X-Files: FPS

[robinturner]

Watching the X-Files episode "First Person Shooter", I learned a number of things:
1. Computers do not have plugs. When a program is out of control, you can't just unplug the computer, you have to find the secret code that shuts it down. Even hitting it with a hammer won't work, you have to find the code.
2. Programmers in TV shows take Linus Thorvalds' quip "Real men don't make backups" far too seriously. When they finally learn the code (Alt-Shift-Bloodbath), it erases the entire game program and it is lost for ever.
3. Computer game skills translate flawlessly into real life skills. Darryl Musashi handles a pair of machine pistols just as well as a game controller.
4. The best way to win a FPS game is to stand still and shoot straight in front of you.

Compared to all that, the idea of a created game character evolving a mind of her own, hopping into another program and using it to kill people in real life sounds almost believable.

Update: I've just found out that this episode was written by William Gibson.

Comments

[ironed_orchid]

We were just saying today that we like systems with manual override, even when the easiest way to do it is pulling out the plug.

Unless they were explaining the crisis as caused by a computer developed into a supernatural entity, there is no excuse for that sort of sloppy writing.

Gibson on a bad day?

[solri.livejournal.com]

It was only the software that developed into a quasi-supernatural entity, not the hardware. The idea worked brilliantly when Gibson did it in Neuromancer and Count Zero and you'd have thought The X-Files would have been a perfect platform for playing around with it, but somehow it just fell flat. It's not even as though Gibson doesn't understand games and gamers: he once wrote a brilliant story about a video game. I reckon there were some idiots on the production team saying "No, we wanna do it like in that film where they need to find the code to stop the computer starting a nuclear war, and hey by the way, I think the chick should cut off that dude's hands with a broadsword, that'd be awesome, and it's hey, like broadsword, get it?"

[solri.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, the name Darryl Musashi is todally William Gibson.

Re: Gibson on a bad day?

[ironed_orchid]

This is the problem with TV, some people involved can take a good idea and make it stupid.

Also what works in a novel set in the future doesn't necesarily work in a show set in the (whenever that episode aired).