A few weeks ago, fellow games writer Daniel Lipscombe sent out a call for participants in “Gamers Speak.” It’s a blog where he throws the same 13 questions at gamers (mostly game writers, so far — we have big egos and love to talk about ourselves) and publishes the responses in whole. Here’s mine.

Lest that blog ever go away, I’ll repost my favorite anecdote here:

Q7. Now the tough stuff… Favourite gaming platform ever… and why?

Oh, that’s easy. When I was in college, I lit some incense in my room before a house party, then I went downstairs to play beer pong, and forgot about the whole thing. I didn’t have a proper incense burner, so my stupid solution was to stick the incense in a chunk of Styrofoam, perched atop my television. A few minutes later, my housemate’s girlfriend informed me that my room was on fire. I got up there and discovered flames coming from my television and my Gamecube.

Fortunately, I was able to blow out the fire without any help, but now the room was dense with black smoke and the stench of burnt plastic. I didn’t care. Priority one was to fire up the TV and test the Gamecube, whose front side was melted to the point that the second memory card slot and a couple of controller jacks were inaccessible. Imagine my surprise when Metroid Prime’s title screen popped up on the television.

I like a lot of game consoles for a lot of reasons, but there’s always a special place in my heart for the one that didn’t quit after becoming a fireball. Hell, the Xbox 360 craps out when you stare at it the wrong way.