u/JasonAQuest

(Continuing my off-season exploration of ideas for games that are impossible for one reason or another.)

Four players, two teams. Joseph from RealLifeLore returns to help Sam with his geopolitical knowledge. The game area includes all of the 20-ish nations and nation-like territories in the Sahara or the Arabian Peninsula. The players are dropped off in Bir Tawil, the small region between Egypt and Sudan, that each country insists belongs to the other. They can travel by dune buggy, camel, or sandworm.

Each team accumulates Desert Power by claiming territories within the game area. The amount of power they get from each territory will be based on a Call Your Shot challenge, each of which spotlights the rich cultural heritages of the region. Either team can steal power from the other team by visiting a territory they've claimed and beating their score on the local challenge. Whoever has the most Desert Power at the end of the fifth day... wins.

The reasons this game is impossible are many – and most of them obvious. White boys playing a region-claiming game in Africa and Arabia is never a good look, especially with active armed conflicts going on as we speak. This is a region where even drawing borders, or claiming territory no one wants can still get people angry with you, to the point that I decided not to even name all of the countries included. Then there's the tiny fact that the terrain itself is often deadly – impassible without specialized equipment, local expertise, or both.

I was riding down a fairly busy 2-lane street, when an F-150 truck pulled out of its driveway across the street, into the same volume of space I was in. Physics doesn't allow that, so I basically got pushed off the road down to the sidewalk.

The good news is that I was wearing a 3/4 helmet with a face shield, armored gloves, and an armored jacket. If I hit my head I don't remember that happening: my head was unscathed, no loss of consciousness. Every place I had armor, no damage.

Y'know, there's something surreal about lying on your right side, believing that your left arm is at your side, but your left fingers can feel the pavement beneath you. Yep: my left humerus was snapped in two, allowing my arm to bend *twice.* (I'll skip ahead here and reassure you that all skin, nerves, muscles, and arteries remained intact.)

I chose not to move, recognizing that this wasn't the kind of incident where you end up saying "that was close" and limp for a couple weeks. This was THE ONE that you've been hoping never happens to YOU. It took me over 50K miles to get here.

The trauma crew used portable X-ray units and a CT scanner to conclude that my spine was OK, and my ribs were also cracked in several places on the left side. This indicates that it was the truck (not the pavement) that did the damage.

I haven't seen the scooter, but my neighbor who retrieved it from police impound and rode it home says it's mostly OK except for scrapes and a broken mirror on the left side (again).

5 days later I'm still in the hospital. My arm now has a plate holding the bone together. I'm pretty much ready to go, but they aren't allowed to let me without first determining that I'll be able to handle living alone with one usable arm and bad ribs. Eventually I should be back to 95%.

TLDR: Always wear protective gear, and always be looking for death threats!

Not Lag: The Impossible Games – DUNES DUNES DUNES