iPhone, iGame, iSubway

What caught me first was the name of the software company – Goorusoft.  

It couldn’t have been the wanton violence, mayhem from the shooting cannons, the sensation of rolling waves, or the sound of wood as iron cannon balls cracked decks into splinters.

Horatio Hornblower, here I come.  

I’m not usually a sucker for video games but this one got me. Warship puts you at the helm of a sailing ship out to fire broadsides against all enemy warships (which means everybody) in the age of sail. You move the iPhone to turn the ship and tap the screen to fire a broadside. It’s incredibly hard to clear a screen – Hell, the iPhone is so small it’s incredibly hard to see the screen.

And I’ve only cleared one area out of eight, and I only did that once. The first version of the game came without instructions. Thank God the updates came in and clarified what you were supposed to do – other than try not to get four ships in a row sent to Davy Jones’ locker. Here’s the problem. Warship has gotten in the way of my serious subway reading and my straphanger observing. I get on the F and lose myself in the rolling seas and incoming broadsides. Next thing I know it’s Roosevelt station and time to get off – half an hour gone.   

I’d sworn a while ago I’d never be one of those guys playing a handheld video game on the subway, earphones in, thumbs pounding away at the control buttons and toggle switch, oblivious to the world.  Better to be reading a Kindle. So, I’m not. There’s no toggle switch. Just a tilting screen, like a rolling ocean’s surface, and a tapping thumb on the screen – one thumb, not two. And you have to wait until your cannon has been reloaded before you can tap again or you’re just wasting your thumb energy. Today I decided to be a little more aware of my surroundings on my trip home. Or at least try to be. I was on my second ship when the F train came, the platform on 23rd Street not too crowded yet. I had to do something while I waited, didn’t I?  

I couldn’t look up from the screen – or I’d get hit by the three Santa Maria-size Spanish warships closing in on me in area 3 – the North Sea and the English Channel. Just what were the Spanish doing there? Was it another armada?

Don’t get caught up in the story line, I told myself. Just fire another broadside.  So, only bumping into one person, excusing myself twice, and getting through the car doors, I almost fell when the train jerked to a start. I took a wide stance with my back to the door, my backpack cushioning me as I smacked against it every few feet. I thought I smelled the ocean. No, it must have been someone’s aftershave or perfume. Maybe it was sweat. It wasn’t important except that it threw my steering off and my ship went down in flames. Crap.  I looked up and two women and a man were right next to me. The train was crowded. The guy was looking down at my screen. Where’d all the people come from? My ship had appeared again and already two cannon balls had made splinters fly into the sky in my wake. Crap again! I dipped the screen to the left, tapped to fire and ran for open sea. 

The woman to my right watched me. I saw her in my peripheral vision. My elbows were a little wild so I tucked them in against my ribs and squinted against the screen glare. Forget about her, I told myself. You’ve got a ship to command. Damn the glare.

Where’d my ship go? There it was. I held the screen a little further away trying to get a bead on the action. Use the force, Luke, I told myself and escaped from a closing knot of enemy warships, taking out one ship but starting to smoke from the damage I’d taken in the skirmish.

Dodge and weave, dodge and weave. I took out another ship then reinforcements appeared from three sides of the board – now that’s not fair! Damn those game designers. There was nothing to do but pound away as I steered between two of them taking broadsides from both sides. My ship sank and the word failed, appeared across the screen.  I looked up and the car was packed.  My heart was pounding in my ears. 

People pressed in around me. Don’t touch the phone. I need space. Give me room, the commander of my ship yelled inside my head. I looked at the station we were passing – 65th Street. How did we get into Queens? Was there time for one more game? We hit the dark tunnel between 65th Street and Roosevelt just as I tapped the word Sail, and my ship appeared on the rolling ocean waves of the North Sea once again.

This time those Spanish ships were going down.  

Huzzah!

–Joe Lunievicz