Month: February 2008

OK, this auction is ending in eight minutes even as I begin typing this, so good luck winning this, but I gotta say, this is a pretty interesting “game.”

Here’s some pics:

And a write-up via Everything2:

An arcade game (although it resembles a game that would be more likely found at a county fair). It has two polished metal bars, and four buttons (ranging from low to “max”), and then has a series of colored lights that go up to Uncle Fester’s head. Uncle Fester has a white light bulb in his mouth.

The instructions tell you that the game can be played by one person (it shows someone holding the metal bars with each hand) or by two people (here it shows two people holding hands, with each person’s free hand holding a metal bar). The only other instruction is “The game ends when you let go.”

Not seeing any warnings, I knew that this must not be all that bad. I didn’t know what to expect, but I figured that I would spend a dollar to find out. (I imagine that this is the marketing technique: curiosity).

The game has a small digital display (like you see on the new pinball machines). When you press one of the four intensity level buttons (I chose “max”), you find out what its all about.

The bars vibrate rapidly. It surprises you so much, it kinda feels like a shock. The digital display flashes some wattage, and there is noise. Every ten seconds or so, the vibrations suddenly increase in frequency, and more lights light up (getting closer to Uncle Fester’s mouth). It kinda reminded me of holding onto a power drill or power sander that was supercharged.

I managed to hang on until the end, and the machine informed me “You did the maximum!!! 3000 watts!”. The bulb in Uncle Fester’s mouth flashed some, and the game went back to asking for money, silent.

I took a good look at my hands, no charring, although they did tingle for a while. The whole experience lasted about a minute or so.

Weird huh?

And, just to top things off, here’s some YouTube videos of folks getting “shocked”:

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