I don't believe I was a particularly morbid child, but it's fortunate no one in my parade of shrinks saw me read a Choose Your Own Adventure book. Every fork in the road I reached was methodically dog-eared, and I'd take the path less traveled by those without wish of death. It has made all the difference.
To this day I'm the guy who jumps at railings and walks himself off platforms, just to see if he can fall. No scenario plays out without every limit found, consequence felt, and friend in green crosshairs gun-butted, shot in the face, and fragged. One could argue I have a self-destructive streak, but every gamer worth their game knows that going the wrong way first yields the most loot, and the greatest treasures of all are found down dead ends.
And Sprung is nothing but dead ends.
Critics complained that making the right dialogue choices when chirping up a bird is rarely intuitive, and that the least logical thing to say was most often what she wanted to hear. I contend that these folks haven't spoken to any women recently.
Hitting close to home as it did, I soon started over with the female character. Nothing would stop me from becoming the sloppiest ho on Snowbird Mountain. I shamelessly threw myself at every male that crossed my path, but this approach quickly led to a case of herpes and precipitous drop in Becky's self-respect, resulting in Game Over.
Trying the opposite direction, I moped around the mountain shrugging off all male advances with allusions to broken heartedness and aspirations to rebound avoidance. But, receiving neither support nor pity, Becky was branded a prudish cold fish and retreated further into her sad solitude to contemplate suicide, while I was left to contemplate a Game Over.
Once again at a fork in the road, but unsatisfied with the ends of either means, I resolved to forge my own path. Becky would pick herself up and get back on the market. She'd be her buoyant, boisterous old self again, but it would be on her own terms. Her own fucked up twisted chick mind terms. Again, it has made all the difference.
