Command and Conquer and Engineering Design???

Well you all will be surprised with the title. The experience that I am going to tell you also surprised myself and actually judged myself how insane I am. It happened in my E121 Engineering Design I course during my Freshman year in my university. Throughout that course we were supposed to form 4-people teams, design and build a prototype of a search and destroy robot (or search and rescue robot if someone prefers) and compete with each other for points. Later we have to do a final oral presentation about the thing. Since presentations are always meant to be presented in a professional manner, I took a different approach. It also surprised my teammates too. I took a casual or should I say fictional approach. Maybe because I knew how the professor was so free about everything we do. I made a presentation solely based on Command and Conquer Generals. It was very humorous.

 

So how we presented. At first we introduced ourselves as military contractor for the US Allied Forces. We introduced our robot as Destroyer (I forgot the original name I made up). We introduced each of the team members as follows:

 

Partner 1: He is an electrical designer and programmer who worked as a hacker with Black Lotus during GLA driveout campaign. His photo displayed him giving thumbs up.

 

Partner 2: He is a mechanical engineer who designed and built the Chinese Overlord tank. His photo displayed as him giving salute.

 

Partner 3: He is a mechanical engineer who designed the prototype of the partcle beam. His photo was not shown because it was so confidential since others may kidnap him or steal his work.

 

Partner 4 (that is me): He is an Enginneering Manager who planned the overall military contract and carried out the project. He was a former black marketeer for the GLA before he double crossed them and joined the Allied forces.

 

The whole class laughed. One of my partners told, "Syed, you are freaking insane." I guess insane turned out to be my favorite word. Few days later I got my final course grade as A-, maybe because the robot could not perform faster than other teams. However, I can clearly say that everyone enjoyed our little C&C related presentation.

 

I knew I wasnt supposed to do this because it is not professional. Maybe because I tried to make myself free since this was my first oral presentation in my university life. The professional was also free so I tried to make myself pretty confident. I am pretty weak at presentations. I however advice everyone not to follow this stunt or you might screw your grades because its not professional. However you might try this stunt if you know your professor very well.