Terminal Lance #12 “Tom Clancy is Full of Shit”

Does anyone remember the Splinter Cell games? I know I do. While I always preferred Metal Gear Solid, I always enjoyed how high speed I felt playing as Sam Fisher. In the videogames and movies, night vision is clear, useful, and makes a fucking awesome “bweee!” noise when you turn it on. In real life, unfortunately, it is none of those things. The current generation of PVS-14’s fucking suck. Yes, they’re night vision and obviously they have their uses on the battlefield, but it’s never as cool as in the movies or games.

I would be amiss to say that Solid Snake wasn’t 50% of the reason I joined the Marines in the first place. I think it can be said that movies and games influence all of us subconsciously to do something as ridiculous as join the military. It’s all so incredible, so badass to do what you see on TV. To be the guy that people make movies and games about, that’s pretty awesome. But of course, none of us are really Solid Snake. None of us are Sam Fisher, and none of us ever will be. While I wouldn’t go as far as to say that war movies and games are great recruiting tools, I would say that it would be nice if they did a bit of research and made the tools they show realistic.

Maybe next time you turn on your NVG’s in Splinter Cell, Sam trips over a piece of trash or something because he has a 5 degree viewing cone and can’t see a fucking thing in front of him. Howabout the part where you’re adjusting the brightness and contrast of your NVG’s to get a better picture, or smacking it to keep it from flickering…? Naw, I doubt they’ll put any of that in there–that would be too realistic. If people didn’t have the fantasy, those games wouldn’t be any fun.

I’d like to announce the opening of the Terminal Lance Store, hosted by Printfection. It’s basically like Cafepress, but I liked it more because it was cheaper and had more color options. Get to the store by clicking on the “Store” tab at the top of the screen. I think the “Terminal Lance” skivvy shirts will be a hot seller.

In an effort to be honest to my loyal readers, I’d like to note that I have already received the skivvy that I ordered. I wore it today under my cammies. While it is not exactly OD Green, the “Military Green” color offered by Printfection suffices as a true skivvy shirt. It’s slightly paler than I thought it would be, but it gives it the “Salty” look we all want anyway. Overall, the product is a pretty high quality print.