Not because it’s easy
Me and some gamers born the same year live in an area with hundreds of row houses, each with three floors and of two hundred square meters and in long buildings painted in yellow or cream. All gamers play a lot of video and PC games and in the area we are friends. One of us is a girl, Debra. Debra is the one that stands out, full of energy, always very happy and her eyes light up. We often play games together. All of us who have only one sibling still living at home have a ground floor for themselves. We know when it’s time to eat something when Debra starts to calm down.
Many of the row houses are situated on a hillside so that from some fronts and backs one can only see two floors. This means that the ground floor of those houses only have a short side with windows, such sub-floors improve the gaming experience.
Last time Debra brought a new horror game, we had no expectations when we started playing it. It had rained in the morning and it started again before we turned on the game. You could hear the rain beating down, and when the game was on it only took a glance to the right to see the rain hit and run along the windows. We didn’t use the curtains because we were far from the windows and clouds blocked most of the daylight.
The game’s minimalism increased our concentration and once something seemed to approach or even appear each scare mixed with dismay. What would happen, we took it seriously. We think the game is by far the best in its genre, but that wasn’t what made us lose a sense of what we were doing, playing a game. There was something wrong with the game, everyone could feel it and when it became clear a group psychosis grew.
One got the impression that the evil in the game was directed towards the player and not just the character you play, the evil wanted to reach one as a player outside the game. We couldn’t see any pattern, constantly finding new ways to access fright. In addition, just for us was there absurd coincidences that gave me the willies. We didn’t finish it, for it was hard, then it was time to go to a computer festival. We say that we don’t play because it’s easy to create the right attitude.
At the computer festival the game was spread incredibly quickly, and somehow it got through that it was Debra who had found it and got some stardom. She had to get up on the biggest stage when it had gone so far that the organizers would recommend the game. We ourselves didn’t finish the game and eventually we gave up. For the first time we asked for help, since there were those who had finished the game at the festival. With brains which had retired for a while it was a blow to us to cheat, that’s how we saw it, we didn’t play because it’s easy. But we were so near the end, an end people were already talking about and we didn’t care if it was cheating. Or did we do that, we couldn’t think clearly anymore.
Just when we had found three guys who knew how to finish the game Debra said.
“Wait!”
We waited and waited, one of us lay on his back, another was sitting down against a wall with his head down against the arms folded over his knees. But everyone obeyed Debra so she got her time and came up with an idea that we tested and it worked so we finished the game in the end. I was in the end, it was I and the other guys who had made the game engine. It was just a ‘point and click game, when we were doing it Debra didn’t want to join us. She always went home and got a little off during that time. She always brought the latest version of the game engine with her and said as she put it, she needs to learn it at her pace. It was she who had made the game, but for example, instead of moving around a hand like a mouse pointer with the mouse, the character lifted up his arms when you would use your hands, and now we are rich.
© Copyright Martin Norberg. All rights reserved.
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