Skyrim is Here

First, happy Veteran's Day. Thank you for being a part of what's developing into a tiny subculture, if not warrior caste, upon whom the vast majority of a sometimes indifferent population rely. It isn't melodramatic to say you are the backbone of this Republic.

Now, you know what else happens today? Skyrim has been released. Don't know what that means? Neither did we.

Most of the gaming press these last couple of months has been wrapped around Battlefield 3 and Modern Warfare 3. That's understandable, both are juggernauts in the first person shooter world and there's been incredible anticipation for them. Trailers garner gozillions of viewers, the live action ones are better than a SyFy Channel movie and mulitplayer mode vs. weapon value (how dare they nerf the shotgun!) becomes a point of contention that rivals college football rivalries.

We get that. Shooting stuff is fun, and if you don't get to go killing people what need killing in real life then you should go do it in a game.

So it was that we were caught completely off guard by the utterly unexpected, nerdgasmic reaction of some of our friends to this thing called Skyrim...not least because we had no real idea what the hell a Skyrim was. Imagine our surprise when one of Swingin' Dick's friends recently home from TF Slugger (glad you're okay, Danny) was caught vacant-eyed and drooling at a live action trailer for something with dragons and dudes in armor. We thought it might be a fluke...Slim called a couple of the guys from 1/1 and Bridgeport and asked them what they thought. To our utter astonishment, they were busily cleaning the scabs off their normally dragging knuckles in preparation for a marathon weekend of dragon hunting.

Dragon. Hunting.

Skyrim? Seriously? What the hell is a Skyrim? It sounded vaguely obscene, like teabagging or...well, you get the idea.

Apparently it wasn't the name of some weird sex fetish.  Fact is, it's the biggest thing in fantasy since ever for getting your dork on. It's not an MMORPG, like World of Warcrack or the AVN awards, but it does, from what we can tell, have the potential to be amazing. If you watch the live action trailer (which we have included here for your edification) you will no doubt see the potential. You'll also see they put more effort into it than the directors of the last Conan movie and Clash of the Titans combined.

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This game series is 17 years old now and just seems to be getting more popular. It's go an all start cast, including Christopher Plummer, Max von Sydow, Lynda Carter (you know, Wonder Woman?)...anyway, there's something like 70 actors in over a hundred roles. As far as graphics, it looks amazing. We're talking some truly sweeping, grandiose cinematography.

It's made by the same folks as Fallout, which should tell you something, and it's said to have the potential for over three hundred hours of game play tied up in the main quest line.Then add in side quests and the amount of time you'll spend watching jiggly amazon princesses run around in chainmail bikinis...that's a lot to wring out of one game. If you want some more information, there's some great background over on Cnet.

In the meantime, you might find this amusing. Now, just replace the main character with a beady eyed thug wearing multicam who speaks with one of those funny accents like in the move Fargo and you'll know what we've been dealing with.

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Stay tuned...we'll let you know what we think of Skyrim in about a week or so. We like to get our dork on as much as the next closet nerd, and we're not talking about teabagging or salad tossing either.

The Mad Duo can be contacted here on UTR, over on Kit Up! or at Breach-Bang-Clear. High speed, low drag celebrities of the action figure and steely-eyed snaker-eater world, the commentary of Richard “Swingin’ Dick” Kilgore and Jake “Slim” Call has been likened to a .308 op-ed to the head. They don’t like the Taliban, marplots, hippies, sissies or SNCOs and officers who don’t grasp the concept of Noblesse Oblige. Loyalty starts from the top down, assclowns. (Some folks have asked for some background on the intrepid doorkicking twosome: background is here and you can find us on Facebook, even if you're typing one handed. Which is nasty, so stop it.)