This is an impromptu podcast I recorded with Mike Suszek (The Wiire, Sports Anomaly) after expressing an interest in creating a gaming podcast that was smaller and more casual, something in the same vein as Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier’s “SModcast.”

Originally, this was to be used as a test pilot for a new Kombo podcast. Unfortunately, Kombo was going through some changes at the time and didn’t feel the format Mike and I had cooked up would gel with their new editorial direction, so the podcast got shelved.

It’s about 2 o’clock in the afternoon, Pacific Standard Time, and I’m in downtown San Francisco standing beneath Route 80. I’m exhausted, and the Starbucks vanilla latte I called “breakfast” is not doing its job. Hours earlier, midnight,  I touched down in the City by the Bay after being flown out of Philadelphia, PA. I climbed into a limousine and drove in style to my hotel, the St. Regis, where I succumbed to jetlag-induced sleep. All of this – the flight, the limousine, the five-star hotel – was orchestrated and paid for by THQ. I’m here to cover a press event for Metro 2033, their upcoming post-apocalyptic shooter set in the ruins of Moscow, Russia. Under different circumstances I would not allow THQ to curry favor by footing the bill – integrity, journalistic ethics, that whole thing – but I’m a destitute student, one who does not get paid to be a journalist. One who has never been to San Francisco, video game journalism’s Mecca. How could I turn down this opportunity?

So here I am, waiting under an overpass to gain entry to Temple, a local nightclub where THQ is hosting their Metro 2033 event. I am not alone. There are twenty or so other writers with me, hailing from Destructoid, GamingNexus, 1UP, GameRevolution, and a handful of other outlets I’m not as familiar with. All of us are snapping photographs and scribbling in our notepads. I jot down observations in my own Moleskine. I observe how post-apocalyptic the underside of this highway overpass looks and feels. Battered, worn, abandoned. I wonder, is this intentional on THQ’s part? Am I being subconsciously coerced into the right mindset for playing Metro 2033? Probably. Too bad I sort of dig it.

When we are finally let inside, daylight gives way to darkness. A few flights of stairs later, that darkness is broken by harsh red lights mixed with roiling, manufactured fog. We’re in the basement, I think. Or what was once the basement. Right now, for all intents and purposes, it is a Russian fallout shelter. There’s barely any lighting, and people dressed as Russian paramilitary have taken over the place. In the back, a raggedly dressed man plays a guitar beside a rusty oil drum that’s aflame. Seated next to him is a boy, maybe ten years old, whose face is dirty and whose clothes make relief victims seem fashionable. THQ has gone through enormous trouble, not to mention expense, to construct this spectacle. But will Metro 2033 be worth it?

The short answer is “yes.”  Though, my reasons for thinking so probably won’t resonate with most gamers. Nor do I think, when the game is released in March, it will make a very big splash. Before I tell you about Metro 2033, I want to quote a very famous journalist: “The idea of trying to cover this race [event] in any conventional press sense was absurd.” So I’m not going to. I refuse to remove myself from the equation. You’re stuck riding shotgun with me. Now, about Metro 2033 …

If you didn’t already know, Metro 2033 is a shooter. And now that you do know, you probably agree that little more needs to be said. Anyone reading this is undoubtedly a gamer, and as such they either play shooters or know enough about the genre to know what the hell I’m talking about. Well, Metro 2033 is a shooter through and through. It is a shooter that has been stripped down and laid bare. It is a raw, earthy experience. There are no biotic powers, no plasmids, and no calling in air strikes. The player is left only with their gun and its bullets to brave the harsh wilderness the world has become. This is a game about the beauty in struggle, and that beautiful struggle is what has me smitten.

I’ve lost interest in deconstructing games to their base components, then trying to reassemble them to see if they add up to a $60 value. I only care about the totality of my experience – the good, the bad, the ugly, and how they all come together. At the core of Metro 2033’s totality, what everything else about it must come back to, is the story it tells. Rather, I should say, the story the book it is based on tells. “The game actually follows the book very, very closely,” Luis Gigliotti, creative director at THQ, told me, “It is a beautifully scripted, cinematic, linear experience.”

Metro 2033, the novel, was written by Russian journalist Dmitry Glukhovsky and published online in 2002. By 2005, it was printed and quickly became a nationwide bestseller. The novel tells the story of Artyom, hero of both the game and the novel. Artyom lives in a world that has seen better days. After some catastrophic atomic war, the remains of Russia’s populace retreated underground to the safety of Moscow’s metro system, which also serves as a massive, web-like fallout shelter. This is the world Artyom has known his whole life – the oppressive, claustrophobic confines of a ruined metro system and its rabid, increasingly insane inhabitants. But they are the least of his concerns. To make matters worse, post-blast Russia is also plagued by the “Dark Ones,” living shadows that look like silhouette cutouts of the cosmos. The danger they present is an unorthodox one. The Dark Ones attack psychically, wreaking such havoc on the human mind that a few days later their victims drop dead. Through contact with a man named Hunter, Artyom is tasked with nothing short of saving what’s left of the world.

In between a few glasses filled with rum and coke, I played roughly five hours of Metro 2033. When I finally put the controller down, what remained with me was a sense of immersion – an illusion all my favorite shooters have managed to cast over me. Half-Life 2, for example, was a game where the lines of reality at my peripheral vision started to blur, and slowly I became Gordon Freeman. This phenomenon happened again with Metro 2033, interrupted only by random, seemingly useless cut-scenes that break away from Artyom’s perspective. The rest of the game is experienced through Artyom’s eyes. To help sell this, developer 4A Games removed almost any hint of a HUD. Only when the player swaps between weapons and ammunition is their screen invaded by a menu system acid trip. The rest of the game’s information is presented contextually. Artyom’s journal, which acts as an outline for mission objectives, is presented as an actual journal that Artyom holds up in his right hand and illuminates with a lighter held in his left hand. When going topside Artyom requires a gas mask to survive. The gas mask adds a layer of distortion to the player’s vision – its edges streak with water and sweat, and his line of sight is broken by cracks and imperfections that contribute to the overarching anxiety built into Metro 2033. Artyom is only allotted 15 minutes of breathable air, which the player keeps track of via a gauge strapped to Arty’s left wrist. The result of all these touches is something that feels less like a Metro 2033 video game and more like a video game adaptation of Metro 2033. As Gigliotti put it, “the gameplay reinforces the fiction even more.”

This notion of Metro 2033, the game, as an adaption of the novel is reflected not only in how the game is played, but also the challenge in playing the game. Metro 2033 is fucking hard. I heard these sentiments echoed among the other writers. Sadly, this is something many Western gamers – especially console owners – will struggle with. Western gamers hate to “pussy out” and play on Easy Mode. Instead, they’ll vilify the Normal difficulty setting as being “broken,” maybe “unbalanced.” But to divorce playing Metro 2033 from the rest of the experience is to play it all wrong. Video games shouldn’t cater to our needs or wants. In a post-apocalyptic nightmare world populated by mutant monsters and human detritus, a persistent tension sells me on the experience even more.

Early in the game, after Artyom leaves his hometown (homestation?), Exhibition, he winds up at another station, Riga. There he meets a possibly unstable fellow nicknamed Bourbon. Bourbon hires Artyom to escort him to Dry Station. Early into the journey there is an encounter with bandits. A firefight breaks out. During my first attempt, I approached the situation hoping to strongarm my way through it. I ran in, guns blazing. Within moments, I was a corpse. In my second attempt I took things more slowly. I shot out lights in order to take cover in darkness. I picked off enemies one at a time, looting their corpses while bullets whizzed overhead. In the heat of battle, playing this sequence was the furthest thing from being fun. In fact, it felt more like work. But after the bullets stopped flying and I could let my guard down, the feeling of genuine accomplishment was worth all the nerve-wracking non-fun.

I reached this part about the same time as another writer seated near me. I overheard him complain to a THQ representative how it was difficult to distinguish allies from enemies, how it was a pain to loot corpses for ammunition, especially mid-firefight. Oddly enough, this is what stands out to me as a defining moment in Metro 2033, one where every aspect of the game gels together. I felt like this other writer just didn’t get it. Sure, I was on edge. Sure, I wasn’t having fun. But that just made me empathize with Artyom even more. I shared his anxiety, his fear.

That, in a nutshell, is Metro 2033. If you’re looking for a video game that plays it safe, that celebrates the complacency of our medium, that is more concerned with being a shooter than fitting shooting into the context of its story, then Metro 2033 probably won’t be for you. But if you appreciate when games try to be more, when games try to turn a genre into an art form, then play Metro 2033. It’s far from perfect, but its flaws are integral to the overall experience. Sure, maybe they make playing the game flirt dangerously close with a controller-throwing tantrum, but goddamn if that frustration doesn’t put me right there in the hellish Russian metro system with Artyom.

iPhone, meet the world. World, iPhone.

What makes the iPhone unique is how it delivers its multiple functions: Say goodbye to a mess of buttons; all of the iPhone’s offerings are handled on a 3.5 inch touch-screen display, which can be personalized with Widgets, a playful name for optional on-screen accessories added to deliver information like the weather, stock reports, and more – all received on a mobile device in real-time.

The iPhone and its functionality come at a price: $499 for a 4GB model;$599 for 8GB.

Compared to its competition, like Samsung’s BlackJack, which runs $50-$80 with a two-year Cingular contract, you pay six times less than the iPhone for a device with almost all the same features. And while it may not sport iPhone’s screen interface, it does have a familiar one – one that’s been a standard for years now. The BlackJack, and other similar smartphones, can be bought with a $250 30GB iPod Video in tandem and still cost consumers hundreds of dollars less than the iPhone.

So, is iPhone just another smartphone all jazzed up with Apple aesthetics? And, do consumers even want an all-in-one device?

J.J. Sereday is a 21-year-old resident of Franklin Township, N.J. who has been using Apple’s computers and products for five years now. The young artist already prefers smartphones, and as an Apple user he’s “stoked” for the iPhone and all it has to offer.

“I personally am all about convenience,” Sereday said. “I would like to have one device to do everything.”

He said he wouldn’t have as strong of an interest in iPhone if it were just part cell phone, part MP3 player, like Motorola’s Chocolate. The scope of the iPhone’s connectivity and its intuitive user interface was what convinced Sereday the iPhone is worth every penny.

Sheena Lewoc, 20, who studies graphic design at Drexel University, is also a fan of Apple as well as smartphones; Cingular’s 8125 is her weapon of choice. Unlike Sereday, however, she won’t be so quick to adopt the iPhone.

“Price is an issue,” Lewoc said, adding that until iPhone comes down a bit, you won’t find her signing any two-year contracts with AT&T/Cingular. She noted how it took several generations of iPod before that device really took off with consumers, for all the “bugs” to be worked out. She said she expects similar development with the iPhone.

“I like Apple products, but I’d like to, you know, let everybody else test it out first and then go from there,” she said with a laugh.

Okay, so Apple-enthusiasts are pretty turned on by iPhone. Go figure.

What about PC users?

Anthony Nardone is a 23-year-old information technology/computer science graduate of LaSalle University, and certainly knows a thing or two about computers, technology, and smartphones; he’s an owner of Sprint’s PPC6700.

“It is true that many of the features of the iPhone have been around for years on the PocketPC/Windows Mobile platforms, but aside from stability improvements and minor innovations, the Microsoft platforms are becoming somewhat stagnant,” Nardone said.

Having dropped $500 for his smartphone, Nardone declined to criticize iPhone’s pricing. He said he feels the price is competitive when considering how much more storage capacity the iPhone offers and how much stronger a multi-media device it is.

Only a few people had anything negative to say about the iPhone when interviewed. Most barely knew about the phone, or admitted to a general prejudice against Apple products. Unfortunately for them, general interest in the iPhone is all-encompassing, not just limited to Mac-Heads; studies suggest they’ll soon find themselves in the minority.

In an online survey conducted by Digital Life America, a market research firm, it was discovered that out of 1,230 people definitely interested in immediate purchase of the iPhone, 31 percent were ages 15-24, 32 percent were 25-34 and 31 percent 35-49. The remaining 6percent were 50 and older.

These results may seem surprising to some, but as J.J. Sereday pointed out – his mom, and his grandmother, own iPods. Apple seems to have achieved their goal to create a medium that crosses generational gaps.

Still, the iPhone ain’t your grandma’s rotary phone. It is truly “higher IQ” than your average smartphone. Not only is it a phone, internet communicator and a fully equipped iPod, but sensors detect when the phone is raised to your ear and automatically shut down the touch-screen to avoid any accidental button pressing. These sensors also adapt on-the-fly when the iPhone is being held horizontally or vertically, changing the display accordingly.

The popularity of smartphones grows each year, with sales increasing 75.5 percent to 37.4 million units in 2006. As a result, these devices, like the iPhone, may be relegating flip phones to a Converse Chuck Taylor sort of “classic cool.” And with something as sleek and stylish as Apple’s iPhone, it’s sure to cut a strong corner for itself in the market. Unfortunately, with the exception of the die-hard Apple fan and the well-paid technophile, the average consumer may be slow to warm up to iPhone’s cost.

Come June 29, we’ll see just how strong Apple’s influence has become since permeating every household with i-Branding.