YourGamer.Net

It is indeed one of the very small joys of life to steal someone’s tetris high score under their nose, especially if you know that they have been playing for hours to achieve that goal, and it took you around a half less time because you play on a harder level. I can imagine how the vein on the forehead of my jolly fellow and competitor starts growing and how a very heavy sigh escapes his lips before he sits down, counts to ten and starts all to play again.

Must say that I admire his patience and will to beat me in a small arcade game like tetris. It does take some personality to waste hours and hours of your life to it, although I’m not rather sure whether or not it crosses the line of healthy hobby. I’ve been a member of the forum where this small contest between him and me takes part for almost three years now, and we’ve been fighting for the status of Master of Tetris almost since my joining day. Why almost? It took me sometime to get into tetris, and actually develop to a level where I can say I’m better than average.

I’ve noticed similar events take place between other players in other games. The competition situation gets lit by something very small, and off we go; You’re stuck with a game that gets out dated fast just because you can’t let the other win. Arcade games at a forum are only a single example. A friend of mine accidentally stole one low level creature from another player in an MMORPG when he was grinding to get up from lvl 1, and he got himself what could be called a Nemesis. After a short while he found it very, very annoying, but in the long run he has admitted that having someone to compete with.. someone who’s always trying to mock you or prove they are better than you was what made the game fun. He would’ve quit playing the game long ago in case that wouldn’t of seemed like he was giving up.

This rises up an interesting question - do we play online only to show off the size of our e-penis, or is it for the fun of challenge brought by wider variety of players? I think that most of us would like to answer both, at least I’d like to. Also, in a situation where I really, really would need to choose only one I’d go for the latter, because I’m like that, no matter how much I enjoy the frustrated look on the face of someone who’s trying to beat my high score.

What about you?