Monday, January 31, 2011

I am not a coward, but I know who is

I got into an argument with Pogue the other night about what a coward is. He kept calling the guys on the other team cowards because they hid inside doorways and kept picking him off when he ran through. He got fed up and "pulled a Pogue". Which means me quit the match and expected this team mates to back out and pick him up again.

We've done that several times for various friends but when your team backs out to pick you up again don't sit there and say you need five minutes because you went off and decided to do something else for awhile. I'm not going to sit there and wait for you every again.

Which got me thinking. Who's the real coward here? The guys on the other team didn't run from the fight with their tail between their legs because it wasn't going like they wanted to. If the other team is camping out a room here's a tip: THROW GRENADES IN THERE. Make the team run around trying to stay alive before you run in there and expect to wipe them all out with just your killer smile. Throw gas, smoke, flash or grenades and see if they're still sitting in the same spot when you go it. Or better yet. DON'T KEEP GOING IN THE ROOM!

Yes, I hate campers too, but the only one I saw being a coward was Pogue. He was the one who quit the match. He was the one who ran from the fight. He was the one who couldn't take it like a man. I can. I usually stay around when I'm getting slaughtered. I'm use to it. I guess that makes me more of a man than Pogue.

I will admit to "pulling a Pogue" two or three times over the entire release of Black Ops. Pogue, on the other hand, will do it two or three times a night. When I do it's more what's going on with me personally than with what's going on in the game. I could have had a terrible day, my eyes could be tired and getting killed over and over again it just too much for me to take.

If I get slaughtered I shrug it off as part of the game. We've had good nights where we've creamed the opposing sides in all matches and nights where we can't get anything going. I don't expect to be king of the world every night....or every match either. I take what comes and roll with it. Unfortunately there are some players who have to be the top scorer in a match, get the most kills, have a positive kill/death ratio, or be on the winning team every time or they won't finish the match. Who cares! It's just a game.

I remember when my friends didn't take those statistics seriously. Partly because I think in some games those numbers where known. Now that kill/death ratios, win/loss rations, number of kills and the number of assists are recorded and available for anyone in the match to see they seem to think those numbers are more important than playing a good game with friends and having fun like the old days. I miss those days.

I don't mind backing out of a room when things keep going bad and trying to find a new one. But I don't want to have to do that after every match. And I don't want to have to wait around while cowards in my party decide to go redecorate their living rooms, clean their bathrooms, or just flip over to watch something on TV while they make us wait on them. After all, they were the cowardly ones that left the match in the first place. They should wait to get back in until the rest of us decide we want to back out. If I'm hosting the room they will. Be warned: I am not a coward, but I know who is.

5 comments:

Helll Weasell said...

I don't concern myself with my stats so much as I want to make a contribution to the team. I most certainly do not need to be a team leader every time, nor do I expect to be. But it is nice to at least be competitive.

Video games have always been competitive. I remember as far back as my Atari 2600 competing with friends to see who could get the highest score in Asteroids (If you've never seen "The King of Kong", you should rent it - it's an interesting watch). But online gaming has taken the competition much further. Competing against trash talking 10-20 year-olds sitting in their parents' living room on a different continent - or at least in a different state, knowing full well that you can't slap their cheeky mouths... It can be frustrating. Add to that some sketchy game coding, lag issues, quitters, and glitchers and its no wonder people blow their tops.

In the "good ol' days" we used to play against each other. We could fill a room and just play. If someone had to leave there was always someone else waiting to take their spot. If the teams were unfair, they could be switched up next round. Sometimes a new person would enter the room and if they fit in well with the group we would all make a new friend. This is how most of us ended up on each others friends lists in the first place.

We used to stick up for each other, not yell at each other for making a bad move. And if we did trash each other, it was in a joking manner. If someone outside the group did it they would be mercilessly abused or booted from the room by the rest of us. You couldn't wait to see who was online playing your favorite game.

When you talk to the athletes that leave a team game like hockey or football, they generally all say the same thing: what they miss the most is the locker room before and after the game. The friendships and camaraderie amongst the players were what made it worth it. If I only played games to pad my stats I would have quit gaming years ago.

Yup. Things have changed. And not necessarily for the better.

Pengwenn said...

I hear ya Weasell. I miss those days. With the new maps out for Black Ops yesterday I thought it would be nice to play with friends on those maps in Combat Training until we got the feel for them. In the middle of the second map they wanted to just jump into the action and figure it out as they played.

For me I did much better on the maps because I play them once myself and then once with friends before jumpting into instant combat. I don't think I would have liked to play them the first time in a live match. It wouldn't have been as much fun.

I just want to play, have fun, and contribute to the team. Nowadays I can't seem to get my teammates to talk to me where the enemies are because they sometimes seem to be complaining too much about the game to help out a teammate.

Anonymous said...

I can't remember the last time I was in a good game with you guys. I downloaded the new maps, played one map on combat training and lost interest. Gone are the days of Battlefront when you would have to wait to get into a room with friends because it was full up. There were no stats back then, no prestige or ranking up but I seem to remember having a lot more fun. Don't get me wrong I like Black ops but I find myself turning the xbox off rather than waiting for friends to come online, which is sad. Mobeye.....

Pogue Moran said...

It's not running from a fight if the fight never takes place. Grenades and such don't always work as you found out last night. No I want running into the same room it was that their whole team was camping in different places. What exactly is the fun in that. It's not about stats weasel. I come in to have fun and theres no fun when the other team actually refuses to play.

Helll Weasell said...

Pengwenn - I saw the group in the game last night and I thought about jumping in but I decided against it. I tend to shy away from CoD games because of my inability to be competitive in them. The maps, the controls,... I never seem to get the hang of them. It gets frustrating and puts me in a pissy mood. People think I turn my mic off because I'm "going quiet". It's actually the opposite. I turn my mic off so that I don't subject anyone to yelling and swearing that would make a trucker blush. Some games, even when playing them with friends, are just not fun.

Mobeye - Well said. As a Battlefront alumni myself, I know where you're coming from. Maybe that's why so many of us long for Battlefront III.

Pogue - I didn't write the blog nor did I aim my comments specifically at you. It was more a general feeling of how the group dynamic has changed over the past little while.

I don't think that the tensions are entirely game related. I think that we all have crap going on in our lives and those tensions are starting to spill over into our gaming.