Gamers redux

For the last few weeks now, I have been tucking myself in bed to the sound of ecstatic birds and the crash of strategically placed pieces of glass, wood and concrete. There is also the intermittent mutter of disgust, disappointment and occasionally grunt of grim satisfaction. In case you have not figured it out yet, the wife has fallen for the latest mobile game craze - angry birds.

Just so we are clear, my wife is no gamer. But for some reason angry birds has awakened her hidden urge to destroy egg-stealing hogs. So what is it that causes a person, who otherwise has disdain for all forms of gaming, to actually be addicted to one themselves?

There obviously is no formula, otherwise I'd be rich now, but I'd argue that we are now in a position where it is actually possible to create these mass-market game hits. There have been a lot of people making numerous breakthroughs before my wife could take immense pleasure in hurling birds at remorselessly idle pigs.

Availability: In the beginning gaming required that you have a desktop and no human friends. Or have a Playstation and know other people that had no friends. With the smart phone, now having a life is not detrimental to imaginary achievements. Zynga discovered this and has been unbelievably successful (hint Farmville). Mobile games take accessibility to a whole new level.

Believability: "Here, see this triangle - imagine that is a inter-Galactic fighter". Luckily we don't have to do that anymore. There is no need to appeal to the inner child - things in games look as they are supposed to. This isn't photo realism, and it is not expected to be. When the inexplicably flightless birds are raring to hurl themselves, you almost want to help them out. And that has involved a vast number of improvements - experience in making games to enough processing power to support it. Without the 1GHz processors in our mobiles, games would still be leaving a lot to the imagination.

Relateable: Getting things to seem natural is a very difficult task. Cause and effect, it seems, is not that easy with bits and bytes. Early games had to invent arcane rules to compensate. And keeping track of those rules led to the creation of the stereotypical nerd with his glasses and rule books. Angry birds is quite different. It has a flawlessly simple, natural physics engine that responds differently to even minute differences in action. That suddenly makes the game an extension of what people recognize otherwise - making it vastly more relateable.

"I finally understand Civil engineering ... and where to hit to cause the most damage" - this from my wife getting more proficient with her birds. And that is the crux of a good game. All she cares about are the birds, the physics and the app. Hiding the simple fact from my wife, that she is playing a game, has been the biggest success of angry birds. There is a lot that needs to happen, technologically, to be able to achieve that sleight of hand. I think we are there now. Which is why as I am writing this, it still sounds like a war zone in the next seat.

Vegas baby!

There is not much that can be said about Vegas, that has not been said before. But having been there fore the first time last week, it is almost worth repeating it all over again. Vegas is simultaneously an embodiment to the success of human endeavor while being a symbol of the excesses that the very same success can bring about.

Vegas is a large city, the most populous in all of Nevada with more than half a million people. Yet when one talks about Vegas, one refers to the 4 mile stretch of land that lies just north of the airport - the Vegas strip - which is home to the probably the heaviest concentrations of hotels, casinos and other tourist attractions. And nowhere is the sharp contrast of a place and its surroundings more palpable than this stretch of land in Vegas. One could argue that the Manhattan in New York presents such a dramatic study in contrasts. But unlike the purity of Vegas, Manhattan is more of a mixed, fluid form of excess. In New York, you will see the worker squeeze past the tourist, the eye-sore next to the latest high-rise.

Vegas doesn't brook such differences. Everyone there is present for just one goal - to have fun. And no matter what that definition of fun is, Vegas is glad to cater to it. Once you are on the strip, it is difficult to imagine and world outside that has other, different demands.

Las Vegas is situated in a desert. One has to but drive a couple of miles east of the strip to see the hard baked earth and its thorny vegetation. On the strip however, the hotels do not even have the small card that says "Save water if you can - reuse towels". Forget conservation, but the lack of acknowledgment of the realities of its location is the cloak that Vegas cheerfully covers itself in, in its pursuit of fun.

The hotels are another study by itself. What would you say of the Venetian, a hotel that borrows so heavily from Italian architectural elements, shamelessly pandering gondola rides to the masses. Do you decry the death of a certain royalty with the jean clad in the marbled halls of the hotel, or do you stand in adoration of the gaudy tribute to the times of yore? What about the tropical forest in the middle of the Flamingo hotel - worry about the waterfalls or just enjoy the paradise walled in concrete?

When a place deviates from its natural center, there are always repercussions. The fact that Vegas has been able to take us so far from reality, for so long, is in itself a tribute to a certain obstinate inertia of human nature. I loved our time at the Sin City, but in a time of duress, it does well to reflect upon the nature of extremes. And no place to do that better, than Fabulous Las Vegas!

T.O.S.S and K.I.C.S

When it comes to shopping, I subscribe to every one of the clichés and stereotypes. I do not like it at all. It is not that I am against buying stuff - by all means, buy. Spending money of stuff seems to be a pretty logically conclusion for all the time spent at work. But shopping is not buying.

I know, you know all this. But what precisely in the process of shopping made it so unbearable. It couldn't just be the lack of a purchase. I decided to investigate, and by careful measurements of my blood pressure during the many shopping trips devised by the significant other, I believe I have the answer - the twin syndromes of KICS & TOSS.

K.I.C.S - Kid in Candy Store Syndrome. This is the first reason I dislike shopping trips organized by the significant other. Shopping tends to be disorganized, random, driven by an effusion of emotive exclamations. "Ooh look at that, isn't that nice?" "Oh my God, who would ever buy that?". In other words, like a kid in a candy store.

Shopping, unlike buying, brings out the kid in the significant other. Any semblance of a plan disappears as soon as the we take the first breath of industrial controlled air. Instead we seem follow the rough path taken by a bee as it searches for honey. And in place of the sweet nectar, we seem to be searching for, well, nothing. Sometimes it is a bright color, other times it is a sale tag. A bee has a better chance of finding blooming flower in the dead of winter, than our shopping party of finding a buy. Everything looks great, and nothing worth buying.

Now imagine we find something that looks good and is worth buying. The shopping trip shows a budding promise of turning into a successful buying trip. That is when the second syndrome kicks in.

TOSS - The Other Store Syndrome. The S.O. is convinced that the same items is available, cheaper or better quality or both in another store.

Before we know it we are shuttling back and forth between stores. The TOSS syndrome has successfully taken over, standing firmly between shopping and buying.

There was a time when shopping was synonyms with buying. Not today. In the age of infinite choice, the twin syndromes of KICS and TOSS conspire to keep any shopping trip from turning into a successful buying trip.

IKEA

There is something about an IKEA that reminds me of the airport.

First of all, there is this massively multinational crowd. There are few places in the world where so many languages are crammed into so small a place. There are curious eastern tongues, interspersed with the lilting sounds of Nordic languages, punctuated by clipped Germanic sounds. The only English sounds one can hear, seem to be warning kids to behave themselves.

Secondly, everyone is spaced out - as if they were trying to see beyond what was directly in front of them. Airports, understandably, make folks want to be at their destination already. And at the IKEA, no one sees the products. Instead everyone is busy imagining everything they see, in their own places. Sometimes this brings on such ecstasy, that one has to jump out the way if one has the misfortune of being stranded between said ecstatic shoppers and their target.

Then there is the world-in-a-world nature of the IKEA itself. Just like the airport, everything you need to survive an entire day is available in the store itself. Food, rest and a purpose - available on every floor. But that is not the only similarity. Just like the airport, once you are in an IKEA, it is going to be a while before you are back in the parking lot again.

That said, there is one key difference between an IKEA and an airport. You can always find lone travelers that need to be in the airport on business. But in an IKEA, you always go in pairs. And never on business.