Post by dlevere on Oct 23, 2014 2:36:31 GMT -4
By Joseph Bernstein
All images and video courtesy of Jon Bois and SB Nation
Once in an unbearably long while, a person produces a thing on the Internet that transcends politics, gender, race, religion, class, personal and professional jealousy, the balkanization of public interest, and the unsteady tides of social distribution. In my view, these things tend to succeed for two reasons: 1. They are so surpassingly Good that not even the wartiest Internet hobgoblin can make a tolerable claim that they are Bad, and perhaps more importantly, 2. They are motivated by such obvious good faith, good humor, and good sense, that to pick their nits would be not just pointless, but somehow, immoral.
This fall and winter, the writer Jon Bois made one of those things. It is called Breaking Madden and it is one of the funniest things to ever appear on the internet.
Breaking Madden, if you haven’t read it, is the recounting of 17 attempts by Bois to fuck with the hugely profitable and popular football videogame, through various modifications to the game’s myriad settings and player creation options. It began with a Bois-created 400 pound mobile quarterback inspired by the zaftig Jared Lorenzen, and included single games in which a team ran for 2,400 yards, in which offsides was completely legal, and in which the New England Patriots fielded an offense comprised of 11 Tom Bradys.
It culminated in an epic finale days prior to the Super Bowl in which Bois, through a series of diabolical manipulations, attempted to score 1,000 points with the Seattle Seahawks against the Broncos. And in a nice instance of life imitating art, when the IRL Seahawks laid their own pasting on the IRL Broncos on Sunday, Twitter lit up with “Breaking Madden come to life” jokes.
Bois, who is 31 and splits his time between Louisville and Montreal, has written for SB Nation since its launch in 2009. He talked to BuzzFeed about the origins of the series, his history as a gamer, and the pains of being a Chiefs fan.
All images and video courtesy of Jon Bois and SB Nation
Once in an unbearably long while, a person produces a thing on the Internet that transcends politics, gender, race, religion, class, personal and professional jealousy, the balkanization of public interest, and the unsteady tides of social distribution. In my view, these things tend to succeed for two reasons: 1. They are so surpassingly Good that not even the wartiest Internet hobgoblin can make a tolerable claim that they are Bad, and perhaps more importantly, 2. They are motivated by such obvious good faith, good humor, and good sense, that to pick their nits would be not just pointless, but somehow, immoral.
This fall and winter, the writer Jon Bois made one of those things. It is called Breaking Madden and it is one of the funniest things to ever appear on the internet.
Breaking Madden, if you haven’t read it, is the recounting of 17 attempts by Bois to fuck with the hugely profitable and popular football videogame, through various modifications to the game’s myriad settings and player creation options. It began with a Bois-created 400 pound mobile quarterback inspired by the zaftig Jared Lorenzen, and included single games in which a team ran for 2,400 yards, in which offsides was completely legal, and in which the New England Patriots fielded an offense comprised of 11 Tom Bradys.
It culminated in an epic finale days prior to the Super Bowl in which Bois, through a series of diabolical manipulations, attempted to score 1,000 points with the Seattle Seahawks against the Broncos. And in a nice instance of life imitating art, when the IRL Seahawks laid their own pasting on the IRL Broncos on Sunday, Twitter lit up with “Breaking Madden come to life” jokes.
Bois, who is 31 and splits his time between Louisville and Montreal, has written for SB Nation since its launch in 2009. He talked to BuzzFeed about the origins of the series, his history as a gamer, and the pains of being a Chiefs fan.