item on some website detailing the improvements that Retro Studios were making to the game for its PAL release. These improvements include:
- More speech
- A harder difficulty level
- Some other bits and pieces that I fail to remember
You may show me some leniency though as these details were not exactly highlighted by an obvious source such as Nintendo of Australia’s web site but on some other rather obscure enthusiast site that I just happened upon that night.
I was particularly roused on the issue of increased difficulty in the game as I am fair and square in the middle of the camp preaching that “today’s games are too bloody easy.” There just seems to be few games lately that will take you and tell you in a shower of profanity that “I am going to make you my bitch.” I was having a minor issue with Metroid’s difficulty level. I had completed about forty percent of the game with only having witnessed the intense game over screen once in all that time — the result of taking too long to escape the first level due to being too busy gawking at the visuals rather than any lack of game playing prowess on my part. You won’t see any such words of ease now however as not more than an hour ago I had my arse handed to me, several times, by several different varieties of alien space pirate. Needless to say those bitches are going to pay a hefty toll and my craving for some measure of a challenge is being satisfied in the best possible way. Just be sure that when you remind me that Metroid features an explicit “hard” mode which you can unlock upon completion, that you have some sort of kerchief handy to wipe that drool away from the corner of my mouth.
Note to Nintendo: I never meant a word of it.