Windows "Internet Games"
Dec. 17th, 2009 06:09 amYay frivolous post! I don't seem to get many comments when I make a serious LJ post, so let's see how many are generated by a pointless one :-P
In Windows XP, in addition to the standard Windows games (Solitare, Minesweeper, etc), there are several "Internet" games, like Checkers, Reversi, and so forth. I'm not sure how many of you actually play these, but I usually start my day with a few rounds of pretty much any of the Windows games, to wake up the logical side of my brain, and again in the evening when I'm winding down from coding all day. The novelty of "Yay, I'm playing against real people!" wore off after my very first Reversi game, and I'd be just as happy if they were games against computer players. In fact, I think I'd enjoy them more.
Reversi has always been my favourite, because I love it in board-game form (where it's called Othello), but it's in this game where the flaws in Microsoft's games are most obvious. The skill level indicator, rather than being based on one's actual performance, is a three-level manually-chosen option. And, it defaults to Beginner, without making it obvious how to change it. So, everyone just leaves it there whether they're awesome at it or crappy. This is especially problematic in Reversi, a game whose basic strategy is easy to master, but moving beyond that practically requires a master's degreee. Thus, Internet Reversi is populated by people who purely play defensively, or they're experts playing against beginners.
I've played Checkers only occasionally, and I'm actually pretty decent at that, although roughly 50% of my games end with a vanished opponent.
Backgammon, though, is what prompted this post. If you've never played, I'm not even going to try to explain it here, because it's rather complex, but it's a really neat game once you get used to it. Until this week, I'd only played it once before in my entire life, and I didn't understand it at the time, but I brushed up on it earlier this week. After a few initial rounds, I figured out what I was doing with it, and with about a half-hour of learning, I felt like I could actually present a challenge for an opponent. Three days later, with about a half-hour of play a day, I haven't won a single game.
My unbroken losing streak has nothing to do with my lack of skill, though. The problem comes from the fact that Windows Internet Backgammon is populated with sore losers and morons. So far, every game I've played has ended in one of four ways:
-During/after the initial roll to determine who goes first, my opponent vanishes. This happens well over 50% of the time.
-After my first move, my opponent vanishes. This is the next-most-common endgame.
-I lose the game. This is actually becoming less common.
-I come close to winning, sometimes within a couple moves, and my opponent vanishes. Occasionally, they even leave a snarky (or as close as you can get with indirect "pick from a list" chat) message on the way out. This has happened no less than a dozen times.
If I just plain sucked at the game, I'd be less bothered, but most of the time, I don't even get the chance to see if I'm losing or not. And having been on the losing side of several games (which can often be very cut-throat), I know how tempting it is to hit the "Find New Opponent" button when a win looks impossible, but that's a real dick move, even in a game that might as well be against a computer for all you know. I just don't get why Backgammon is the game to attract so many players who are full of fail.
What really rubbed me the wrong way was this evening, when it looked like I was about to actually make it far enough to win a game. I pwned my opponent hard at first, beating him by nearly triple, but he had a good sense of humour about it, and we kept going. The game went on for quite awhile, with him managing to pull out of a certain loss and nearly make a full comeback. In the end, he was only slightly behind me, and I was looking forward to playing him again just for the challenge. But then, when I was two easy dice-rolls away from winning, he sent the messages "No", "Goodbye", ":-)", then disappeared.
*sighs* I know it's just a game, and a rather pointless one at that (though it is a fun challenge), but is it really so much to ask to get opponents who will actually play the game and not be dicks about it?
In Windows XP, in addition to the standard Windows games (Solitare, Minesweeper, etc), there are several "Internet" games, like Checkers, Reversi, and so forth. I'm not sure how many of you actually play these, but I usually start my day with a few rounds of pretty much any of the Windows games, to wake up the logical side of my brain, and again in the evening when I'm winding down from coding all day. The novelty of "Yay, I'm playing against real people!" wore off after my very first Reversi game, and I'd be just as happy if they were games against computer players. In fact, I think I'd enjoy them more.
Reversi has always been my favourite, because I love it in board-game form (where it's called Othello), but it's in this game where the flaws in Microsoft's games are most obvious. The skill level indicator, rather than being based on one's actual performance, is a three-level manually-chosen option. And, it defaults to Beginner, without making it obvious how to change it. So, everyone just leaves it there whether they're awesome at it or crappy. This is especially problematic in Reversi, a game whose basic strategy is easy to master, but moving beyond that practically requires a master's degreee. Thus, Internet Reversi is populated by people who purely play defensively, or they're experts playing against beginners.
I've played Checkers only occasionally, and I'm actually pretty decent at that, although roughly 50% of my games end with a vanished opponent.
Backgammon, though, is what prompted this post. If you've never played, I'm not even going to try to explain it here, because it's rather complex, but it's a really neat game once you get used to it. Until this week, I'd only played it once before in my entire life, and I didn't understand it at the time, but I brushed up on it earlier this week. After a few initial rounds, I figured out what I was doing with it, and with about a half-hour of learning, I felt like I could actually present a challenge for an opponent. Three days later, with about a half-hour of play a day, I haven't won a single game.
My unbroken losing streak has nothing to do with my lack of skill, though. The problem comes from the fact that Windows Internet Backgammon is populated with sore losers and morons. So far, every game I've played has ended in one of four ways:
-During/after the initial roll to determine who goes first, my opponent vanishes. This happens well over 50% of the time.
-After my first move, my opponent vanishes. This is the next-most-common endgame.
-I lose the game. This is actually becoming less common.
-I come close to winning, sometimes within a couple moves, and my opponent vanishes. Occasionally, they even leave a snarky (or as close as you can get with indirect "pick from a list" chat) message on the way out. This has happened no less than a dozen times.
If I just plain sucked at the game, I'd be less bothered, but most of the time, I don't even get the chance to see if I'm losing or not. And having been on the losing side of several games (which can often be very cut-throat), I know how tempting it is to hit the "Find New Opponent" button when a win looks impossible, but that's a real dick move, even in a game that might as well be against a computer for all you know. I just don't get why Backgammon is the game to attract so many players who are full of fail.
What really rubbed me the wrong way was this evening, when it looked like I was about to actually make it far enough to win a game. I pwned my opponent hard at first, beating him by nearly triple, but he had a good sense of humour about it, and we kept going. The game went on for quite awhile, with him managing to pull out of a certain loss and nearly make a full comeback. In the end, he was only slightly behind me, and I was looking forward to playing him again just for the challenge. But then, when I was two easy dice-rolls away from winning, he sent the messages "No", "Goodbye", ":-)", then disappeared.
*sighs* I know it's just a game, and a rather pointless one at that (though it is a fun challenge), but is it really so much to ask to get opponents who will actually play the game and not be dicks about it?