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Restaurant Review:

MATTI SCANNELL

ae@technewsiit.com

TechNews | Tuesday, October 29, 2013

White Castle: Last bastion of fast food

Kyle Stanevich
STAFF WRITER

With the addition of Burger King’s
new Satisfries, I pose a question. Has the
essence of fast food been lost? Over the years,
many people have criticized fast food chains
for not having many healthy food options. The
restaurants have slowly caved in, introducing
salads, vegetarian options, and now healthy
fries. However, fast food has not been about
healthy options. It is a fast way to eat a meal,
packing in many calories into a small and
convent package. If one wants to eat healthy,
they should make their own food, not go to
McDonalds.

Not all hope is lost though. The
last fast food chain to remain a true fast food
restaurant is White Castle. They have no salads,
no veggie burgers, and no healthy fries. The only
vegetarian options they have on the menu are
the fries and onion rings. Sorry vegetarians.

I recently went to the White Castle
down on 35th, and while some would say it is
classless and rundown, I would say that it is all
part of the experience. It all started with a late
night hungry stomach. It was 10 pm. and I
just had the craving for the Castle. 35th at this
time of night is not the best looking place in
the world, certainly out of the comfort zone for
many students at IIT.

Again, all part of the experience.
You would not remember a comfortable trip to
White Castle, rather your adrenaline pumping,
ready to start sprinting if something goes bad.
Although it might look seedy, it is not that bad
for a place most just coming home from 2nd
shift or like me, out for a quick snack. Plus, this
is only 35th, no need to be scared; the “Shire”
is just around the corner. If approaching from
State Street, you will pass many other fantastic
establishments, like Mama Lou’s Kitchen, KFC,

Tech[nology]News:

and Popeye’s. Stop yourself from spontaneously
hitting up these places, because the prize is just
a few blocks more. Finally the warm glow of
White Castle is shining down upon your hungry
face, like a light guiding you to your destiny.

This White Castle is like most others.
The interior is all white and blue, with black and
white posters commemorating the rich history
of the chain. The wallpaper border along the
ceiling contains photos of old White Castles and
happy customers. There are a few high tables
in the center of the dining room surrounded
by booths and shorter tables. Not the most
comfortable, but again, the experience. I would
recommend you order classic “sliders” from the
menu.

Though on the surface these may
appear the equivalent of a regular hamburger,
there is nothing regular about them. Bread
base, followed by beef patty with 5 holes cut in
its center, secret sauce, pickle, onion bits, and
finally top bun. Unlike most other burgers,
these are square and small allowing them to fit
into their 2.5 inch castle shaped orange box. Be
warned, these little things don’t look like much
but they are very dense with oil and flavor. 4 to
5 should be enough to fill you up.

There are the variations on this classic
burger. They have a double, cheeseburger,
pepper jack if you’re adventurous, chicken rings
for those not into red meat, and a few more
variations depending on the season. And for
you who don’t want the bun that comes with a
burger, or maybe just a smaller snack, I would
recommend trying a sack or either fish nibblers
(spherical fish sticks) or chicken rings (a classic
chicken nugget with a whole in its center).
These are all good options, just order one of
everything. For you White Castle veterans, I
would go for the crave case, 30 sliders packed
into a cardboard briefcase. Once I attempted to
eat the entire 30 burgers, but maxed out at 17.

White Castle is quite the adventure. I
love the atmosphere, the food, and the lingering
smell of their greasy fry kitchen wafting through
the entire establishment. And the trip from
IIT is a true urban adventure that adds to the
experience. Be warned though, many people
assume not to be able to stomach these burgers,

If

 

Image courtesy of www.yelp.com

but I say you will never know if you don’t try.

White Castle

3457 South Kin Drive

Chica ,IL 60 16

Scale <€140): Fastfood at its mostpure
Cost: $7—10 depending on hunger
Oddities: not much for vegetarians

BlackBerry Messenger could be BlackBerry's game-changer

Swasti Khuntia
LAYOUT EDITOR

Last week while surfing my Facebook
page, I came across a post “Congratulations to
BlackBerry for becoming the leading mobile
app developer.” For some time, I was in a
dilemma whether BlackBerry is a mobile app
developer or the wireless devices/services
manufacturer. Then I saw that it was posted by
one of the leading news satire website of India.

But for most of us, who have been
pretty active on any social networking sites

must have experienced how people are sharing
their BlackBerry PIN. Well, a BlackBerry PIN
is an eight character hexadecimal identification
number assigned to each BlackBerry device.
These PINs cannot be changed manually on
the device, and are locked to each specific
BlackBerry.

Using this PIN directly on BlackBerry
devices or BlackBerry messenger application,
one can message each other. This is pretty much
equivalent to the iMessage on iOS devices.

The sharing of PINs became viral
after BlackBerry announced the launch of free

BlackBerry messenger application for Android
on September 21 and iPhone on September 22.
In 24 hours, the number of downloads crossed
a remarkable 10 million.

But it’s not necessarily a sign that
people would stick with the new instant
messaging app that was once a BlackBerry
device exclusive, when they have iMessage and
WhatsApp, to name a few.

For me, I’ve been pretty satisfied with the
widely—used instant messaging tool, WhatsApp,
and also iMessage (since I’m using iOS device).
After seeing this flurry of PIN sharing on my

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, I gave a try.
I’ve never liked BlackBerry, but have heard a lot
from my friends about its services.

Now, I’ve registered for my PIN, and
I’ll see how long I can stick to this new instant
messaging tool.

Currently, the BlackBerry messenger
application is available as a free download on
Google Play and the App Store.

But, I’m highly delighted that
the app has retained the iconic appeal of
BlackBerry and hope in the future, it can retain
BlackBerry’s languishing capital.

Future of ‘Star Citizen' rests in Kickstarter campaign

Austin Gonzalez
STAFF WRITER

Twenty—three million dollars, this is
the snapshot of how a Kickstarter project—to
prove the worth of an idea—has grown to
become the largest crowd—funded project in
history. Originally hoping to crowd fund
a colossal two million dollars to generate
interest from larger investors and publishers,
Chris Roberts has become the pioneer of a
dramatically different way of funding and
developing games.

Chris Roberts is a developer with an
incredible length of achievements. Creator of
the Wing Commander Series, Freelancer, and
Privateer, Chris is the king of Space simulators
and 4X games. Returning from a ten year hiatus,
he came with a vision of creating the greatest PC
game to date. Originally Chris left the industry
due to being burned out; games couldn’t be
made without publishers and publishers weren’t
funding anything other than the next FPS or
sports title, and especially not anything of the
PC. Even today, publishers have kept their mind
set. A little over two years ago, Chris Roberts
was searching for the capital to produce Star
Citizen and was met with hesitation and a

challenge. If he could gain $2 million worth
of preorders solely on concept, he would
have his funding.

Today, it is not uncommon for
AAA games such as Call of Duty and Grand
Theft Auto Franchises to cost hundreds of
millions of dollars for production. Because
of this drastically increasing price of
development, publishers are finding it
difficult to make back their dollar on every
project. They are not as willing to take risks
on new and innovative games. The largely
homogenous Modern Military Shooter
genre is the consequence of this, whereby
game developers are unable to create
compelling games due to the constraints of
publishers.

We are in an age where a critically
acclaimed Tomb Raider reboot sold 4 million
copies and is considered to have failed to meet
expectations. The state of the industry is that
publishers are willing to mangle near perfect
titles to produce cash cow franchises. The
original Dead Space was a cult hit horror sci—fi
game that gained immense popularity.

Capitalizing on the original title’s
success, EA made two sequels. Dead Space
2 featured the horribly degrading catch line,

RC]BEQTSSPACEINDUSTR’IEEZCDM

 

Image courtesy of wccftech.com

“Dead Space 2, the game your mom hates.” It’s
generally considered that EA’s second sequel,
Dead Space 3, abandoned the roots of the
original in order to gain a larger player based,
and suffered from it.

Game designers and publishers are
often at odds because of different directives.
Designers are artists trying to create the most
compelling experience possible, whereas the
publishers are gallery owners trying to sell the
work. The industry has grown away from the
players and is now focused on itself. Some of

the gaming community is fed up with the
garbage that publishers are pushing out, but
have never had someone in the industry to
lead the charge.

In walks Chris Roberts. Little did they
know, they should have given him everything
they asked for from the start. The PC gaming
community has exploded with fascination
and excitement over this title which is slated
to come out fully in 2015. To day, Star Citizen
has become the first fully crowd funded
AAA game in recent history, and the effort
is ongoing. This game promises immersion,

challenge, immense space, and unobstructed
vision.

Chris Roberts’ only promise is to

put everything he has into making the best
game possible and nothing else. The industry
is watching Star Citizen closely, so let’s hope for
not only its success but also that its methods
take hold. With Star Citizen’s lesson in game
design, funding, and community management
there is hope for more in coming years from
game developers.

Addendum: In the time it took to
draft this article Star Citizen reached its $24
million stretch goal. Check out the buzz at
robertsspacein dustries. com