218: Hooverville ... Now Loading

[D-Ship]

Hooverville ... Now Loading

Recession! Depression! Every dime store politician and radio wise guy is aiming to spook you into such a jitterbug you can't tell your soggy stocks from your stained skivvies. But Brett Staebell has a cure for what ails ya: some practical (and not-so-practical) tips for gaming through the worst economic conditions since the Hoover administration.

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[Spleenbag]

That was hilarious! Looking forward to more from you.

 

[LTK_70]

Is there, by any chance, a translation? My American isn't quite up to scratch.

It slightly helps by having this guy [http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/dd/Cletus.gif] read it out loud.

 

[Frankydee]

Hah nice.

Good point though, particularly your earliest one about titles. I picked up GTA IV release night only to be disappointed a month later after being called to go out to the strip club for the bajillionth time by the retard cousin. I'm usually a bit pickier now, downloading demos and getting recommendations from my brother. Saves me a good bit of cash.

 

[Taawus]

And if ye wallet ain't handling the heat, turn yourself into a life of plundering and pillaging on dem open seas!
(Please don't ban me?)

 

[Mr Companion]

Hark at the guv-nor he's gone barking bananas! The fools'd pop their clogs is they caught a penny of this lark!

Sorry I deserve a smack. Anyway excellent presentation. Although by page three I started going a little mad.

 

[GonzoGamer]

23 Skidoo.

 

[CrystalShadow]

Argh! XD. That is both incredibly painful to decipher, and amusingly hilarious to read.
Oh, and a little insane.

Well done. XD.

 

[Grand_Marquis]

Hell yeah! We need more 1939-era snake oil conmen in the world.
I can practically hear that old-timey cosmopolitan New Yorker accent

 

[whaleswiththumbs]

I only understood half of the meaning to this, but definitely the most entertainging article I've read in awhile.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

I don't know what's worse. The fact that I narrated this entire article in my head in a 1930s New York snake-oil salesman's voice, or that I UNDERSTOOD EVERY LAST REFERENCE.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to kick my feet up, turn up the old Victrola and let George and Ira Gershwin bring me those sweet soft melodies.

 

[Dooly95]

I'm with the majority - enjoyed it, but has no idea why.

 

[Andronicus]

Yeahhh... Very well written, however my American is not so much rusty as, well, non-existent. I don't suppose anyone could offer a brief summary of what Mr. Staebell was trying to get through?

 

[D-Ship]

Mr. Staebell can!

This is the author even if I don't look it. I haven't yet asked for the keys to the car, as it were, in regards to forum-hopping via the same profile that posts these articles.

[edit] Ask and ye shall receive! Vroom, vroom.

First off, thanks for the feedback! I knew The Escapist editors were taking a bit of a gamble by posting something so dense with anachronisms you could submit it to a museum, and I'm glad people enjoyed it despite the apparent encryption.

Those of you who understood it in it's entirety (I'm looking at you, The Rogue Wolf) - congratulations! If you were somehow to fall into a rift in time and space that warped you to 1930s America, you'd be sitting pretty! (Except for whole "GREAT DEPRESSION" thing. Good luck with that!)

For anybody who isn't burdened with a vocabulary pretty much nobody uses anymore:

http://www.paper-dragon.com/1939/slang.html
http://www.alphadictionary.com/slang/
http://www.miskatonic.org/slang.html
http://home.earthlink.net/~dlarkins/slang-pg.htm

These sites went a long way in getting the article off of the ground, though I mostly used them to confirm the slang I wanted wasn't out of place. (Did you know "the fuzz"[police] is a 1960s term? Almost put it in anyway!)

Beyond vocabulary, I would encourage anybody who only half got it to give it a second read-through, particularly after reading Grand Marquis' comment. All the tools you need are here, all that's missing is some moxie! Gumption will also suffice.

Now that you have me singing like a canary, this cat's gonna scram before the fuzz throws me back in the slammer!

 

[Dark_Lemon]

Sir, bravo.

 

[Andreyblade]

a great article, i really imagined someone on the street corner of 1930s New York saying all of these things to bystanders

 

[Crops]

We have a saying in the Netherlands;
"Als het niet gaat zoals het moet, dan moet het maar zoals het gaat"
Roughly translated to something like;
"If things don't work the way they're supposed to, then they're supposed to work the way they do."

That's pretty much what popped into my head while reading the second half.

Beside that, my hat's off to you, awesome style.
Even though things make a turn for the silly every now and then, there's some very valid points about getting the most out of your games in there.

 

[The Random One]

I have no idea of what this article was about!

 

[Silver Scribbler]

This article confused the hell out of me, until I changed the reading voice in my head to a cheesy, film noir, new york gangster. Funny stuff once you get your head around that!

Although now I'm stuck with the gangster voice. Something tells me that the novel I'm reading isn't going to be the same in that accent...

 

[Asciotes]

that made no sense...until I read it in a fast-talking 1950s door to door salesman accent. Then it only made a little sense. It was fun to read though.