Some old friends...

Whether it's reasonable justification, or pure and simple hypocrisy, my progress in letting things go is compounded by a mad obsession with surrounding myself with things I enjoy, or if we're being honest, toys of a new era.

For some reason (other than the fact that I'm a hoarder, and there's possibly eight dead cats strewn about the garbage in my room), I want to wear my heart on my sleeve, to show off things that I like. I never want to get rid of my favourite video games. Whether or not I ever play them anymore, I want to hold onto them, to show everyone out there... 'Hey! I played Sonic & Knuckles! It's part of who I am!!'

In a similar fashion, I chose to collect two of my favourite athletes of all time, Steve McNair and Eddie George and proudly brandish them atop a bookshelf that is in our spare room, and few people ever actually see. And funnily enough, I have no buyer's remorse whatsoever. Someday, in my great big billion dollar mansion with rooms the size of airports and stairways that lead to nowhere, the figures will stand tall in a man cave to be proud of.

But really, I've given this far more thought than I probably needed to. In short, I got some more toyz. Online shopping sprees, they're dangerous things.

We commence with this handsome Jose Bautista bust, slugger of Toronto Blue Jays fame. Despite the Blue Jays being the very first team I was ever a fan of, primarily because dad had a Jays sweater I enjoyed looking at, I'd say there are fewer Jays in the all-time echelons of my favourite athletes than in my other teams. Nearly all of them played during the glorious years of back-to-back pennants, save a few obvious exceptions: Stieb, Delgado, Halladay et al.

In Jose Bautista, the Jays have had a true superstar, garnering the rare adulation that Toronto-based athletes often deserve but often miss out on. He's our modern-day Joe Carter, only with a better OBP, keener defensive abilities, and at least 99% more Dominican conversations.

Hacking through his plastic enclosure to yank him open feels mildly perverse, like bulldozing a rainforest, or performing a really unpleasant Caesarean section. Frankly, it doesn't feel like he wants to come out to play: he's held in place with a cable tie, and then, shockingly, his right leg is held in place by a hole in the plastic. I don't know why, but it's no wonder he was injured so much last year. That's dangerous, man!

Eventually however, he's freed from his transparent hub. In the process, I manage to do minor damage to his bat, as I didn't realise it was held in with a layer of tape, and came into two pieces. It's supposed to detach, apparently, but not so violently. I'll pretend it was wear and tear caused by dingers. Or, if I were at bat, a pop fly that lands harmlessly in the glove of the pitcher.

As is to be expected, he's a striking young figure (no pun intended, unless it was funny), obviously thicker than his more lithe cohorts of other sports, and with a more intense glare. Personally, I would have made the figure sporting Joey Bat's awesome reflective sunglasses, but I guess sacrifices have to be made. He probably would have looked a little bit nonchalant with them on, like he was just chilling at the beach, wearing entirely inappropriate beach wear.

At first, getting his bat in his hand felt so difficult, I almost contemplated leaving it out. Without it, he's just doing the cha-cha, or launching a Kamehameha. I'm cool with that. I really don't want to snap his arm off and ruin the whole figure, when suddenly...

The arm wretches aside! What is this? His arms are... movable? What a shocking revelation! After years of just accepting that these fellas were locked into their respective positions, but Jose chooses to freely flail his arms about in the interest of making that perfect batting stance. Unfortunately, it now means I have two unwilling hands to force that bat through rather than one, but I'll live with it. Whether he will remains to be seen.

Our next subject is Chris Bosh, formerly of the Toronto Raptors. Rather amusingly, he comes packaged without legs.

Despite this, he's still better than anyone currently on the Raptors roster. Also, it means that I could recreate the scene from Robocop 2 where Murphy gets dismantled, if I wanted to. ...I don't think I want to.

The first thing that strikes me upon unleashing the Boshtrich is that... wow, he's really tall! I mean, it's to be expected when your subject matter stands at 6-10, but beyond that, the box reveals that this model happens to be 11½ inches tall, or exactly four inches taller than Muggsy Bogues.

One of the things I like about the McFarlane figures is that, whenever a player moves to a new team, their model is rereleased with an updated look. Sometimes, it's with a new pose and whatnot, but in the case of Mr. Bosh, it was in the exact same pose, only sporting a Miami jersey and a shaved head, as is his current look. If they were being truly accurate, the new Heat model of Bosh would come complete without the ball in his hand.

Oh, I kid. I kid because I love. As Scott Carefoot once pointed out, and yes, I realise I'm heavy-handed with the links today, Chris Bosh cops a lot of shit from fans, primarily because of how awkward he is. The other guys around him, LeBron and D-Wade, they're pretty cool, y'know? Pretty slick (like LeBron's forehead). But our boy Bosh? He's just this lanky dude who sometimes looks like a lizard. No reason to hate on that. Indeed, all the more reason to cheer for him. He'll always be a Raptor to me, perhaps primarily because he so resembles one.

Once I've finally gotten his legs on (one fell off onto my lap at one point. It was horrifying), I perch him upon his stand, and good lord, this thing really is huge!!

As you can see, Bosh towers over the once-hulking Jose Bautista, ready to dunk all up in the face of Felix Baumgartner. In fact, Jose looks like Joe Pesci, about to crack the kneecaps of this enormous beast. Truly, I fear for Bosh's safety up there: he's held in place by a sturdy little piece of metal, but he still wiggles when I touch him. It's actually really fun to poke him and watch him bob back and forth, but I surmise that it's not the best way to maintain the figure.

...Just one more poke. Hehe!

Now we meet Ryan Kesler. His box is dustier than the others, which makes me feel as though I am the only one who is buying Ryan Kesler. If I know my countrymen as well as I think I do, I figure a great deal of this is due to his being American. What do fellow Vancouver Canucks Kevin Bieksa, Roberto Luongo and Maxim Lapierre all have in common? They are all Canadian, and as such, they will always have that homegrown love. What else do they have in common? None of them are very good goalies.

I'll stop now. Because I have a near-legitimate fear that everyone I've talked smack about (Bosh, Luongo and the entirety of the 2013 Toronto Raptors) will come and get me. Which would be really cool for a photo opportunity, but ultimately dangerous to my person and my personal belongings. They might even poke my Bosh figure. Dangerous!

Ryan Kesler comes with a removable hockey stick, a tiny little puck I think I'll lose by the end of this sentence, and a shocked expression on his face. Maybe he's shocked that he's responsible for that tiny little puck, wherever it went. His pose is quite amazing, because he's leaning over so far he looks like he'll fall at any second, and it makes me really appreciate the grace and athleticism of hockey players. I mean, imagine being in that position on a field or a court, you'd lose your balance, right? Then imagine doing that on the ice, while being chased by many men with few teeth. Now I understand the look of alarm on Kesler's mug.

And finally, last but not least, the coup de grâce, the mack daddy, the man who garners more animosity from the Toronto faithful than perhaps anyone else (though really, that hatred should be directed at Hedo Turkoglu)...

Vince Carter.

For years, I bemoaned his name. The former Raptors' superstar, one of the biggest names in the league, who brought excitement to the young franchise with his sheer athletic prowess and bevy of amazing dunks. Then, after six years, things went south. Vince was traded for peanuts to New Jersey, and the divorce was less than amicable. It took me almost a decade to get over it, and now, I look back fondly on who he was for us, and what he did for us, rather than how it all ended.

And now, he's in my house. This particular figure is modelled after one of Vince's finest moments, his triumphant performance in the 2000 Dunk Contest, with a series of jams that many consider to be the best of all time. Perhaps it's appropriate that I got this figure in a year when Terrence Ross became the second Raptor of all time to win the contest? Perhaps it's fate? Perhaps it's coincidence? Perhaps I was just shit scared that if I waited much longer, the Vince figure would no longer be available in Raptors garb? ...Yeah, that was it.

Just like Chris Bosh, Vince is in mid-flight, but unlike his crimson ally, Vince tragically has the metal jutting right into his knee. Which frankly, you'd think would hurt his ability to jump. It might be my misty-eyed nostalgia, but I think this one is my favourite. It represents one of the highlights of my tragic tenure as a sport fan (bested only by Sidney Crosby's golden goal and the day that Joe Carter touched 'em all), and it will be forever immortalised upon my mantle, at least until one of several things happen (theft, earthquake, or angry fiancé furious that I spent all this money on toys).

And so, my set is complete, for now. There are other athletes who hold a place close to my heart, and inevitably there will be many more on the horizon. I look forward to watching this collection grow (as long as it doesn't become obsessive, which it most likely will), because there's always room for winners in my home.

...Fingers crossed, the next one is Andrew Wiggins after he leads Toronto to an NBA title.

The box of Titans

Oh, lookie here! It appears as though I have a package labelled 'action figures' waiting for me from the United States postal service. What thrills! What suspense! What a contradiction in a blog where my supposed objective is to clear away a house full of toys.


Upon unwrapping it, I was shocked to be met with my old friends, Steve McNair and Eddie George, formerly of Tennesee Titans fame. But of course, I wasn't really surprised. I ordered them a week ago.


Emmitt Smith ran with the best of them. Eddie George was a fierce blocker for his quarterback. And in the fourth quarter, Randy Moss was excellent at getting out of the way.

They're hardly action figures, because they're modelled after certain poses, and feel rather fragile, but they're marketed as action figures all the same. Eddie and Steve are from a collectible series of McFarlane toys, from 2001 and 2004 respectively, so they're only going to appreciate in value, but I'm not interested in keeping these fellas boxed up. They wouldn't like that, and it's far beyond me to evoke the ire of a pair of pro athletes.

Right after the snap, we have to burst up the seam.

Then, we have to break through the middle. Eddie George was king of this.

Finally, there's sticky tape. I hate it when the opponent uses sticky tape.

Stellar. Now let's get a look at those bad boys in their finery.


This is an exact replica of Steve McNair with his offensive line of 2004. Unfortunately, I haven't figured out how to get the tiny little bit of metal on his foot to fit in the hole and keep him upright, so I have to balance him like a drunkard. Champion move, Tony.


Eddie George, on the other hand, stays firmly in place. For this reason, he's stoic, but hardly efficient on the football field, garnering a 0.0 rushing average. At least McNair in his current state is able to fall over for a short gain.


Eddie: "I don't get it, why do we have two balls?"
Steve: "Because we're boys, Eddie."

#0040: Madden NFL 06 (PS2)

In every great legacy, there's a setback. Even the strongest among us falters here or there, and it's because of these missteps that we are able to grow and learn.

For Napoleon, it was Waterloo. For Nintendo, it was the Virtual Boy. For Kesha, it was pursuing a career in music. And for Tiburon, it was Madden NFL 06.

It was supposed to be a good idea. A gameplay mechanism that allowed more control and precision over your quarterback's throws. It sounded to the layman like a massive step forward from football game to football simulation.

After all, 2005's hit stick was an exciting way to finally deliver those bone-crunching tackles you'd always wanted to on puny guys like Az-Zahir Hakim. The rear cover boasted that this was the 'year of the quarterback'. It omitted the word 'shitty' between 'quarterback' and 'the', because we were handcuffed to the infamous cone of shame.

Known at the time as 'QB vision', it meant that every time you threw a pass, a ray of light shot out from your quarterback, indicating their range of visibility, or their fondness for Scott Summers. Throws made outside of this light area were horribly off-target, and suddenly this made a QB's awareness stat of utmost importance. If you were Peyton Manning, you could see almost everywhere. If you were Kyle Boller, you were Stevie Wonder.

To test it out for the first time in ages, I took on the woeful 2-14 49ers, and the results were not pretty. Steve McNair completed 15 of 33 passes for 222 yards, 2 TDs (one a miracle completion to Drew Bennett, the other an inexplicably successful 4-yard goalline grab by Troy Fleming, where the 230-pounder miraculously juked a defender) to 3 interceptions (iPhone wanted me to say interventions), and 2 sacks. On the other side, rookie Alex Smith fared even worse: 9 of 20, 136 yards, 1 interception and 7 sacks. Those are the kind of stats I'd expect if I were playing football.

In case you were wondering, yes Erron Kinney was fantastic. I'm beginning to think that he was actually the lead programmer with EA at the time, or had slept around a fair bit in order to put himself in such high regard. End game: a 13-31 win that I'm not proud of. Also, the only good game that Andre Woolfolk ever played. Historic.


As you can gather, the QB vision element was more of a hindrance than a benefit, simply too cumbersome for a game of it's pace. You could turn it off if you wanted, but then that defeated the purpose of even getting the game. If you were updating your Madden, you wanted more of a payoff than Pacman freakin' Jones.

On that note, this Madden is a bit sour grapes to me anyhow, because it came after a Titans 5-11 campaign, making them one of the worst teams in the game. So I'm playing the worst Madden game with one of the worst Titan teams... why, exactly?

Another gripe I have is that punt returning is simply impossible, because your AI won't block for you. Instead, they'll face your direction, watching with eager anticipation to see what happens next. And, inevitably, that results in your return man getting absolutely killed. In my case, that returner is aforementioned Pacman, which makes it okay.

AI issues aren't new to Madden, but because the overall package is usually so good, it's otherwise overlooked. In 06, however, it's hard to get into the game when your QB passes as well as Garo Yepremian.

#0017: Madden NFL 2005 (DS)

Well this is terribly mildly exciting, isn’t it? INAKA now shows that it is neither sexist, racist, or toyist, as it expands its ever-reaching clutches towards the medium of video games.

Video games are a different monster for me entirely, as far as parting ways goes. I’ve been playing them for as long as I remember, and eventually, like most other people, while my interest in toys waned as I grew up, my love for video games stayed strong.

According to IGN, I have a mighty collection of 244 games all up, with an estimated value of $7,606.32. I’m none too sure exactly how this value system is calculated; are games judged separately? Do I have a Lowly Worm-like ‘HTF’ gem? Has the presence of Bubsy 3D bumped the value down by approximately $800? And does anyone care that I own the Simpsons Cartoon Studio? Anyone at all?

Partly because of this list, and partly because of a feeling that I just might want to play them again someday, I have never once parted ways with a game. Not even my busted copy of Mortal Kombat 3 on Sega Genesis.

But they take up room, just like any other toy. So with a stiff upper lip and ecstasy knowing that GAME might pay me $5 for it, I cut my ties with Madden ’05 on the Nintendo DS.


I recall the night well. There I was, tucked away in the farthest reaches of Comox, B.C. The hour was approaching midnight, and it was December 31st. Whilst almost everyone else in the country was gathering with friends, out on the town, or at least enthusiastically eying their new Hello Kitty calendar, eager to unveil January’s illustration of Keroppi playing baseball, I was at home. Alone. And that was just the way I liked it.

It shouldn’t come as a surprise that I was ending 2004 playing video games, because that’s how I started the year. It was a little bit less lonely that time however, because I was playing Animal Crossing, so I got to hang out with my good mate Alfonso. Unfortunately, Alfonso was absent from my copy of Madden on the DS, so I had to just make due with Albert Haynesworth.

There was a rare sense of achievement as I began 2005, because while most folks got sloshed, I shut out the Miami Dolphins to begin my season. It was exciting! It was stellar! And looking back now, it was entirely insufficient.

I am an avid fan of American football, at least as much as anyone can be when they’re on the other side of the planet, and broadcasters are under the miserably false impression that everyone wants to see five Oakland Raiders games a year. In 2004, my fandom was still in its infancy. I had only started following it during the ’02 playoffs, and my first foray into Madden was with the 2003 edition on the Gamecube.

Funnily enough, I skipped a year for some unknown reason, thereby missing the game-breaking mechanics of ‘04’s Michael Vick, famous for running faster than either Sonic the Hedgehog, or Kabal from the aforementioned MK3.

So I hadn’t seen a whole lot of Madden just yet. I didn’t know that the 2005 counterpart on home consoles would prove to be immeasurably superior, and I was too high on my new DS to realise that the player models were woefully lacking, especially when compared to another launch title, Mario 64 DS.


You might think I’m being a touch too critical based solely on those images, but it gets even worse when Madden’s in motion. They move rigidly, animate jerkily, and appear to have a magical ability to kick a football seconds after their foot had already passed by it. Frankly, I am unclear how this mystical kicking power would prove useful in the game of football, but darn it, they sure have it.

Beyond just the cosmetic shortcomings, the game also controls very awkwardly. Predominantly because of the poor animation, it’s hard to track exactly what’s going on out there. Is that mess of pixels a friend? A foe? Or is it Pac-Man, lost en route to his own game? Can’t be sure, better chuck the ball there and hope for the best. On the plus side, you can use the touch screen to throw to receivers, but that still doesn’t make them much more efficient at actually bringing the pass in.

To me, Madden just shouldn’t be done portably. I haven’t yet played a ‘Madden to go’ experience that didn’t disappoint, despite reviewers giving them the thumbs up. Call me spoiled by the ‘roided up performances of today’s consoles, but I’ll leave football sims to the big boys, thank you very much.

But perhaps the thing that frustrated me most, that filled me with such confusion and bewilderment, was who they chose to select as the Tennessee Titans’ best player…


Erron fucking Kinney.

Look, I loves me some Kinney, he was a solid and dependable tight end, but he was coming off a 25 catch, 193 yard and 3 TD season. Christ, I could get those numbers if you flung the ball at me enough times. For some reason, the ratings system was stacked in this one game to favour tight ends, making Kinney statistically superior to Tom Brady, Jamal Lewis, and both co-MVPs, Peyton Manning and Steve McNair.

Methinks this DS game was coded by tight ends, or at very least, tight end fanciers. Hehehe that sounds cheeky…

One of the other things that makes this game so disposable to me is the sheer number of Madden games I currently have in my possession. They’re bigger and better now, and this underpowered offering simply can’t stack up. Basically any positive quality it holds, its PS2 parallel has trumped. This includes: statistical brilliance by some of my favourite players, the song Wait by Earshot, and Jerry Rice.

Of all the Madden games I own, this one is the worst. And when you consider that I have the cumbersome Madden ’10 on iPhone, you know that this game is really bad.


Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go score a touchdown using only the Titans’ best player… Erron Kinney, it’s go time!

Damn you, Kinney! You and your tricks…