I had bought it on a whim. Not really thinking through the decision, but things as cheap as the Xbox Zealot Console where not really heavy decisions to begin with. It was an inconspicuous little box, same width and breadth of a ream of paper at about half the thickness. Gun-metal gray with the trademark green X logo on the center top that acted as the power button, with some USB 4.0 plugs on the front for those that still preferred the older type of controllers, next to it was two digital camera lenses that could have been mistaken for LEDs if you didn't know there true nature.
It taken me the whole of 15 minutes to un-box and hook it up to my HDTV, the instructions couldn't have been simpler comparatively speaking. Power plugs, HDMI cables, and what not. After turning it on, I went through the various setup processes, wireless preferences, name, XBL account log in, blah, blah, blah....
After the basics had been taken care of, chose to play around with the interface a bit. The NATAL cameras caught and recognized my motions in smooth and easy ways, with a wave of my hand i scrolled through all the options i had. The system came with an allotment of MS points to purchase an initial game. By my reckoning, i could get three smaller Arcade games, six Indie games, or one triple-A title. I choose a combination of the arcade and indie games. Choosing an adventure/RPG from the arcade, a fighting indie game, and another FPS from the arcade. In my reasoning a felt that this would give me a good cross-section of the games i would like.
Now, I'm no stranger to gaming, but before the Xbox 360, i stayed on the PC side of things the majority of the time. I still have my 360, it has served me well, especially after they finally fixed the red ring issues, (it took them ten damn years), and the Zealot's dashboard interface was a carbon copy of the 360's with the minor caveat's that you would expect to go with a motion control basis. Thankfully, the games were made with it in mind also.
For my first foray into untested waters, i chose the RPG game. It was called NetHACK//immersion, a descendant of the original NetHACK game, (something i had played around with, but never got into). Using the motions as prompted by the game; I learned to hack, slash, loot, equip, and cast spells through a low-resolution (but otherwise passable) 3D dungeon randomly generated, just for me. It was fun for a while, then my shoulder started hurt from making the sword slashing motions. For a moment, i considered playing a tourist. Yet i moved onto the next game.
The FPS came next, Unreal Competition edition, an updated generic first person shooter that focused solely on the multi-player aspect of the game. You logged in, chose your load out, and joined a server, then wail on the enemy to your hearts content. Miming the motions for hold a gun and jumping then squeezing the trigger all was very invigorating. Didn't stop me from sucking at it, yet still fun. I had forgotten to plug in my wireless headset, so i couldn't respond to the quasi-sexist/racist/homo-erotic taunts given by a collection of eight to thirty-five year old players. So much the better that i turned it off. After the umpteenth head shot imposed upon me, i set that game aside, and decided to try the fighting game.
I was warmed up after the first two games, and thought that this indie fighting game would be cake. It was called Martial Mayhem, where you had to fight different styles of martial arts from pretty much one-dimensional characters, but it was fun. First was the bar brawler, whom with my "nerd-fu " was no match. It worked up past karate, boxing, kendo, and so forth. Some of them took a lot of work to defeat, and even then just barely, a stark realization hit me that it had been quite a few hours since i had break. I went to the bathroom when needed however, my stomach was growling and smelled exhausted after so much moving and bopping around.
The game how ever had drawn me in and i was stuck on a character who wielded a knife, called "Mugger". It was frustratingly stupid, each time I'd thought i had his moves down, he would shift his stance, catch me off-guard, or simply charge out of desperation. Each way, he'd get me. Sweat rolled down my neck and back, I had a serious runners stitch in my side, and i was almost certain that i was getting shin splints from the high impact aerobic work out the game forced me into. I am a nerd, who's primary method of weight loss up until now was large amounts of energy drinks and insomnia. This sudden dive into physical activity of this scale could not be good.
Why was he so damn hard to beat? The programmers must have given him super kung-fu reflexes or something. Ugh.
I was hungry, didn't feel like cooking and my small, one bedroom apartment felt stuffy from the work out i had been engaged in. Hoping in the shower, i scrubbed off the grime and smell that came from sweating so much and (out of habit) brushed my teeth. The hot water felt good as it sluiced over my aching joints. I'm in my late twenties and, although not Atlas incarnate; a fairly fit man. being an IT director for a public library wasn't something that gave you the time or necessity to be perfectly fit. I decided that the IHOP two blocks down would be the best bet, being two-thirty in the morning and within walking distance.
I dressed in some clean cloths and grabbed my cell phone, wallet, and house keys and proceeded down the street and around the corner to the lovely blue roofed dispenser of consumable happiness that is coffee and pancakes. I meandered down the twilight streets and was pleasantly startled by the street lamps flickering, and wondering why they have yet to upgrade them to the now popular OLED variants. The clean fresh air was still invigorating, though.
Just about three blocks down i took a turn down a small side street to relieve myself. I thought i could hold it until i reached the restaurant, but apparently one's bladder tends to complain when it is forced to hold a full tank while the body was near cramping as is. Fighting the urge to shiver, i finished and zipped in time to turn and see a moving pile of discarded, old clothing stand up. I stock, mouth agape in shock for half a second, until i realized it was a homeless man in a motley collection of discarded rags and coats haphazardly sewn together. I realized also that groaned in a steady rhythm opposite is heavy breathing, (not really relevant, but i did find it odd at the time. One must always be on the look out for zombies.)
He paused his groaning long enough to gruffly mumble something.
"I'm sorry, wha-?" i responded.
He let out a short frustrated sigh and exploded in anger, "I sez, gimme my money!"
"I don't have it," I explained while trying to back out of the alley, he would have nothing of the sort.
"Gimme mah MONEY!!!" he charged forth with something that looked like a knife, extended his arm to lash out and slice me.
He was mid-swing when things slowed down, and the world seamed syrupy. My mind seamed to instantly recover from the near pants-filling-terror i was experiencing not a heartbeat ago, the whole situation seamed academic in simplicity. I used my left hand, and grabbed the wrist of my attacker while simultaneously thrusting my elbow up and into his face with a forward stepping motion. I realized that he was precisely like "Mugger" from my video game, both in looks and actions. I cackled with maniacal glee on the inside as i completed the devastating maneuver i had been endlessly repeating in an effort to defeat this homeless man's counterpart. Yanking his upper body down and ramming my left knee up and into his abdomen, i felt a satisfying crunch and watched with quite a smug expression as my foe collapsed in a fit of labored breathing and spasmatic pain.
I took a deep breath of cool night air and nearly hyperventilated at at the adrenaline still coursing through my system. This feeling was fantastic, better than sex, it was just soooo....... painful?
I felt myself cast into reality, away from my revelry. Much like slamming into a brick wall i suppose. My right leg hit me with a terrible charlie-horse as punishment for exacting further physical exertion on it's already tired flesh. The rest of my body must have thought this a good idea for then i received loud complaints from the rest of my body as the rush wore off and the adrenaline crash that followed made me feel weaker than a one-legged kitten.
I, to stumbled and finally fell to the ground, grunting and gasping at the pain my own own body was inflicting upon itself. I fumbled through my pocket and pulled out my cell-phone and pain-painstakingly dialed 911.
I managed to set it to speaker-phone as a dark tunnel closed around my vision.
"911, please state the nature of the emergency," it crackled a bit, reception must have been iffy.
"hello? if you are in danger please say something so i can help," i managed to mumble at the now echoing voice emanating from my phone.
"Please repeat that, i can barely hear you."
"Dude, it was fucking EPIC!" and then i passed out.
