|
Finding Five Dollars (Why 'The Game' is Dumb) | |
Posted Mar 31, 2010 - 8:56:40
|
|
 So there's this thing that annoys the crap out of me. I've talked about it before... lord knows I've talked about it before. Recently it received a major mention in my Anime Milwaukee 2010 con report (including the comic that I've also featured with this particular blog post) and also is the subject of this week's UnCONventional comic strips.
I speak, of course, of "The Game."
For those unfamiliar with this idiocy, I envy you. You can find a decent description at Wikipedia if you're actually curious though. It's one of those things that just gets under my skin, and let me tell you why.
On it's own, it's a simple mind game. That doesn't actually bother me. It annoys me that the rules are conscripting, and demand that I am playing it (although I stand by the fact that I am, in fact, not playing). I think the first time someone posted the "rules" to the No Brand Con forums, I kept changing the person's post to add win scenarios. The poster got mad (well, in his defense, I was editing his post) and said "You can't change the rules to the game" to which I replied "You can't demand that everyone is playing it!" I laughed a little, and moved on.
I had no idea how big it would get.
Over the following years, I would start hearing people yell "I just lost the game!" at any Anime con I went to. It would always be followed with an echo of "Awww... I just lost the game!" from half a dozen people. Over the course of a weekend, this started to really get on my nerves. It all came to a head at No Brand Con this year though.
For those of you who don't know, I host a lot of stuff at No Brand Con. Two of the events I co-host are the Variety Show and the Cosplay Contest. These are both good sized events, especially the latter, and are scheduled fairly tightly. Both of them were interrupted by some bozo yelling "I just lost the game." This caused a large portion of the audience at each to moan, proclaim it, and halt the entire proceedings.
This happened multiple times.
So I decided I had enough and my hatred for this thing was cemented. When the posts hit the No Brand Con forums regarding it, I added a little word filter. Now, if someone posts "I just lost the game" they find that they just said "I just found five dollars!" (and recently, thanks to Kellin, I've had to add this to the TRHOnline forums too).
Some of us have decided to start yelling this in real life.
If a bunch of people start saying "I just lost the game" we simply respond (as excitedly as possible) with "I just found five dollars!" The key here is to be as excited as possible. They've already caused the disruption, so we're not making things worse, and instead we're ending it on an energetic note. There is no (imaginary) loss, there is only (imaginary) gain. Let's make it an upper folks.
Or not. It's just an idea.
Either way "The Game" is dumb. Thankfully, it's been slowly dying out. Fewer and fewer people are playing it. But like Goatse, these things never completely go away no matter how much you want them to.
- Traegorn
At least thanks to a former con director I am exempt from the game by his decree...
I guess my mind was a whole blank but oh well.
|
