Forum Overview :: Reviews :: Re: breakdown of the cutscenes for William Hayt Jr.

[quote name="Senor Barborito"]So this is a game about SB. One of the first long conversations I ever had with SB was about swords. This was years ago, like back when his chatroom was still up or something. Anyway he wanted to know if the Weaponsmith would make him a couple of swords. What kind, I asked. He described what he wanted. The closest actual cutting weapon approximation to what he was talking about were the thick hatchet-like knives/swords that was used to crack open helmets or armor on already dead men in feudal Japan. What on earth would you want with a pair of those, SB? They're ninja swords, he explained. I explained back that they were too thick, heavy, slow, and short to do anybody any good against anything but a dead man's armor, or possibly a very hard cheese. No, he enthused. They're ninja swords. If you cross them, a certain way of course but if you cross them, you can create the perfect defense. (I will never forget this conversation ever for the rest of my life.) Perfect defense? In <u>The Book of Five Rings</u> Musashi describes the usefulness of short swords in closed surroundings, there are some well-developed iaido short sword maneuvers, etc. etc., I continued, but nothing I've heard of, even in the fruitiest reaches of what gets taught now as "ninjutsu", involves two slow-ass armor crackers. <i>Well,</i> he said... <i>You have to move really fast.</i> That's the secret. If you cross the swords and move really fast you can beat anything. After I stopped laughing, and calling over the Weaponsmith so he could laugh, and calling my brother and father so they could laugh, I tried to tell him that not even in a straight up sword-vs-sword fight would that shit ever work - much less against, you know, <i>a gun</i>. A perfect defense is being the first guy to sign a urinal, not dicking around with some sharpened mallets. It wasn't until a year and a half later that he finally admitted I was right about that. Up to that point he would still, from time to time, attempt to draw me into a discussion about the viability of his crossed ninja swords theory - always in the strict confidence of IRC or AIM, never where men could see it. Then there was the time veronica (who fucked Umberto) was certain I was trying to steal her man.[/quote]