The new Gunslinger, Hermit Grimm, swaggered through our saloon doors for some rounds of Borderlands 2. Before he loots TOO many chests or kills TOO many raiding mutants, let’s get to know the man behind the controller a little bit better. Without further adieu, here is the interview with our brother Grimm!
GS: You were part of the record-breaking wave of new members who signed up during the week of September 21st for Borderlands 2. What are your thoughts on the game thus far? Also, have you had a chance to co-op with any fellow GSers for the game yet?
Hermit Grimm: I have been able to game with a few GS members. Though not as much as I’d like. Laynas has been especially fun to group with. I believe he’s another fairly new member and the games I’ve managed to play with him and the few others I’ve managed to wrangle up at my odd play times have definitely been memorable experiences. As for borderlands 2, initially I was stoked I believe I was one of the first GS members to make it all the way to 50. I just wish there was more to do once there. So I started over again. Attempting to lead GS teams when I could to help others reach the so called “end game”. And recently with the new mechromancer DLC in convinced gearbox expects people to enjoy the journey to 50 and are unconcerned with people who have “finished” the game. Perhaps that will change, but either way I’ve got 5 characters now to take through this amazing game.
GS: Within your Introduction, you mention that you log in some long hours as a Industrial Mechanic. What is exactly involved in that role, and how did you happen to get involved that line of work?
Hermit Grimm: As far as my job goes, I work on production lines as a mechanic for Hillshire Brands (previously Sara Lee Foods) making sure the various machines and assembly lines work the way their supposed to. As far as how I got into it, it honestly just seemed a natural progression after dropping out of college with a partially finished structural engineering degree. Not my proudest moment but considering what I make now, I’m pretty darn lucky all things considered.
GS: Have you gamed all your life? If so, what was your first home console and favorite game as a child?
Hermit Grimm: My first game system I’d have to say was a DOS based PC on which I heavily played the original Duke Nukem. Followed shortly after by an NES and Super Mario. But yes I have gamed nearly my entire life and have no plans of stopping anytime soon.
GS: Both your GS Forum name and your Xbox360 gamertag is “Hermit Grimm.” How did you decide on the alias, and is there a story behind it?
Hermit Grimm: I’ve always been a bit of a “Hermit” between growing up as a military brat and later after my father retired growing up as an Iowa farm boy I’ve always been on the outskirts. Just a bit away from normal whatever that happens to be. So I took the Gamertag Hermit with pride feeling I was the outsider with a wider perspective. The “yoda” amongst my group of friends. Sorry for the Star Wars reference. Grimm comes from my college days, my friends and I took on the title of the Brothers Grimm through our fascination of all things both fantasy and historical. Not unlike a lot of gamers I’m sure.
GS: You have also mentioned in the forums that you enjoy boating and swimming. Where in the United States do you reside? Are there other hobbies that keep you entertained outside of the work week?
Hermit Grimm: As I mentioned before I do live In Iowa, unfortunately. Right next to a very sizable lake. As a military brat I learned to love surfing. Although I can no longer do that, my love of the water hasn’t changed. The rest was just a natural progression, I suppose. As far as other hobbies, I do work on my car regularly, though that’s more of a necessity than a hobby as its literally as old as I am, and of course I game every chance I get.
GS: You are the subject of October’s Member Spotlight, which is the month of Halloween. Do you have any fond Halloween memories? For you, what movie/game/television series best personifies the holiday?
Hermit Grimm: Halloween is a strange subject. I’ve never been asked about it before. But as far as movies from the past that remind me of it, I’d have to go with Earnest Scared Stupid. Yes, I know it’s a cheesy old school bad comedy. But that’s what Halloween is to me. It’s not scary, it’s comical in a very silly way. Fond memories of this particular holiday are few and far between aside from the hordes of candy I would bring back and sort with my friends.
GS: Do you enjoy watching any sports? If so, which ones? Do you have a favorite team?
Hermit Grimm: I do greatly enjoy watching American football (not soccer). Growing up how I did the team of my birthplace, The Atlanta Falcons, kind of became one of those unchanging pillars I depended upon. Not that they haven’t randomly sucked from time to time lol.
GS: The rumor is that the next Microsoft console will be almost exclusively geared towards digital copies of games. Is that a change in the industry that you welcome or dread?
Hermit Grimm: With the creation of larger and larger hard drives and Steams obvious take over of PC game sales, I just see this as another step forward. Whether we like it or not, nothing ever successfully stands in the way of technological progress. That just seems to be the human way of things.
GS: Real or otherwise, what person do you consider as a personal hero?
Hermit Grimm: This ones easy. As a gamer and a nerd it has to be Gary Gygax, for those of you uninformed he is the deceased creator of the original Dungeons and Dragons and arguably the founder of RPG’s as we know them. A true visionary and gamer. R.I.P. Gary. You will be missed.
GS: And, for the toughest question you will ever be asked, what is your favorite drink?
Hermit Grimm: This is a tough one! My most common drink would definatly be beer, Bud Heavy or a nice Sam Adams depending on the budget. But as far as favorite I’d have to say its Vodka, Svedka or other highly distilled brands to be specific. That bottom shelf stuff is just begging for gut rot.
And on a personal note I’d just like to say thank you to this amazing community. Both in game and here on the forums GS has never felt like anything less than a really, really large group of friends. One that I’m proud to be a part of!
The following interview originally started a few months ago and was intended to accompany the Gunslingers 5 year anniversary celebration. Aligning the interview of Freddy with said celebration made sense. Freddy, otherwise known as bigfreddy or TripleF, has been with the rest of us for quite sometime, traveling with the clan across multiple games and even consoles. Life is the cleverest of pitchers and, due to some curve-balls slung Freddy’s and his family’s way, the discussion had to be postponed until now. Please, readers, join me as we learn more about a long time member and dear friend to many members, bigfreddy.
GS: You originally joined the Gunslingers back in October, 2008. To put that in perspective, we were all communicating back on the original GS site then. We weren’t exactly easy to find at the time, either. How was it that you ever came across the group, and what made you decide to join the Gunslingers? Do you remember who you first gamed with after joining?
bigfreddy: I had recently managed to get online with my Wii and was enjoying online racing so much I thought I might join a clan. I had signed up on mariokartwii.com (when the site admin wasn’t full of douchebag spineless hacker wannabees..lol) and looked through their clan recruiting threads. Most of the clans seemed to be little kids who took the whole thing WAY too seriously. Being a teacher I didn’t want to hang around with kids. I have enough of them at work, coupled with the fact that it would be just weird.
I was looking for an adult-only clan, and Gunslingers popped up from the search. The rest, as they say, is history.
I believe the first people I gamed with was Vykk Drago, Thorny, LilBev, Korchie, Balki, yourself (Murph), Worcester Rob, Forming, Jethro and Bennet Tilapaugh also seem to ring a bell.
GS: Extremely few active members can have the global perspective in regards to the evolution of the Gunslingers as you. What are some of the most striking changes that have occurred here that, maybe, people who have joined after you may not be aware?
bigfreddy: The clan was so small back then compared to now. You would go into chat and know everyone there. In fact, because the Wii had such a poor friend request system, the GS chat was the only way to communicate with other clan members.
It was fun, Friday nights used to be the BIG event. Everybody would be on, and because the site revolved around one system and one game (MKWii) we could have 2/3 rooms going at one time , all full of 12 GS members. One of the biggest changes is the way the site operates. It is huge and amazing compared to how it used to be.
As many people will be aware, I don’t use the forums much, mainly because I just don’t have the time, anymore. However, the games and topics that are now available are astounding and a great credit to yourself, the site admin and the contributing members of GS.
GS: Let’s take a trip down memory lane. The following is the exact quote from the registration information you provided when first joining:
“Interests/Hobbies:Walking the dogs, flying my kite, spending quality time with the wife, taking the piss out of my friends and Logging on to NASA’s Website.
Brief Bio:
Left Uni in the late 90′s, studied Applied Chemistry, but most of my uni mates will say I studied Mariokart and Super Mario World instead. Worked as R&D chemist. Now in education.”
How much of the above information is still reverent to your life now days? And, Freddy? Flying your kite? Really?
bigfreddy: Well, the “Brief Bio” is still fairly accurate, but I would need to add “Proud Father, zombie slayer and occasional pwner of Noobs on CoD”.
I have a kite in the boot/ trunk of my car still …. so, really Murph, I do still fly it ….infrequently..lol. I would need to add “Playing with and educating my son Theo (aged 3), going to the park and gardening”.
Some things change and some things stay the same, like me taking the piss out of my friends, Murph …. lol
GS: There was a segment of time when you took a break from the Gunslingers and gaming in general to support your wife during her pregnancy. What are some of rewards and challenges of fatherhood that you didn’t necessarily expect? Can you give an example how your son is clearly taking after his father?
bigfreddy: That time was sadly due to the unexpected arrival of Theodore, our son. Why sadly you ask? Well, he was born premature because my wife, Sammie, had a placental abruption, and I nearly lost them both. It was a very worrying and then ecstatic time for us both. He was 3 lbs 7ozs when he was delivered by emergency C-section.
Rewards:- When he looks me in the eye and says “lub you Daddy”, running to greet me after I get home from work, his first milestones in talking, crawling and walking, the list is endless.
Challenges:- Changing and burping such a small baby, he was like a little doll ; Having to take him to A&E (ER) because he went blue through crying when he had colic at 2.5 months old ; Having to wait 4 weeks to get him home as he was in special care ; Screaming to get his own way (doesn’t happen often but it still does happen…. thank goodness almost never in public) ; Puking on me …I have an irrational and pathological fear of vomit ….I can’t stand it. He puked on me two nights ago…..and I just whined for Sammie to come and take him off of me ….lol.
Poo and wee :- Not a problem, as a baby he projectile pooed and wee’d on me many times …it was funny, I didn’t bat an eyelid, but puke……urrghh…lol.
Theo takes after me in quite a few ways … He likes gaming…..He makes sackboy jump up and down on LBP and says jump, then laughs. He also likes toy cars. Oddly enough, I have also rediscovered my love of playing with toys cars and going “brummmmmmm, brrrrummm, rrrrrrrrr (Brakes squealing)” …lol. He also is a bit of an adrenaline junkie….like I used to be before I got fat…lol, He also likes using the “….” key instead of a comma ….
GS: You are a teacher of science. How did you first figure out that you had such a passion for science? What do you find most fascinating about it, and what article of scientific trivia still proverbially blows your mind that you can share with the rest of us?
bigfreddy: Ever since I was a kid and allowed to mess about with mercury and actually touch it (something that health and safety no longer allows), science has always interested me. The fact that it CAN actually answer many of the questions that plagued me as a child also helped; i.e.: How did we get here? Where are we? What causes night and day? What happens when we die? Obviously the last one (and maybe the first one, too, for the creationists..lol) is contentious. I’d say rotting and a good time will be had by bacteria everywhere….lol. There are many things that “blow my mind” about science.
There are three that I will share with you. All of them are quotes by the great Carl Sagan:
The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of starstuff.
Atoms are mainly empty space. Matter is composed chiefly of nothing.
This was Carl’s speech when Voyager’s cameras were finally turned around and A “Portrait” of the solar system was taken. Our planet was smaller than one pixel. Man, that guy had a way with words.
Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home. That’s us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every “superstar,” every “supreme leader,” every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there-on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot.
Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.
The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.
It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we’ve ever known.
― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space.
Finally, this is a clip I show to the kids at school to get them to realize the vastness of the universe:
Science is truly the greatest pursuit that humankind has ever undertaken. (That’s my quote…lol)
GS: Anyone who has gamed with you can testify that good times have been had. For example, you have been known to wander off to grab another brew or take a needed smoke break…sometimes in the middle of the match. These moments can lead to hilarious times. Can you tell us about one of your personal favorite moments while gaming?
bigfreddy: Many times I have to wander off after getting crawlers on BO Zombies, and I come back and my bro, Mr. Richard Lazer (Dick Lazer) is standing over my soon to be cold corpse. “Bro the crawler died, you went down, blah blah I’ll try and save ya.”
The one that sticks in my mind though I was playing with Dick, the Docs and Tick….I think GS4thMason was there too and others. We were playing sticks and stones. I come back from a smoke to find that EVERYONE is lined up in two rows all aiming at me. I am on mute and I can hear them laughing. I think about what to do and then just fire my crossbow. I dunno how many I took out….only that I was dead very soon after.
GS: Recently, your news in regards to your wife being diagnosed as having breast cancer has made us all collectively pause. Our thoughts and prayers are with you and your family during these trying times. Are there any updates or thoughts you can share with the rest of us?
bigfreddy: I have been meaning to update the thread I posted for a while, but it has been just too much emotional for me to do. Sammie has had her mastectomy and is coping with losing her breast very well now. She was obviously quite upset at first, saying that they have “butchered me”. Now she uses a prothesis to go out and she feels absolutely fine.
The chemotherapy has been rough, though. She has been quite poorly and has had some touch-and-go moments with her white blood cell count being so low and getting infections. So far, she had had Bladder and kidney infections, pneumonia, gastric flu, and been 4 hours away from total organ failure. We have been back and forth to the hospital quite a lot recently.
Sammie is halfway through her chemo now. Her nails and the rest of her hair will go after the next treatment. She is coping, and we are still laughing at life. But it is hard sometimes. Especially when putting it in print.
To those people who don’t know me very well, I may seem a bit sweary and aggressive when playing online. This is currently my release valve and opportunity to vent my pent up anger and rage at the injustice of it all.
Sammie is a good person who has never harmed a soul and always worked her whole life, who desperately wanted to be a mother. It seems that there is no justice in the world, that just three years after the difficult birth of our son, at the age of 42, after being told she would never conceive naturally (which she did), she is diagnosed with breast cancer.
Her odds are an 81% chance she will live 10 years. Theo will be 13 in ten years. Further thoughts or words aren’t necessary. I just can’t contemplate that possible future. It is just too awful, not just for me but for our little boy.
GS: You reside in the UK, but more specifically, where? Do you have any locally bound interests that keep your attention?
bigfreddy: I live in Royal Lytham St.Annes, more specifically in St.Annes on the Sea. Any golfers amongst the clan will recognise the name as The Open was recently held here. I live about a ten minute walk from the course. I didn’t go because the price was ridiculously high just to gain access to the course.
I could watch it all in glorious HD, and I am not that interested in golf, though I do play infrequently.
My main interests lie in going to the park I “inhabited” as a child and taking my son around it, playing football (soccer), and taking him on the swings and slides. We also teach him about nature, and it is fun watching him explore by himself. There are plenty of tourist attractions that we have and can go to, as St.Annes and the neighboring toilet of a town Blackpool is well known for it’s tourist attractions. We don’t go often as we like to get away from crowds of people and get some piece and quiet.
GS: Not too long ago, you had a real life get together with a few other English Gunslingers. Who was involved, and what do you all do? It is reasonable to believe that it may have been awkward at first. Was it? What broke the ice, sort of speak?
bigfreddy: We got together in Blackpool. We went to the Pleasure Beach, which is a Theme park, which for a while had the tallest rollercoaster in the world.
Dave and Becs Gosling (goz007boyz & ss007mums) and Steve Shaw (GS SteveUK) and their children (Harry, Mia and Matthew). You would probably think that it was awkward, but we have been playing together for over 2 years and had been talking on a daily basis almost for over a year. So after a bit of “you look different to your photographs” it wasn’t awkward at all. In fact, we invited them all to our house and ate dinner together and played the new maps for BO that had been released that day.
We also met again this year. Sadly, Sammie wasn’t well enough to join in on the first two days they were here, and we sadly missed out on seeing Steve, Emma and Matthew this time.
However, we went out for a meal with Dave, Becs, Harry, Mia and baby Mason. Then they came over to our house the following day, and we went for lunch and a shell hunting expedition on the beach. We had a great time. Theo loves babies and older children. Mia and Harry were excellent with him and played with him like he was their little brother. No, from our experience meeting GS’sers is a good thing. Just got to organise a trip to the States to meet some people. Richard and Lee, family Freddy is a coming…….Well, sometime in the near future. Hopefully.
GS: Most importantly, what is your favorite drink?
bigfreddy: Jamaica’s finest : Red Stripe Lager Beer is my favourite tipple. That and Dr. Pepper, Barcardi and Coke, Vodka and Coke, JD’s and Coke….lol…. the list is endless…..Oh, I forgot Southern Comfort and Coke or lemonade…..lol.
Thank you for taking the time to answer these questions. We are honored to count you as a member and a friend. Fellow Gunslingers, if you would like to leave your best wishes to Freddy and his family, you are invited to do so in the “Sammie’s Get Well Thread.”
Whether you have run across Merky Water in chat, in game, or on the Gunslingers Forums, you probably noticed he is a friendly and interesting person with whom to swap ideas. He has been sporting the GS tags since December 28th, 2010, and it is high tide..er..I mean, high time that we learn more about Merky Water! Please forget the lame pun and join us in reading an interview about him below!
GS: You joined the Gunslingers on the final days of 2010. What game drew you to here, and what was your first memory in regards to gaming with another member?
Merky Water: CoD: Black Ops. First CoD title the Wii had with in-game comms. The day after Christmas, the amount of screaming youngsters on the headset was enough to get me looking for a way to mute them. The solution: Gunslingergaming!
GS: In the “How’d You Get Your Name?” thread, you mention that your username is, in part, a reference to working on a river. What is your line of work, and what do you enjoy about it the most? Speaking of rivers, what state is said river in?
Merky Water: Ha. I say a lot in that thread but the river aspect is a bit of the truth. I work at a canoe, raft and kayak livery that operates on the Delaware River. As I love the outdoors, this job appealed as at least 90% is under an open sky. I love kayaking the river and while work requires it from time to time, the type of paddling I enjoy most occurs on my days off. We have a few campgrounds as well but the river work is the draw for me. Interaction with various customers is also usually a plus. But as others in the Recreation business know, even with 95% of the people being pleasant, that other 5% can be so difficult smiles can wander off my face… but then I remember the other 95% and carry on my day! The river flows through a few states, but the area we operate on is where it borders NY and PA and later NJ and PA considered “The Upper Delaware.”
GS: The word on the virtual street is that you have a mean Netflix addiction. What tends to be your genre of choice? What have been some of your favorite “rentals” thus far?
Merky Water's current signature in the forums.
Merky Water: Much to my girlfriend’s dismay, Documentaries are my favorite genre when on Netflix. Ken Burns docs being the best by far. National Parks: America’s Best Idea being my favorite and Baseball being second. Also, nice to catch up on TV shows I either missed nostalgically or missed in existence. The TV show “Life” slipped by me somehow. Arrested Development was good to finally watch, too. Would have been a loyal fan almost to the extent I am of The Office and 30 Rock had I but known.
GS: Since joining, you have convinced your significant other (known around these parts as “Liz_Lemon20“) to also join GS. How did that come about, and are there any games that you both enjoy playing? Has this created a new dimension over who gets rights to the television?
Merky Water: Liz thought I was a bit odd to be playing games as much as I do let alone with ‘strangers.’ Just before MW3 hit, her sister-in-law talked her into trying BO and she fell in love. From there, she started realizing the benefits of an online gamer community. Now, she and I keep trying to nudge her brother and sis-in-law to join the ranks. Liz and I also enjoy bowling and playing You Don’t Know Jack together. The big TV (although mine) is hers when she’s here and rarely would I put up a fight as I already know the winner.
GS: Being a Wii player, I must ask. What are your initial impressions on the WiiU, and do you think you will be purchasing it?
Merky Water: I think I might. It looks very interesting. I honestly thought I was done with console gaming since my N64. Had a friend not talked me into trying his Wii, I would have dismissed it as well. But the motion controls got me hooked. Locating one around launch may prove the issue. I may get one of the other next gen consoles as well if they start to embrace the motion controls they hesitantly started to try.
GS: Okay. Let’s pretend that the controllers need to be recharged. What are some other interests of yours that keep you busy?
Merky Water: Rechargeable AAs are in good supply and I almost always try to keep an extra wiimote with fresh in arm’s reach… But aside from gaming, I enjoy running, cross-country skiing, biking, hiking, rafting(aka drinking as we float) and my favorite: kayaking.
GS: A band of GS members jump into a DeLorean and travel back into time to see what 80′s child version of Merky Water would be doing. What were some of your favorite toys? Cartoons?
Merky Water: Depending the year, watching Fraggle Rock, Voltron or Thundercats, and running around the neighborhood keeping my parents on their toes. “Toys” would largely be Legos, Playmobile, Matchbox cars, Micro Machines and water-guns that showed the least resemblance to guns (overprotective mother ). For the record, I do not consider Legos a toy, but I realize the department they are placed in retail stores.
GS: The world is going to be hit by a comet because Bruce Willis wasn’t a qualified astronaut, after all. What would you do on the final day of Earth? (Pretty morbid, huh?)
Merky Water: Kayak the rivers and streams and enjoy the sights. Even the streaming comet through the blue sky.
GS: We had a couple silly questions, so let’s talk a bit more seriously. What is something you personally regard as important to lead a fulfilling life?
Merky Water: Nature. We humans can make a lot of ‘improvements’ and while comfortable to work and live in, mother nature is second to none as a decorator.
GS: What is your favorite drink?
Merky Water: mixed: Bushmills and Ginger
beer: Yuengling (lager or black&tan)
straight: Bushmills (…or most any whiskey on hand when that runs dry)
Thank you, Merky Water for taking the time to sit down with us. If you would like to read more about him or swap gaming contacts with him, feel free to find him in the forums or chat.
Robin has been a fellow Gunslinger since August 2011, but if you have spent any time in the GS chatrooms, you probably know her best as the ever polite personality named Sophiebean. Of course, you may not find her crossbow tactics all that friendly on the Call of Duty battlefields. Let’s find out a bit more about Robin/Sophiebean/TheReasonYouHaveanArrowStuckinYourHead by sitting down for an interview with her!
GS: The very first post you ever made in the GunslingerGaming forums was in the Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Masterlist. Is it safe to assume that was the game that got you here? Regardless, how did you happen to wander into our virtual saloon? With whom did you first get into game?
Robin: I found Gunslingers when I was looking at the Battlefield forums and happened to come across this great place. The first people I remember gaming with are Margarita Mama, Bullet Stopper, RLGORMORTIS, and Carbon Bigfoot in Black Ops.
GS: Despite the fact that you have many responses that welcome new members into the group, you like to keep your discussions close to the vest. Would you consider yourself a shy or secretive person in real life? Speaking of real life, how widely known to your friends and family that you are a first person shooter killing machine?
Robin: At first I am a very shy person in real life. As for my friends and family that know that I play first person shooters, that would only be the ones I hang out with the most so not many know.
GS: Your profile states you reside in New York. All too often, people assume that must translate to a life in New York City. What is YOUR New York life? In the city? In the country? Can you share with us a story from your personal life that, for you, best illustrates what a life in New York state means to you?
Robin: I actually live in the country. The closest city to me is Rochester about an hour away. Though, someday I would like to visit New York City. As for what life is like in New York, I don’t really have any stories to illustrate what life up here is to me, but, to me, it seems fast paced at times, and I like it at that pace. Though, the winters up here are too long for my liking, and the summers are too short.
GS: Your PSN is a crossbow reference. How exactly did that come about? Since we are on the subject of names, your forum name is Robin, yet you may be best known for you chat handle, Sophiebean. Which of the two do you identify most with and why?
Robin: I was given the nick name Crossbow Queen in Black Ops. I like the crossbow and some how managed to get kills with it, so the name was created and stuck. I liked the name so much that I decided to make it my PSN. The name I identify with most is Sophiebean since Sophie and Bean are the names of my two dogs, who every once in a while can be heard in the background when I have my headset on. So, that name just means more to me.
GS: Right now, there is a thread in the forums discussing favorite GS moments. As someone who enjoys a presence in chat, what would be one of your favorite moments in chat, funny or otherwise?
Robin: There are so many moments that I have enjoyed in chat, but my favorite has to be one night when we where talking about interesting flavors like Soy sauce Kit Kat and Smokey Bacon Lay’s chips. And so many other flavors there are.
GS: We need to know what makes Robin tick! Gaming aside, what are some of your other passions in life?
Robin: Some of my passions are to read and to spend time outside when its nice out, preferably 80 degrees and up. I also like to look at the stars on a clear night.
GS: True, you are a killing machine in FPS games (and, no, she is not paying me to type that), but you also seem to love a good role playing game. If someone absolutely green to the genre asked you what were some titles that are mandatory to play so he/she got a true impression of the potential of the genre, what titles would you name and why?
Robin: Even though I like role playing games, I can’t remember other ones that I’ve played, but I would definitely recommend Skyrim since you can do almost anything in the game that you can think of. I think it’s a good game to jump into even if your new to Role Playing Games.
GS: Okay. A leprechaun appears in front of you, gives you a million dollars for traveling expenses, and limits you to only to the speed of light. What place would you most wish to visit? No, you are not required to take the leprechaun along. Lawn gnomes, perhaps.
Robin: I would have to say Ireland. Even though I could go any where at the speed of light, I would still choose there mainly because I’ve always wanted to go there.
GS: It is time to come clean. Everyone has a guilty pleasure when it comes to favorite television series or movies. What series/movie that you just can’t help but like?
Robin: My guilty pleasure for TV/Movies is MASH. I know its an old show, but I’ve always loved watching the series.
GS: What is your favorite drink?
Robin: My favorite drink is Snapple raspberry tea.
Robin, thank you for taking the time to answer some of our questions, and, to everyone out there reading this interview, thank you for taking the time to learn more about your fellow Gunslinger!
Super Mario Galaxy 2 is back. This time with improved Multiplayer features.
While the first Super Mario Galaxy was well received by fans and critics alike, it was criticized for having an unsatisfying multiplayer option. A second player had to be content with merely moving around a cursor and collecting fire bits while the first player had all the real fun.
Nintendo seems ready to answer that call of improvement with Super Mario Galaxy 2. Now, according to pre-released demo versions, the second player may still be in a supportive role, but he/she can have a significant impact on the game by collecting fire bits, attacking enemies, grabbing power-ups and extra lives, and even shake the remote to knock villains out of Mario’s path. The second player can also offer encouragement as a neat little bonus by means of cheering and coin collecting sound effects issued from the WiiMote at the second player’s cue.
Super Mario Galaxy 2 is due to hit the shelves May 23rd, 2010.
[Source: Gamespot.com]
The Beta version of the forthcoming Halo: Reach game for Microsoft’s Xbox360 is scheduled to go public May 2nd, 2010. Bungie, the game developer behind the Halo franchise, is offering it as a free download to any one who owns a copy of Halo 3: ODST.
The new Gunslinger, Hermit Grimm, swaggered through our saloon doors for some rounds of Borderlands 2. Before he loots TOO many chests or kills TOO many raiding mutants, let’s get to know the man behind the controller a little bit better. Without further adieu, here is the interview with our brother Grimm!
). For the record, I do not consider Legos a toy, but I realize the department they are placed in retail stores.
