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That
Guy
(taken from www.gamepig.com)
[ED.
DISCLAIMER: All misspellings are probably intentional, for
"character"]
I think at one point in time, way back
when, we were all "That Guy." You know the one I am talking
about, the newbie, llahma, and retarded guy that runs around and doesn't
kill anybody. We all, at one time or another, were that guy. Now what I
wonder, is how do we get back to being that guy?
A long time ago, maybe not so long for some, you can think back and say
"omg I cannot believe I used to just play with a keyboard".
What you won't remember is how much fun you had doing that. When you
first get into online gaming more than likely you start with keyboard,
unless you have someone tutoring you. Even still, just getting one frag
makes the whole game. You have died 200 times, but you got that one guy,
and who cares if it was with inf ammo on Heat.net and the guy had a 999
ping, he is your frag now. You know where the chain gun is on every map;
you have blown yourself up with the rocket launcher more times than you
can count. Your l33t crouch style gets you killed a lot but god knows
it'll work one of these times. You are in heaven. In your world there
are no bots, no cheats, and god mode is turned off. It's you vs. them.
Now for stage 2. It starts to dawn on you HOW THE HELL ARE ALL THESE
PEOPLE SO GOOD the fever then sets in. Your brain gobbles in anything it
can about the game. You go through super newbie phase. You have someone
tell you "to get better use the keyboard and mouse combo". How
is that going to help me I can't even run like that, can't pick up the
mouse n run it across the pad like one of them rev it up cars I sit
still for too long. With that given up, you go for the first gamer's
option. Hello wingman15000 joystick/microwave/allinwonder. Your joystick
can make toast it's so great. You calibrate, you go through the joystick
setup and bind all the keys to weapons/crouch/lookupanddown/strafe. You
are now ready to go be on top. You play the game first, wow new joystick
is great, you're gonna kick some ass! Then you log into the net. Go to
your online craziness place of choice, and get in the game. Your ass
gets kicked again. Not as bad but still not what you need. You still
have that intense feeling though, that newbie intense gotta play as much
as you can feeling. We all used to know it.
Onward and upward. You are in your computer toy store, browsing for you
don't know what, maybe a new joystick, maybe a new computer, you're just
hanging out. As you stroll through the help books, you find it. THE
QUAKE 2 COMPANION(or whatever it was called) hrm you kneel down and
start reading. Yada yada yada, I have already won the game. Then you get
to the chapter, "Thresh's guide to online gaming". Whoa, who
the hell is Thresh? As you read, your brain gathering all the
information it can handle, you realize just what the mouse keyboard
combo is. You find out about shooting at peoples' feet with rocket
launcher. It tells you about latency, which you still don't really know
or care about, you could have a 400 ping and not care one bit, just as
long as that phone jack thingy doesn't rear its ugly head, you're still
in bliss.
Brain packed with new information, you drive home. It takes a while to
get used to, probably about a day or two, But then you are doing better
then ever. Getting 3-5 frags instead of your normal -2. You are all
powerful! You are in the game!! Now what's this lag shit? You start
noticing people always saying it. "Lag omg lag". You research
pings and latency and find out why the guy with 70 ping is normally on
top. This would be great you say, but not an option yet in your area, so
you still play and you are still happy. The taint of lag is slowly
seeping into your system though. PJs begin to drive you nuts, you start
to actually feel when you have a 400 ping. It's the beginning.
Now you move onto different mods. What for god's sake is CTF?? As you
take 3-4 hours worth of downloading mods, updates, maps, and whatever
else the good guys tell the newbie to get. You get into different mods.
CTF, you find out what the Spiderman thingy is, RA2 you find out just
how high you can jump and still not blow yourself up. Some other might
have spun off into different mods, but those were mine. Now in ctf you
have found out what the spider thingy is, and how to bind keys, you get
quad timers and cfg's, figure out just how much the power shield helps,
and how those guys get out of the room in McKinley (then you get to stop
looking for the secret door that you knew had to be there). You are
addicted; you learn of offense and defense, of clans, the good ones the
bad ones. You absorb the online game, it's what you think about, it's
what you talk about, it is what you have become.
Now you are the gamer, you have a cfg from hell, you have timers for....
well a bunch o stuff, you are getting better and better, and starting to
get known. It is a good time, BUT WHAT THE HELL IS ALL THIS TALK ABOUT
BOTS? You hear it at almost every server you goto, omg another bot
(note, this is not to you but about somebody else, c'mon yer on a modem
and you still suck, but yer a legend in yer own mind). You inquire and
find out the horrible, auto aim. WHAT you mean they have things that aim
for you!! This comes as a great shock, who would do such a thing, why?
You do research on the aim bots; find out what's out there, upon a few
servers you randomly say "ratbot" just to test. Sometimes you
get a response, and then this turns into a great melee of trying to get
the bot kicked along with the ritual cussing of the cheater. This turns
into great fun, with sometimes people all joining the opposite team, or
just reckless flaming of the cheater. Good times had by all, well for
the time being anyway. You sink deeper.
You start trying out for clans, getting accepted into some, and also
creating a few of your own. The taint has started though, you find
yourself getting mad more than having fun. Your desire for winning is
starting to consume you. OMG THE LAG, BAH GG BOT!! You find that you are
saying these things more n more. The game is still fun, but not great
like it used to be. You find it to be your competitive edge, is it
really though. Through ladders and scrims, matches and FFA's your skill
increases. So does your cynicism.
OMG, OMG, you are now LPB!!!!! The game gets super fun again, rails are
easier, and everything moves faster, this is great!!! This phase lasts
for at least a couple of months. The competition is greater though; you
are now on the open team ladders. Competition is fierce here, and the
release of the nose-pak has just become a prominent factor, as well as
the hacked ratbot. Everything on servers all around is going downhill,
bot this bot that, nose pak, cheater cheater!!!! It's frenzy, clans
getting forfeited because of bw-admin. Crazy fites about servers and
bots and nosepaks and just basically anything to fite about. Frustration
about pl, matches running late, and cheater cheater pumpkin eaters!!
Every now and then you have a few GG's but other then that you just
wonder if it's the bots that own you or the people. Turns into only fun
everysooftengame, instead of superfunallthetimegame. Now you might say
"no this is not me" but really think about it. Have you
bitched about lag? Have you called someone a bot? Have you had a really
fun game lately?? Today? Yesterday? Last week? Week before?? Or can you
remember truly having fun playing an online game within the past 5
months or later??(This obviously directed at the long-term players, if
you just started playing a month ago you should still be that guy).
I am not saying that we should all delete our gaming directories and go
fishing, not in any way shape or form. Online gaming is still great fun.
Even with the cheats and the hacks and such. Still a good time. It was a
couple of days ago though, that I was on a server, and I saw "That
Guy"(or maybe it was twitch taking a break from eq, Hrm). You could
tell he used nothing but a keyboard (wouldn't strafe or aim up or down),
and he died a lot, but never complained and stayed on server the whole
time. I am willing to bet he was having the time of his life. I find
online gaming still truly fun; it is still the great time consumer it
always has been. It's just not the
superdupergreatestthingofalltimeholywowthisisGREAT that it used to be.
So now that I have spent all this time evolving from being that guy, I
always wonder what it might be like to be "That Guy" again.
S1lv3r?!?!
irc.enterthegame.com
#?!?!
*NOTE* If you haven't gathered yet, this is for FPS (First Person
Shooter <inserted for That Guy>) If you play eq/diablo/anygameotherthenafirstpersonshooter,
then know that this is for a first person shooter, and we FPS'ers
probably wont care if that's not how it was/is for you :-) Just trying
to help.
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