Crazy thing is I remember having neighborhood wars with my friends. We all ran around with airsoft/paintball guns terrorizing the neighborhood oblivious to potential for confusion. I remember one time when my friend got in trouble because he was stalking me in full camo and scared a neighbor's wife (she must have thought the Russians invaded...IDK). Anyway her husband came out and dragged him over to my house, because he said he was playing a game with me, even though I didn't know he was out there at the time. There were words between my friend's dad, the neighbor, and my mom. After some annoyed half threats the night stalks were banned. Thinking back on it as an adult, we were lucky no one called the cops! But I think the whole neighborhood knew we were a bunch of troublemakers. We were always running around making noise, lighting off fireworks, having pine cone battles, skateboarding...just being loud kids. We had neighborhood block parties. Everyone came to hang out and get to know everyone, so I think that helped everyone know it was us not some criminal they'd never met. Also the cops in our city are pretty cool, they show a lot of restraint. Even still, we were pretty stupid, oblivious to the danger. I imagine that's a pretty common story around the country.
I don't want kids to have to stop being kids. We had a lot of fun. But I also don't want them getting shot by mistake. In our case, I think it was just because there wasn't a constant police presence and the neighbors let us have full reign. There wasn't much opportunity where confusion could have led to an accident, just a bunch of dumb kids and understanding adults. In a more patrolled part of town, maybe one my friends or I could have been shot by mistake. We didn't live in rich part of town or anything, in fact it was pretty run down, but it wasn't a high crime part either. Depends on the neighborhood, I guess.
Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
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Classicgamer
- Posts: 873
- Joined: Thu Sep 11, 2014 3:37 pm
Re: Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
As a parent of a little boy myself, I hear you on wanting to let them be kids and do what little boys do. But, I also know it's my responsibility to make sure he doesn't play in the street or other public areas with realistic-looking guns. Light guns are used inside the house though. It's different.
People who go to airsoft events are taught to not wave their guns around in public which is common sense and fair enough. Nobody feels the need to make airsoft guns look like hair dryers. The orange tip does the job. If somebody chooses to wave one around in a shopping mall, they only have themselves to blame if they get shot.
If the police can mistake a bright white wii remote for a gun, that only proves that making things a different color does nothing to prevent careless policing. Plus, plenty of gun stores sell bright pink real guns (aimed at woman), so it's a poor way for police to distinguish a toy from the real thing.
If the SWAT team storms your drug house while you're playing Duck Hunt, you are pretty much doomed no matter what color your light gun... apparently. So, best advice: Don't take a nap in a drug dealers house.... If you have to, um... try sleeping in a kneeling position with your hands behind your head. And, just to be "safe" we should all spray paint our skin orange, throw away our cell phones and wear bullet proof vests at all times.
People who go to airsoft events are taught to not wave their guns around in public which is common sense and fair enough. Nobody feels the need to make airsoft guns look like hair dryers. The orange tip does the job. If somebody chooses to wave one around in a shopping mall, they only have themselves to blame if they get shot.
If the police can mistake a bright white wii remote for a gun, that only proves that making things a different color does nothing to prevent careless policing. Plus, plenty of gun stores sell bright pink real guns (aimed at woman), so it's a poor way for police to distinguish a toy from the real thing.
If the SWAT team storms your drug house while you're playing Duck Hunt, you are pretty much doomed no matter what color your light gun... apparently. So, best advice: Don't take a nap in a drug dealers house.... If you have to, um... try sleeping in a kneeling position with your hands behind your head. And, just to be "safe" we should all spray paint our skin orange, throw away our cell phones and wear bullet proof vests at all times.
Re: Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
In my case, our parents were all working while we we're out being stupid. Blame the public schools system for letting us out 2 full hours before our parents got off work. That's too much time to get into trouble, and we made use of it. Well, when we weren't inside playing Goldeneye...um, I mean...[inserts less violent game to throw off the "see I told you so" jerks]...Mario Party. No kidding, we did play about as much Mario Party as Goldeneye. Ah, those were the days!
WAIT, where was the N64s lightgun? Hold on, I don't remember there being one. NES and SNES had one and some games to play using them. N64 didn't? No wonder we ran around the neighborhood playing with airsoft guns, we didn't have a 4 player Duck Hunt! That's it! We're all focused on the wrong culprit. It's not the cops, it's Nintendo! They decided to stop satisfying our lightgun video game habit, in order to keep things politically correct after the "video games cause kids to shoot up schools" witch hunt. So we took the game outside, where mistakes have greater consequences.
Seems about as bad a theory as any of the other popular ones. The real issue is access to mental health services, police training, and gun control. The former two mean more money to social services, and that last one means crossing the NRA. This pits political parties at odds with each other because of their blanket stance on those issues ("No more taxes, no more social programs, no gun control" vs "more social programs, more taxes, more gun control"). This issue falls right in between political factions refusing to compromise on these positions, even at the expense of public safety. Blaming video games has been the scapegoat. And it's a trite argument. Someone will have to compromise or things will not change. Political civil wars have real casualties, as we've seen in this case. YAY...Adult talk! Aren't you sick of it yet?
WAIT, where was the N64s lightgun? Hold on, I don't remember there being one. NES and SNES had one and some games to play using them. N64 didn't? No wonder we ran around the neighborhood playing with airsoft guns, we didn't have a 4 player Duck Hunt! That's it! We're all focused on the wrong culprit. It's not the cops, it's Nintendo! They decided to stop satisfying our lightgun video game habit, in order to keep things politically correct after the "video games cause kids to shoot up schools" witch hunt. So we took the game outside, where mistakes have greater consequences.
Seems about as bad a theory as any of the other popular ones. The real issue is access to mental health services, police training, and gun control. The former two mean more money to social services, and that last one means crossing the NRA. This pits political parties at odds with each other because of their blanket stance on those issues ("No more taxes, no more social programs, no gun control" vs "more social programs, more taxes, more gun control"). This issue falls right in between political factions refusing to compromise on these positions, even at the expense of public safety. Blaming video games has been the scapegoat. And it's a trite argument. Someone will have to compromise or things will not change. Political civil wars have real casualties, as we've seen in this case. YAY...Adult talk! Aren't you sick of it yet?
Re: Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
It keeps happening because the news gives people the idea. Every normal American has known this and been vocal about it from the beginning, but they will not report on themselves.
We're probably not getting HotD 5 & TC5 home ports and unless Trump wrecks the MSM in the next 5 years Earth is fucked. Paint your knives GunCon orange and pray, UK frens.
We're probably not getting HotD 5 & TC5 home ports and unless Trump wrecks the MSM in the next 5 years Earth is fucked. Paint your knives GunCon orange and pray, UK frens.
Godzilla was an inside job
Re: Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
Allow me to put your minds at ease. Global warming is not a death sentence for the "earth", solar warming is - and that's not foretasted for another 7,000,000,000 years. Global warming will relatively quickly change the ecosystems of the earth such that the living things will be forced to compete or migrate for survival. This includes humans. The current Mass extinction is likely to get worse, but "life" will recover even if biodiversity is greatly reduced. How that will unfold is still unclear, but it's already a humanitarian crisis. That'll get worse before it gets better, no matter what we do.8BA wrote:It keeps happening because the news gives people the idea. Every normal American has known this and been vocal about it from the beginning, but they will not report on themselves.
We're probably not getting HotD 5 & TC5 home ports and unless Trump wrecks the MSM in the next 5 years Earth is fucked. Paint your knives GunCon orange and pray, UK frens.
The current batch of species living on it may not be fine, but the earth and life itself are likely not in danger.
Re: Game peripherals from before the world went mad...
No worries. The nuclear apocalypse will reset the planet back to pre-holocene conditions.
Strikers1945guy wrote:"Do we....eat chicken balls?!"