[Swanky office set. Enter DON, a young entrepeneur; a fat, sweaty BOSS sitting behind a lavish desk]
BOSS: Don, thanks for coming in. Now, I was told by a large number of sources in the biz that you lot were the hottest games developers around, and that our software house couldn’t find a better investment if we stumbled across a goose that laid golden eggs, shat diamond anklets and burped Chanel Number 5 into a nest of fivers.
DON: Thanks.
BOSS: Which, frankly, makes me wonder why you have pitched me this utter cock.
DON: You didn’t like it, then?
BOSS: No, I didn’t. Funnily enough I didn’t enjoy Advanced Buddhism Simulator.
DON: Sorry to hear that. I thought the 3D rendering on the bonsai was gorgeous.
BOSS: Yeah, sure, the bonsai looks nice. The bonsai looks f**king delicious. I’d know, I’ve had a long time to study it because – and stop me if I’m wrong – in this game you don’t have to cocking do anything.
DON: You do. It’s a puzzle game.
BOSS: Well, pardon me for one wank-happy minute, but I missed that, Don. What’s this puzzle about, then?
DON: You know, life. "What’s life for?" "What’s the meaning of the cosmic balance?" "What’s that over there? Oh, it’s just the bonsai."
BOSS: Sounds suspiciously as though we’re back to the arse station zebra where you’ve written a game where you don't cocking do anything.
DON: You do! You have to achieve enlightenment. You may not be moving the mouse, but you’re moving your soul.
BOSS: I don’t have time for that! I’m not interested in moving my soul; I can barely move my bowels some mornings. I want games with killing in. Why couldn’t you have chosen one of the violent religions like...all the others? Our customers want things to happen: bras pinging off, monsters dying. They need a constant reward system and ideally virtual assets to trade online, that’s how we keep getting the money from these stinking arsecoils.
DON: Ah, well, in Advanced Buddhism Simulator, if you meditate to a particularly high standard, you get gold coins, and special mystery prizes.
BOSS: Now we’re getting toasty! And what do you do with them?
DON: You spurn them. Buddhists have no interest in worldly possessions.
BOSS: Jesus, is this a joke? The worst thing is, you can’t even lose a life in this game.
DON: You can!
BOSS: Yeah, right. Sometimes you die of old age, but you just get reincarnated as a different Buddhist. Or a bird, or a worm, which looked interesting at first, but actually, on the balance, most definitely arsing wasn’t. Once I came back as the f**king bonsai. This is the without doubt most boring game I’ve ever had the spunk-splattered luck to stumble across.
DON: Oh dear. How did you find Grand Theft Godot?
BOSS: I sat waiting for it to load for 45 minutes. How long does it take?
DON: Well, you see, the point is – oh, don’t worry about it.
BOSS: No. And I’ll tell you what, my chequebook won’t worry about it either. Your software is tedious and pointless and I hate you and I want to piss on your mother.
DON: Ah, you hate it now, but you’ve not tried it in our virtual reality module yet, that’s when the game comes alive. Have a headset. [Hands old 90s style VR headset to BOSS]
BOSS: What’s the cock-plunging point in that?
DON: Well, immerses you in the Buddhist mindset...and, of course, the players have to buy the headset hardware from us.
BOSS: Now you’re talking, give it here.
[BOSS puts on headset. Fade to black, and fade up later that day. The room is basically bare, DON and a FRIEND are just tiptoeing out of the door carrying BOSS’ desk]
BOSS: You know, I think I’m getting the hang of this little puzzle. Oh, hello bird, hello worm, hello bonsai. Ommm.
