Shoot Club: All Our Pretty Songs Part Four: Pick Up My Guitar And Play Just Like Yesterday

"Okay, here we go." Trevor takes up the mic, Peter hitches up his guitar strap, I lower my guitar strap to be more bass like, and Jude taps the drum sticks against each other three times. Tap tap tap. And then three more times as the song as loading. Tap tap tap. And then three more before the song actually starts. Tap tap tap. And then the song starts when he's half way through trying to tap the sticks another three times. It doesn't bode well for Jude's sense of timing.

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Page 6: what the fuck?

Also, is it kinda wierd that when Pete says, "You almost stepped on BioShock" I instantly thought of the cat?

I...This better not be the last Shoot Club.

Also, that was a pretty damn depressing last page.

An especially potent installment of a great weekly. And I registered just to say so! ;)

Page Six is some kind of Twilight Zone ending.

Everything else was excellent and extremely well-written, and I just wanted to say how much I enjoyed it.

More Shoot Club, please, bizarre pseudo-ending or not.

SatansBestBuddy:
Also, is it kinda wierd that when Pete says, "You almost stepped on BioShock" I instantly thought of the cat?

Same here.

What, it wasn't the cat? I mean, after I thought about it I didn't get how it could be the cat, but yea, I thought it was the cat too.

Page 6 made me laugh a bit, if only because it was completely random.

I rather LIKE the ending. Maybe because I'm one of those weird people who HAVE thoughts like that...

I wouldn't say it was random though...

anable:
I...This better not be the last Shoot Club.

I'm pretty sure it is. From Tom Chick's website:

Quarter to Three:
The final Shoot Club for The Escapist just finished up today. I wasn't happy with the amount of work it took at the rate it paid, and The Escapist wasn't happy with the lack of traffic. So we mutually agreed to call it a wrap. They were very supportive over the last nine months, and I appreciate the opportunity they gave me. I had a great time while it lasted.

I have a couple of opportunities to do Shoot Club elsewhere, but for the time being, it's "on hiatus", whatever that may mean.

Well, those are sad news. I rather enjoyed the collumn...

JimL:

anable:
I...This better not be the last Shoot Club.

I'm pretty sure it is. From Tom Chick's website:

Quarter to Three:
The final Shoot Club for The Escapist just finished up today. I wasn't happy with the amount of work it took at the rate it paid, and The Escapist wasn't happy with the lack of traffic. So we mutually agreed to call it a wrap. They were very supportive over the last nine months, and I appreciate the opportunity they gave me. I had a great time while it lasted.

I have a couple of opportunities to do Shoot Club elsewhere, but for the time being, it's "on hiatus", whatever that may mean.

Wow, that's disappointing.

Thanks for the kind words, guys. I've appreciated the comments. And, yes, that was the last Shoot Club. There are a couple of opportunities for me to run it elsewhere, but it's a tough sell for a number of reasons. Short fiction isn't really a conventional way to write about gaming. I've been insistent that I have "final edit" and the profanity is a sticking point for some sites. Also, I didn't want to split it up into weekly content any more, and it won't always have a consistent word count. So rather than compromise any of these points, for the time being, I've decided to let Shoot Club rest.

The Escapist was great about letting me do my own thing. It was a nice nine-month run and the perfect way to cap off a seven-year series (Trevor's first appearance was in May of 2000).

Also, BioShock was absolutely the cat! In real life, I have a neighborhood black cat who visits every night to hang out. He's very sociable at our weekly LAN parties, although he's never been stepped on, even when we get carried away at Rock Banding.

-Tom

TomChick:
Also, I didn't want to split it up into weekly content any more, and it won't always have a consistent word count.

Oh please, oh please mean that you are going to write a Shoot Club book.

I think that the last two pages felt a bit rushed. It really could have been an amazing way to end a series of they were fleshed out more.

So...book?

Also, for what it's worth, Shoot Club was the reason I started reading the escapist regularly and even created this account. We'll see if they can hold my attention without you.

Actually, I feel the need to expound on this.

I had read random escapist articles in the past when linked to them by various blogs and whatnot, but I never made it a point to visit the site regularly. To me at the time, the escapist was too hit and miss to make for regular reading. Obviously the presence of Shoot Club changed that enough to point that I now occasionally read escapist articles just because I have time and associate something good (Shoot Club) with the site. As a result I end up reading more of the Issue articles than I would have. This may not register as a direct hit for Shoot Club, but without it, additional page views from me personally would have been lost.

Obviously, escapists big cash cow right now is Zero Punctuation and Yahtzee's success no doubt overshadows Tom's. While I find ZP entertaining, I can't imagine I'm the only one that feels like it's incongruous with the rest of the escapists material. Shoot Club, on the other hand, seems like a perfect fit. It's not "easy to digest" in the same way a three minute video clip is. It doesn't slap you in the face with attention seeking antics. Shoot Club is social commentary where ZP is the class clown. Don't get me wrong, this is nothing against ZP, but where do those viewers go after the video is done? Do they read articles about Gunpei Yokoi and lament the fact that he died before giving the gaming world all he had to offer? Do they find it interesting how middle aged game developers are finding inspiration and lessons on design from their preteen kids?

I could be wrong, but somehow I doubt it.

Wow, I am a bit sad. You could have postponed the bad news till after the holiday, maybe offer us page six in the first damn week of January when everyone is unhappy anyway because of the return to work and stuff like that.

Although I thoroughly appreciate The Escapist as a whole and have done so since the days it was more magazine than site I need to say that Shoot club was one of the best written game related pieces I ever glanced upon. The way you blended game related commentary with storytelling and especially Trevor made my weekends (the time of the week when I read The Escapist most of the time) a time to look forward to.

I hope that if and when Shoot Club finds a new house you will drop us a line and let us know where we can read and enjoy it... Good bye and au revoir and auf wiedersien (sp?) for now!

Sad face.

I didn't really like Shoot Club at first, but it grew on me something fierce. Sorry to see it go.

Well, damn, that's depressing. I truly enjoyed Shoot Club, maybe not as much as Tom vs. Bruce, but it was definitely a very well written and entertaining series.

Don't let it die, it really shows your abilities as not just a game column writer, but a proper storytelling writer.

I know I wouldn't object to buying a full length book version of Shoot Club, cause I know that if it's just a fraction as entertaining as the weekly version, it's a good book.

Though the way Shoot Club is structured now doesn't really give itself well to a full length book...

oh my...saddest "gaming news" at the end of the year :( I wasnt one of the first Shoot Club readers, but over the months I became hooked. I liked the style of writing and the humor very much and over the months I learned to "love" you and the guys from "Shoot Club". To me, It was a little bit like a written sitcom and I couldnt wait to find out what Trevor will do next time.
I think a lot of the pleasure I`ve found reading Shoot Club has to do with the fact that it is sooo easy to find similarities in our own daily life as a gamer.It does not matter if you live in spain, norway or Canada-when you are grown up and into gaming you can share and understand the fun and chaos that develops when a bunch of nerds come together for a private LAN Party and "the guy with motion sickness", "the guy who sucks at shooters" and so on become stereotypes and comparable to your own gamer friends.
Thanks for the great moments and fun I had with "Shoot Club"!!!

One last question to you, Tom: Is there a site/link where I can find some collected Shoot Club episodes? I ve been to your site and could just find a handful of them. Where is the rest of that great stuff hidden?

apologies for typos-english is not my native language-I hope this posting makes sense and u get what I ve tried to say ;)

If the "handful" you refer to finding on the site currently is this index,

then you might be interested in the old archives from the site's previous incarnation. I do not know of any more Shoot Clubs online than this (plus of course what is on The Escapist), but perhaps Tom can point you to additional ones.

I hope that is useful. All Tom Chick fans are hoping for a Shoot Club book!

Wow, that last page really came out of nowhere, but what powerful writing! It really made me miss some of my long-lost friends for a minute, in fact I'm going to go call a buddy I haven't spoken to in a couple of years (just irregular emails here and there). So thanks for the inspiration.

I've been lurking here at Escapist for quite a while and have always found Shoot Club to be an entertaining read. Tom, I'm with everyone else here in wishing you the best of luck in your future endeavors. Cheers~

Rest in Peace, Shoot Club. It was fun while it lasted. Great ending.

( ... And I'll be checking your gravesite every so often for signs of the resurrection)

Long time lurker here, but I like other people am sad to see this column go by the way side. When I first started coming to this site, I like the person above me came because of shoot club. As I got more into it weekly(After going back and re-reading the ones I missed) I started to branch out and enjoy the site as a whole and enjoying the content but it is quite definitely the Shoot Club articles that brought me back weekly. Thanks for the good reads. I'll be around your site now since I sadly won't be able to get my weekly crack addiction taken care of here anymore.

That ending was genius, so intense that it is comical.

Ok i'm really starting to miss shoot club now, it feels like an old friend has moved away and hasn't bothered to call. Tom i wish you all the best but i just hope that the fact your not writing about shoot club does not mean you've actually stopped them, i'd like to think they are still happening even if we don't get to hear about them anymore.

i registered here to reply to page 6.

flawless.

i write elsewhere, and page 6 went from 'yeah this is an interesting little ditty' to 'woahwaitwhat?'.

top marks.

Just read from first to last. Totally absorbing.