Ghost in my Head

Luckily I had two days off in a row, to make up for my wasted, muffler-filled yesterday. So today I played a new computer game. Yes, I do consider that a better day. Toss up between cooling my heels for three hours while my car is gutted and then weeping bitter tears over my credit card or shouting furiously at my computer because I don't know what I'm doing? Despite similar levels of frustration, I'll take the computer. At least I can wear sweatpants, drink hot tea, and cuddle under blankets while my anger mounts.

So the game. For awhile I've been killing my spare time playing Elite Force. Yes, that is the Star Trek Voyager game and no, you may not mock me for my Trek-love. You've never wanted to blast off into space, explore strange new worlds, and bond with a group of people who could all, eerily, sell beauty products in their downtime? I thought so.

But I did not play Elite Force today. I found a new game while I was shopping over the holidays called 'Ghost in the Sheet,' which appealed to my love of both humor and the macabre. Simutaneously, even. It begins wonderfully. You're dead. (Well, wonderfully may have been the wrong word.) You head towards the light and through the tunnel, only to discover that you are now part of a dead bureaucracy and, moreover, you're the last rung on the ladder. In fact, you don't even have a rung yet, you're hanging on to the bottom, trying to hold onto your sheet. As low-man on the totum pole, you're sent out to an abandoned factory to figure out what went wrong. It would be creepy if you didn't spend a great deal of time chuckling over the quips.

So far, so good. Until. Has anyone ever played 'Myst'? If you have, then you know where this is going. It's a great game, as long as you're progressing forward. It drives people to drink, however, when they get stuck wandering in aimless circles for hours because they can't solve the latest puzzle or, even worse, they can't find the latest puzzle. 'Ghost,' my friends is the new 'Myst.' There is already a decrease in the vodka in my freezer. Don't judge until you've played it. I managed to kill the sole survivor of the - whatever - that I set loose again in the factory and now I'm wandering aimlessly around Hall A. Losing. My. Mind.

Still, I'm determined to get out of that bloody Hall A before I give up and uninstall. And return to Elite Force. At least when I'm confused there I can always start blowing up aliens with my phaser. It's very cathartic.