Well, dear play chums, as I sit here, I am waiting for a phone call from the estate agents to say I can go and pick up the keys to my first house. Yes, I am in property.
It's been a bit of a long haul – mortgage advisors, surveyors, roofers to give a quote on whatever the surveyor found. Oh and solicitors – the less said about them the better. Then there's the minefield of buying a washing machine. The baffling array of machines is something to behold and to pick the wrong one would be at least a five year sentence of bone rattling spin cycles.
Sometimes you have to stop and think, if only life was more like a game. I'm not talking the alien invasion or one where you awake in a cold dark room with no memory of your identity or how you got there type game. I'm thinking more along the lines of bouncing on chubby mushrooms and facing ‘mild peril.'
Buying a house in Animal Crossing is a cinch. You simply pull a few weeds (which I admit can be back-breaking work, but AC characters are closer to the ground, so there's less bending) and maybe do a spot of fishing to build up funds. Once in your little house all your friends give you useless objects to make the place feel homely. And there's no need for planning permission for that extension. Just get a spot of archaeology under your belt and the bucks come rolling in, making that sun lounge a reality.
Fable had some cracking houses, but they were out of my financial reach. I liked the town in the woods (I know, doesn't really narrow it down), which featured a few yurt-type dwellings. There was a lovely little place for sale there, with a veranda if I remember rightly, but I guess it just wasn't to be. Even so, at least Fable had the good sense to forgo the fiddling around with valuations, solicitors and the like. It was just a case of "have cash, will buy."
The hard bit's done now – well, all the emotional turmoil, mind-melding jungle of terms and signing things bit. Now we've just got to hump a house full of boxes from one place to another. This is where I need a girl like Lara. Nobody can push and pull a box like that girl. She has it down to a fine art; in fact she's made a living from pushing boxes with aplomb.
On the other hand, Solid Snake would be totally useless. Rather than pushing boxes, he'd just be hiding in them – not what you need on a busy move day. It would all be a bit, "No Snake, I don't think we need you to commando roll across the living room" and "Snake, out of the cupboard now. Yes, threat has been eliminated – it was the postman."
However, I don't have Lara on hand, so I'll have to cut this short as I haven't even packed the 360 yet. The fun bit is at the other end when it's like, "ooh, another box with stuff for me!" To have my comic books back safely on the shelf with my special edition DVDs, will be sweet relief. Oh yeah, having our own home will be pretty sweet too.
If this was a game, I could just save, watch a cut scene and it would all be done for me. But as our teachers always told us, "life is not a game." I can't believe they were right – bastards!
Most played: Kameo
Most wanted: Assassin's Creed