The Magnificent Seven...Game

Have you ever wanted a last resort? Hell, have you ever needed a last resort? Very few people can answer no to both questions. Let's face it, life can be a real bitch to live, you never know when it throws a curveball at you to screw you over. Luckily, a solution has been created.

There's a website called The Magnificent 7 Game. Instead of being a promotional ad for some horrifically misguided licensed video game, the website is actually a virtual slot machine of sorts. The aesthetics of the site are nothing to write home about, just a standard bright blue background with flashy Vegas like graphics. The only real odd thing about it is the slot machine itself. It has two buttons below it, one that says "Roll" and one that says "Good/Bad".

Before you play, the website asks for bare info like your name and home address which, needless to say, is necessary in order for you to win. There are seven slots with a number count that goes up to seven. All you do is click the "Roll" button and watch the slots fill with numbers. Once the slots are filled, you then click the "Good/Bad" button. Once you do, the two words roll up and down for a few seconds before stopping. Here's where it gets interesting.

Those seven numbers? They're the number of fortunes you can receive and the Good/Bad button decides on whether it's a true fortune or a misfortune. So let's say you roll 4,5,3,6,7,7,7. This is extremely great if you roll a Good, not as great when you roll Bad. Once it's been decided kind of fortune you'll receive, you get to pick one of the seven numbers. Naturally, you're likely to be going for the big numbers when it's good, going for the small when it's bad. You could always exit out of the browser of course but if you try to go back on, you'll find out that it saved your previous roll.

Fortunately, the game is true to its word. If you pick 6 fortunes, you get 6 fortunes over the course of a week. They're random of course so you never know what you might get but it always seems to be what you need like say, a perfect steak at a diner, or a free roll of 20 Dollars bills. And hell, it's perfectly possible (not even that difficult really) to only get one misfortune. So all in all, it's risky game but one that's not rigged and everything's fine and dandy!

....Until you try to cheat.

It was only a matter of time before someone tried to game the system, after all no one likes misfortune. And hey, a website was still a program on a computer, someone hacking into the thing to get a rigged fortune was just inevitable. How lucky for the site owners then, that said people got greedy with their wins?

Enter Johnny Marlow, a simple family man who's hit upon hard times. His wife's almost due with their child, the money's drying up, he's dangerously close to getting fired from his own job, the man's life could be better. So he finds out about the game and is naturally hopeful about winning but he doesn't want to take any risks. He looks around and eventually finds a way to rig the game. He gets a seven and rolls a good. Within a week, Johnny's gotten a raise, a healthy child and a free TV set, along with some other more minor fortunes.

The funny thing is, the cheat wasn't well known at the time, Johnny could have walked away consequence free. But he liked winning a little too much. So after the week has passed, he rigs the game again and the following week gave Marlow a real goldmine of fortunes. He's now able to buy a luxury car, along with a new extension to his house. The third time buys him a mansion. This sort of thing went on for four more times before payback was due.

At this point the owners were aware of the way to cheat if only because of how many people used it all the damn time. It was suggested (and even almost agreed upon) that they simply rework the website to make it less easy to hack. But then a less merciful option was presented.

So Johnny goes to play another round of The Magnificent Seven Game and does his little cheat. It seemingly works but now there's an oddity that's never happened before. All of the slots are filled with the number seven and I mean all of them. Thankfully the moron doesn't fid anything suspicious and clicks one of the seven slots. The following week is one hell of a rude wake up call.

The main thing that happens in the week is that all of the previous fortunes are warped considerably. Johnny's TV breaks, his new company that he got from one of his winnings experiences a drop in finances, hell his child develops a bad form of autism. The week is gone and Marlow is distraught as all hell. He tries to get onto the site but for some reason, he's blocked. The guy may have been distraught but this was downright child's play compared to what happened in the following weeks. It seems that Johnny Marlow was given 7 misfortunes.

In an effort that was mostly made to fuck with him, the misfortunes were subtle at first. Things like him stubbing seven of his toes or the child accidentally crapping the floor for the seventh time of the week. It doesn't stick like that. Now, Johnny's slender and pretty Wife eats seven fairly hefty meals a day, becoming less and less beautiful, or more if one's into that I suppose. Johnny's Mansion has seven additional TV's everywhere, to the point where the kid almost dies by messing with a newly added TV in it's room.

And then, seven extensions are added to the mansion, impossible given that the dimensions and looks are completely unchanged on the outside. Seven lawsuits are filed against Marlow's company and seven burglaries are committed on the house. And these aren't even covering all of the misfortunes.

I guess the best one was saved for the seventh (and final) week. Johnny's at his now nearly empty home, nursing his child while his Wife is snacking as they say in the kitchen. All of the sudden, Marlow feels a great pain in his back. He falls over and pain beyond pain hits both of his hands. Johnny Marlow watches helplessly as three fingers are bloodied, throbbing and ripped off from his hands and laying on the floor. He now has seven total fingers. The feet don't fare much better as three toes are removed quite easily, thrown into the same pile as the fingers.

The final thing affected are his teeth, falling out from his horrid mouth like it were a water slide from a water park. The cracked teeth are now in the finger and toe pile. The kid meanwhile is screaming like any other retard. A small bruise appears on his leg, causing even more screams. It takes six more bruises to finally silence the brat as Johnny watches in horror. The final misfortune was given.

And now Johnny Marlow's nothing more than a broke seven fingered freak, living in an empty house with a buried retard in the backyard and a bloated pig of a Wife in the kitchen who probably can't even leave the area at this point. He's probably crying himself to sleep right now. It's beautiful.

Well, news of Johnny Marlow quickly spread to other "winners" of The Magnificent Seven Game, which lead to a surprising drop in game riggings. Of course, people still do it every now and then, and the site owners punish them for it.

The point is, the Site Owners were impressed with the results and openly congratulated me for suggesting the idea. They thought beating the Child to death was going too far but screw it. If they had to listen to that thing screech like a damn bird while pulling a guy's fingers off they'd want to shut the kid up too.

- ''Written by Mr. 1up-Mushroom. Feedback is welcome!''