In the battle of Man Vs Game....

I watch a lot of Man Vs Food, the show that sees human eating machine Adam Richman travelling America and eating a ton of tasty looking stuff. In each episode Adam tackles a local eating challenge of enormous proportions, be it a massive pizza, a five pound burrito, or, the one that sickens/impresses me the most, the time he ate fifteen dozen (180) oysters in 21 minutes.

Adam has since given up the challenges due to what I can only assume is the pressure of his doctor and loved ones worried for the state of his now seriously clogged arteries. So Adam now hosts Man Vs Food Nation, which sees him still visiting great pig-out joints, but coaching members of the public as they attempt the ridiculous sort of challenges that Adam’s poor, weakened heart and bowels can no longer endure.

Adam’s advice to these challengers is to keep a steady pace, and when the food starts to get to you, when everything starts to feel and taste the same, then the best thing you can do is to mix it up. Add condiments, change the texture, anything to give yourself the power to push on through.

There are many similarities between my commitment to tackle my huge pile of shame, and a Man Vs Food challenge. It’s an attempt to cram a load of something I love into a short space of time. Sometimes I get discouraged halfway through playing a title. Other times I feel like puking just from looking at the size of the task at hand, coupled with how much I’ve already devoured. When I get like that, I think of Adam.  

Before his untimely retirement Adam would always push through for the good of Man. He may have failed on occasion, but he’d always give more than seemed humanly possible, always managing to push through the food wall whether he finished the challenge or not. So I’m heeding Adam’s advice in order to push through my own personal wall. I’ve been keeping a steady pace, but things have started to get a bit stale and samey. Now I’m going to mix things up. I’m going to add condiments, change the texture.

About two years ago our friends and neighbours flew to Las Vegas to get married. They were gone for three weeks, and during that time we looked after their cat. When they returned they had bought us gifts to thank us for looking after their baby, and what they had bought me was this, the Sony SharpShooter:

This houses the Playstation’s motion controller, the Move. It let’s you play certain games as if you’re holding a real gun, just like those old arcade machines like Operation Wolf:

I've got two games that utilise the Sharpshooter, Killzone 3 and Socom 4, so I’m going to target them next. I’ve got about halfway through both games, so I should finish them off pretty quickly. It’ll be a totally different experience to just sitting back, feet up, with a controller in my hands. The combination of the Move and the Sharpshooter should be just the right condiments to change the texture.