Twin of Doom

Separated by decades: the Fantastic Four villain
Doctor Doom (left) and the Worker of Secrets (above)

When I need a diversion, I've been punching up one of the free games that I downloaded a month ago from Apple. One favorite way of letting off steam is Infinity Blade 2, a sword-fighting game with gorgeous graphics, wondrous weaponry, and fearsome foes. If frantic forefinger- or thumb-swiping helps to ward off senescence, then I'm decades away from having to be put in a home.

I can't say much, though, for the plot of Infinity Blade 2. The game's objective is to free the "Worker of Secrets" from a magical prison. When we see the Worker at the beginning of the game, his appearance should set off alarm bells. He looks like the twin of Doctor Doom, the comic-book villain created 51 years ago by Stan Lee. (Doctor Doom was one of the inspirations for Darth Vader, by the way.) And if his appearance weren't confirmation enough, when the hero-protagonist meets him near the end of the game the Worker speaks with excellent diction in an English accent, the true signs of evil in our age.

Realization comes at the end

Oh, well, no one plays this game because it's a brain-teaser. © 2013 Stephen Yuen