Nerds Without Pants

Nobody’s perfect. We all have our inner demons—those things that we do even though we know we shouldn’t. That’s what this episode of NWP is all about: vices, and how they work into our video games. Since this is technically the second part of episode 5, we skip what we’ve been playing and jump into the discussion. First up, Patrick brings up the subject of gambling, and how prolific it is in our games. Even at a young age we’ve been exposed to this vice in gaming, and we look at how it’s affected us, even without our knowledge. We gamble all the time, including crafting in MMOs or just taking a chance on a game we’ve never played. We also look at the insidious rise of “mystery items” in games—random virtual goods that cost real world cash. Next, Rob takes us into the slippery slope of substance abuse. We look at games that glorify drugs and alcohol, such as Narc and Catherine, and Julian tells a personal story about how GTA IV ensured he would