Beer Pong Video Game Taps Teen Market

There are certain phrases that should be bookended by inverted commas, "Professional Psychic" being one of them. We'd previously thought "Beer Pong Industry", was another, until we ran afoul of one of the makers of a portable Beer Pong table, a slapped-together contrivance we took great delight in mocking until they gave us a stern reprimand. Don't be fooled by their insouciance, as much like the Freemasons, they mean business.

Beer pong, for the uninitiated, un-phased by all the innuendo-laden pics we've posted here, is like billiards if you had to drink a cup of beer every time your opponent sunk a shot, and risked sending pavement pizza all over the felt, and frankly, completely marring the game's inherent gentility (Snooker, that is, not 9-ball, where in less reputable taverns, someone sporting an eye-patch and a denim vest will hustle you out of a week's pay)

Played on a table tennis-like surface with plastic cups, Beer Pong involves sinking a plastic ball into one of your opponents' cups, forcing them to remove the cup from the table after the contents are consumed (typically mass-produced swill that Belgians wouldn't serve to their alcoholic dogs, but any beverage of your choice will do).

The first team that rids the other of their cups, as they get increasingly into them, is the winner, if by 'winner' you mean the team that doesn't immediately strip down to their skivvies, put their head through a glass door or otherwise make their parents resent forking over hard-earned mutual fund dollars so no-goodnick fruits of their loins could get the 'whole college experience'.

JV Games of Las Vegas, like the makers of Grand Theft Auto [click here] have stirred up a giant goulash soup of controversy with their new Beer Pong game for the Nintendo Wii (a game console that allows you to mimic popular sports, without having to go outdoors or have any discernible skill).

After objections from various state law-makers to the Entertainment Software Rating Board, JV Games has had to alter the name of the yet-to-be-released game, Beer Pong, (rated suitable for post tween future booze-hounds), to Pong Toss and is eliminating all references to alcohol, except for, it should be noted, 'Toss', or, for that matter 'Pong'.
Now, we can see the entire beer pong industry quaking in their soiled boots, as instead of drunken participants having to track down a custom table with a bikini-clad woman on it resembling the woman here (everything IS indeed bigger in Texas) for over $200, they can just play virtually, without having to clean up any spills that aren't internally generated.

For anyone who is interested in pursuing this further, the good folks at 'Webtender' have a handy list of Drinking Games (and are not responsible for any related stomach pumpings), which they'll no doubt update once Pong Toss takes the gaming and heavy college drinking worlds by storm.

Of course, detractors of the Grand Theft Auto series will tell you that while the video game is fun and all, nothing can compare with the thrill of actually staging a carjacking or committing vehicular homicide, and the same is no doubt true with Beer Pong, or Flip Cup as it's known to the guys staging the largest tournament of its kind ever in the US in October.

The Flip Cup Guys contacted us about the event, which will take place on October 11, 2008 at the M1-5 Bar and Lounge in New York City and will feature 64 six-player teams and, presumably, an army of mops at the ready. That they also mention "open beer bar specials" means that there is a possibility of a Shark Guy showing up.

Check it out and get yourself registered early at: www.FlipCupGuys.com!

Hopping MADD at Grand Theft Auto

Gaming has suddenly vaulted into the world's third most popular solitary pursuit, second only to the more cost-effective, not to mention better bang for for your entertainment buck, masturbation, and of course, sleep---the latter engaged in to a lesser extent by gamers, the former much more so for reasons obvious to anyone but gamers.

As we noted previously, in our post 'Drink & Drive your way through Grand Theft Auto' the latest entry in the infamous Grand Theft Auto series has many critics wondering how many more banana peels line that already slippery slope toward social upheaval, not to mention a full-on revival of Vaudeville comedy.

The world's foremost ribbon dissemination organization, Mothers Against Drunk Driving ha recently petitioned the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) to "reclassify Grand Theft Auto IV as an 'Adults Only' title" in reaction to the inclusion of drunk driving in the role-playing game, which allows you to basically run the gamut of antisocial behaviors that would garner both a pat on the back from Eliot Spitzer and a chest bump from your local Cripp.

Apparently, the virtual imbibing of alcohol in the game, (which augments the very real smoking of weed that usually goes along with this sort of activity), blurs the screen and complicates the driving controls---which seem to us a very realistic admonishment, but to MADD is a trivialization of the very serious issue that is driving while impaired.

Be that as it may, the Dukes of Hazard dirt ramp-like leap in logic that a fantasy pursuit dictates how people behave in reality, is one in which we're not ready to make--as our viewing of thousands of horror films and our, as of this writing, failure to commit any comparable acts of butchery, will attest.

While this kind of leisure pursuit offer little in the way of redeeming social value, neither for that matter, does the music of Nickelback (whose singer, apropos of nothing, was recently sentenced for DUI).

A thumbs up to all our gamer friends, down to MADD and speaking of digits....watch out for that carpal tunnel.