Oh man, have you guys seen any of that Olympic fencing? I would have been watching the whole thing if I knew the athletes were wearing the coolest sports equipment ever devised... lighty-up helmets.
One fencer is red, the other yellow. Little LEDs in their helmets flash when they touch the opponent with the foil. BRILLIANT.
Plus, the shiny, metallic, bulked-up helmets look like poorly-designed costume props from a low-budget 1970s sci-fi film. I kept expecting James Caan to jump out the shadows screaming "ROLLERRRBALLLLLLLLL!!!" before dismantling another robomatronic Yul Brenner.
I now fully expect Lazer Tag [sic] to become an Olympic exhibition event by 2012. (Andrew and I, being veterans of cheap Lazer Tag knockoff Photon, don't stand a chance.)
I can't speak for where you grew up, but Photon was SO much cooler in the Chicago suburbs. The courses were really intricate and hi-tech, with all kinds of ramps and gun emplacements and stuff. It was wildly better than the alternatives.
Ahh, but this wasn't the arena version; it was the cheap-ass home version.
Yes. as I recall, you used to go for the "close up" method of simply holding me down and pointing your gun at my chest-sensors while I screamed "no fair." Good times!
We were too poor growing up to have stuff like that. We just threw rocks at each other.