In 1987, a Perth inventor changed the children party landscape forever. Q-Zar allowed a generation to prove to their parents that the hours they clocked up on Duck Hunt wasn’t a waste of time and they did in fact deserve to be loved after all.
It wasn’t long until the laser tag tsunami swept the city and left thousands of unsatisfied children in its wake. What was meant to bring us together ultimately tore us apart as the game was about as frustrating as being a dildo at a scissoring party.
Before entering the arena of conflict the participants were divided into red & green teams and were required to put on an ill-fitting green laser pack that was still dripping with the sweat of the kid that had just finished the last game.
Now that you were marinating in stranger sweat and looking like a stormtrooper at the Death Star’s Mardi Gras celebration, you were ready to go. You’d talk trash to your mates on the opposing side and try to ignore the couple of random older weirdcunts who inexplicably spent their day playing laser tag with children and managed to look like different versions of Martin Bryant. You didn’t know much about them, but you sure as shit knew they were on some kind of watchlist.
The arena itself had the chilling feel of an American highschool crossed with the seedy charms of a Berlin techno sex rave. Once the door open kids rushed in and took their positions near their respective bases and awaited the slaughter.
Oh, and what a slaughter it was. A slaughter of your will to live. See, once you got slotted by a laser slug your gun would start yapping like a mature aged student on dexies. While your gun refused to shut the fark up you weren’t able to return fire, so you retreated like a fat man’s chodes in an ice bath.
If you were lucky enough to avoid getting tagged more times than a school bus window then you eventually get a chance to shoot at the other team. That was until your pack decided to cack its dacks and start telling you how to live your life, “warning, warning, return to energiser”. At this stage, you were about as useful as a can of Lynx before speed dating.
Essentially, the game was about avoidance: avoiding laser tags and avoiding the urge to smash your gun into the ground or into the face of the little shit that keeps pinging you from his cheaty position. After several minutes you would yearn for the sweet release of the siren to signal the end of the game.
Once the game had finished you were presented with depressing data of your achievements. While some children went to play in the surrounding arcade you were left to reflect on the fact you were as inaccurate as an after-sex piss. To add salt into the wound, the top gunner was given the title of “Terminator” on the printout and lauded this accolade over the group.
Next stop… Timezone.
Documenting the Human Zoo is thirsty work, so if you enjoyed what you read how about buying Belle a beer, ay?