Social vs Solitary

I have almost always played games. I can still remember playing Tecmo Super NBA Basketball with my little brother and winning, and him throwing the controller across the room in disgust, accusing me of putting a computer chip in the console so I could win. After a few more games of that, it was nearly impossible for me to play with him, since I was always winning, and thus, accused of cheating. It got old. So, with the exception of playing with friends who came over, which happened rarely, I played games by myself.

I am an introvert by nature, so this actually helped contribute to my enjoyment of games in general. The first few times I tried to venture online with Starcraft and Madden, I was rebuffed by vastly superior players, who may or may not have been cheating. Either way, I was not even close to winning. Thus, I retreated into my safe solitary haven, where I could always win if I wanted to.

I got Super Smash Brothers Melee a few days after it came out in the Winter of 2001, and I mostly played alone. I still had fun with even the most multiplayer of multiplayer games, but once I got good, the game ceased to challenge me, and I played less and less.

I had not played the game for a while when I overheard a friend talking about how good he was, and so of course, being confidant in my prior ability, I challenged him to a match. He was better than I expected, and barely beat me, but the match was so much fun and the competition welcome that I didn’t care. The next semester we had senior project together, and so we brought in a Nintendo Gamecube and played Super Smash Bros. every day. It was so much more fun than beating up on the computer.

Coming to college has exponentially increased my social gaming. In addition to LOTRO, there is a lively Super Smash Bros. community brewing on my floor of the dormitory, and we have hour-long 4-player battles almost nightly. Win or lose, it’s still fun.

Playing alone when I was younger kept in line with my general enjoyment of being by myself. I was homeschooled, so it worked out well for me. That is not to say that I didn’t have friends, but I tended to have one great friend, rather than many good friends.

Beginning to play games socially coincided with me becoming more involved socially. I decided to run for Student Body President, and it turned out that everyone liked me, so I won. The friends I had before became better friends, not because we played games together, but because I had become more social after playing games.

I am still an introvert, and no game would change that, but games have helped me come out of my shell. The very thing that kept me unsocial now makes me very social. Life tends to work that way.

And for categorical purposes, this is Mikil (Daddo) signing off.

~ by Mikil Taylor on September 12, 2007.