“I’ve been playing these games since before you were born!”
August 26, 2019 5:41 AM Subscribe
You've been played: when your kids start beating you at video games [The Guardian] “There is a moment in parenthood when your child discovers you are not infallible, that you can be beaten. The first time a kid wins a game of tennis against their mum or dad, or solves a maths problem their parents can’t even begin to understand, it is profoundly bittersweet. While it is wonderful to see your child growing up and becoming independent, when they get good at things, they are a little bit less yours, and you are a little bit less heroic. It is sometimes hard to be the grownup in that situation and not deal with it childishly. I discovered this on Saturday when my eldest son and I were playing Apex Legends.”
• Beating your younger siblings so bad in video games that they cry is a moral obligation [SB Nation]
• Beating your younger siblings so bad in video games that they cry is a moral obligation [SB Nation]
“I beat my siblings so badly that certain characters became outlawed because it was considered cheating for me to use them. I had to start making compromises. I could still use Vegeta in the Dragonball games, but I couldn’t use a whole team of them. No Akuma, Sagat, or Bison in “Street Fighter.” After a few wins, I had to use someone else besides Sub-Zero in “Mortal Kombat.” In “Soul Caliber,” Maxi was off-limits, but I refused to budge on Cervantes. (Cervantes is an evil pirate with two swords and a gun. If any character was ever created for beating your siblings to the point of tears and mocking them, it was him.)” [Almost every younger brother goes through this 💀💀. (via @RahmaanKR)]• I Played Breath of the Wild With My Sister And Put Her Through Hell [Kotaku]
“My sister and I have an excellent relationship. We rarely fight or have any sort of sibling rivalry. However, when I was presented with the opportunity to have a little fun at her expense in Breath of the Wild, I took it. I’m not a terrible person. I just really enjoyed getting the controller thrown at me, sometimes. [...] Experiencing Breath of the Wild a second time was fantastic. It wasn’t just that I got to play a little devil at times with my sister (and that certainly was some of the fun) but I also got to another chance to spend quality time with her. It’s nice to just relax, be chased by Guardians, and laugh at all the stupid things we saw and did.”• This Eerie Mario Tribute Is an Ode to Playing Games With Your Brother [Wired]
“An inarguable truth, if you are fortunate enough to have all the necessary components: There's something sacred about being a kid and playing videogames with your sibling. Not because videogames are that important, necessarily, or essential to family relationships. But because there's an alchemy there, in huddling close to some old television, diving together into another world. A good game can transcend the fault lines of contentious sibling relationships and bring family together in joy, or terror, or awe. Winter, 2001: Someone tell Luigi I love [itch.io][YouTube][Preview] him contains a little of all three. Made by independent creator Joey Schutz, it's a brief, free experience for the PC cobbled together from hushed memories and bits and pieces of Mario games.”
My wife taught seventh grade English for many years. Circa 2009, she had an especially obnoxious group of kids in her class, who talked endless amounts of shit about the merciless beatings they would administer to anyone who dared play against them in that year's edition of Madden football. As it so happened, I lived with a couple of buddies from college, and we also played (and talked endless amounts of shit about) the same game. I don't want to say I was world-class or anything, but muscle-memory is a helluva drug and I had some of the timings on game mechanics down perfectly. One day, as part of an end-of-semester celebration, my wife brought me in with her, and mentioned that I was a halfway decent player of their kids' preferred pastime. Thinking they smelled blood in the water, half a dozen eager hands went up to challenge me over pizza and off-brand Dr. Pepper.
I massacred them. Like, two games in a row that I mercy-ruled them in the third quarter when it was 50-to-nothing. Every one of them used the same combination of three plays, which I'd seen a million times and knew exactly how to counter. I don't think they'd ever played against competition that understood that you could predict your opponent's moves and make plays designed to stop them. I'd like to think I kept the gloating to a minimum, but damn did it feel good to take the wind out of the sails of some 12-year-olds who were used to savagely beating their little brothers at video games.
Someday my kids will beat me in some game that hasn't yet been invented, but today is not that day.
posted by Mayor West at 6:30 AM on August 26, 2019 [35 favorites]
I massacred them. Like, two games in a row that I mercy-ruled them in the third quarter when it was 50-to-nothing. Every one of them used the same combination of three plays, which I'd seen a million times and knew exactly how to counter. I don't think they'd ever played against competition that understood that you could predict your opponent's moves and make plays designed to stop them. I'd like to think I kept the gloating to a minimum, but damn did it feel good to take the wind out of the sails of some 12-year-olds who were used to savagely beating their little brothers at video games.
Someday my kids will beat me in some game that hasn't yet been invented, but today is not that day.
posted by Mayor West at 6:30 AM on August 26, 2019 [35 favorites]
Craig of the Creek Brilliantly Showed Father and Son Bonding/Beefing Over a Video Game
posted by ursus_comiter at 6:36 AM on August 26, 2019 [4 favorites]
posted by ursus_comiter at 6:36 AM on August 26, 2019 [4 favorites]
At some point you risk not having a friend/sibling to play with if you continue to beat them to such a degree that you put them off of playing the game. And maybe it feels good in that short term (those moments when you're mercilessly destroying them), but is that worth not having someone to play with. It's a complicated question to consider. Sometimes gaming is better with company.
I'm not saying you should lose on purpose but to adjust your play style so that it makes things fair for your opponent. As the SB Nation article mentions, this might mean that you have to avoid using a certain character or not use a certain attack to even things up.
I never learned this lesson and after beating my sister a few too many times at certain games, she just stopped wanting to play with me. We're chill now and we've come around full circle, but when we were growing up, that divide in skill and my constant gloating really caused her to just be turned off of games and I feel a bit bad about that now.
posted by Fizz at 6:37 AM on August 26, 2019 [7 favorites]
I'm not saying you should lose on purpose but to adjust your play style so that it makes things fair for your opponent. As the SB Nation article mentions, this might mean that you have to avoid using a certain character or not use a certain attack to even things up.
I never learned this lesson and after beating my sister a few too many times at certain games, she just stopped wanting to play with me. We're chill now and we've come around full circle, but when we were growing up, that divide in skill and my constant gloating really caused her to just be turned off of games and I feel a bit bad about that now.
posted by Fizz at 6:37 AM on August 26, 2019 [7 favorites]
My youngest brother lived with me his final year of high school. There's a 15-year gap between us. He had tons of video game experience on consoles, less on PC games. We started playing Quake III Arena in LAN mode. I had no mercy on the boy, and relished the yelling from the other room when I'd get in a particularly satisfying frag.
Then. Then we started playing Halo on the XBox. Same screen. Kid was a pro screen-peeker, and knew the game inside and out where I was a casual. I don't think I won a single game until we started playing networked instead of on the same machine. The first time I won a game (first of many, after that) was very satisfying.
At this point, I spend very little time playing video games and prefer games that do not require lightning reflexes... I need games that reward playing 20 minutes at a time and don't require memorizing 50 different key combos. After enjoying Breath of the Wild I bought Hyrule Warriors and got fed up after the first 10 minutes being nothing but cut scenes and then a barrage of help dialogs on how to do this and that.
posted by jzb at 6:44 AM on August 26, 2019
Then. Then we started playing Halo on the XBox. Same screen. Kid was a pro screen-peeker, and knew the game inside and out where I was a casual. I don't think I won a single game until we started playing networked instead of on the same machine. The first time I won a game (first of many, after that) was very satisfying.
At this point, I spend very little time playing video games and prefer games that do not require lightning reflexes... I need games that reward playing 20 minutes at a time and don't require memorizing 50 different key combos. After enjoying Breath of the Wild I bought Hyrule Warriors and got fed up after the first 10 minutes being nothing but cut scenes and then a barrage of help dialogs on how to do this and that.
posted by jzb at 6:44 AM on August 26, 2019
I (a 31-year-old with a PhD) was just beaten at chess by my cousin, who starts kindergarten in the fall. I've always known I was not good at chess, but ... that was a lot.
posted by ChuraChura at 6:45 AM on August 26, 2019 [46 favorites]
posted by ChuraChura at 6:45 AM on August 26, 2019 [46 favorites]
I remember well the time I watched my nephew, who was around 11 or so, play Goldeneye, the game a friend of mine and I had been playing as a single player co-op and struggling to get past one of the levels. My nephew, of course, cruised through that level and several more in his first time playing by some manner of reckless mayhem that was heartbreaking to watch as we'd tried every kind of plan we could think of and still couldn't beat the level.
Granted, Goldeneye had a wacky co-op set up where one guy would move and aim and the other guy would look and shoot so playing that way necessitated a lot of yelling at each other to get things done, but still seeing how nonchalantly my nephew could tear through the level without even seeming to pay attention to what he was doing and still find the cool weapons we hadn't yet got was enough to make me realize I didn't have much future in video games. I pretty much stuck to free browser games after that. At least I can be happy I learned that way rather than in a one on one match where he'd kick my ass, so I was able to retain a little dignity.
posted by gusottertrout at 7:15 AM on August 26, 2019
Granted, Goldeneye had a wacky co-op set up where one guy would move and aim and the other guy would look and shoot so playing that way necessitated a lot of yelling at each other to get things done, but still seeing how nonchalantly my nephew could tear through the level without even seeming to pay attention to what he was doing and still find the cool weapons we hadn't yet got was enough to make me realize I didn't have much future in video games. I pretty much stuck to free browser games after that. At least I can be happy I learned that way rather than in a one on one match where he'd kick my ass, so I was able to retain a little dignity.
posted by gusottertrout at 7:15 AM on August 26, 2019
I think the key is to teach the kids, beat them a few times and then never play them again and turn them loose on the general populace. That way when they grow up to be Magnus Carlsen, they will still subconsciously perceive you as the best player ever.
or solves a maths problem their parents can’t even begin to understand, it is profoundly bittersweet
Person obviously does not have parents in STEM.
posted by Query at 7:17 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
or solves a maths problem their parents can’t even begin to understand, it is profoundly bittersweet
Person obviously does not have parents in STEM.
posted by Query at 7:17 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
I remember that exact moment when my son started beating me at Dark Forces: Jedi Knight.
posted by octothorpe at 7:18 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by octothorpe at 7:18 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
My family growing up was competitive in gaming in a way that stuck with me for way too long. I don't play competitive games with the kids, but every once in a while I reestablish their seemingly-forgotten sense that Actually Grownups Know What They Are Doing when I show them how a single-player game is done.
My son (8) already writes melodies and harmonies of greater sophistication than mine, and it is just a delight. If he were to solve a math problem that I couldn't, I think it would be just as much a joyful surprise.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:43 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
My son (8) already writes melodies and harmonies of greater sophistication than mine, and it is just a delight. If he were to solve a math problem that I couldn't, I think it would be just as much a joyful surprise.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:43 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
I (a 31-year-old with a PhD) was just beaten at chess by my cousin, who starts kindergarten in the fall. I've always known I was not good at chess, but ... that was a lot.
Who had White? Did you get checkmated by some kind of opening trap? If they have been playing chess at, well, preschool, maybe your cousin has learned a couple of tricks.
posted by thelonius at 7:49 AM on August 26, 2019
Who had White? Did you get checkmated by some kind of opening trap? If they have been playing chess at, well, preschool, maybe your cousin has learned a couple of tricks.
posted by thelonius at 7:49 AM on August 26, 2019
I absolutely did not get Super Mario Odyssey the first time I played it, with its entire world carefully tuned to precisely fit your exact capacities at all times. So much so that if you've got a few Marios under your belt the game ends up feeling more like raw, aggressively patronizing fan-service retrotourism than actual entertainment. But playing it in two player mode with my kids was a revelation. That bit early on where you become a dinosaur was, somewhere on the halfway mark between "why" and "meh" to my eye but my son thought it was the best thing ever.
With a competent player on Mario and an inexperienced (but excited!) player co-piloting Cappy, it suddenly turns into a _fantastic_ game for parents with young kids. It's the best (and only) example of parent-and-young-child gaming I've ever seen, a same-couch co-op game that's accessible and fun for two people of profoundly different skill levels. If there are more games out there like that, I'd love to hear about them.
posted by mhoye at 7:51 AM on August 26, 2019 [12 favorites]
With a competent player on Mario and an inexperienced (but excited!) player co-piloting Cappy, it suddenly turns into a _fantastic_ game for parents with young kids. It's the best (and only) example of parent-and-young-child gaming I've ever seen, a same-couch co-op game that's accessible and fun for two people of profoundly different skill levels. If there are more games out there like that, I'd love to hear about them.
posted by mhoye at 7:51 AM on August 26, 2019 [12 favorites]
Back in the 60s, when I was maybe 8 years old, my father taught me chess. First game he won easily. Second game was a draw. Third game I was winning when he "accidently" bumped the chessboard over. And refused to ever play me again. In high school a friend of mine and I used to play chess without a board, and just memorized the moves and positions of pieces.
I introduced my wife to video games about 20 years ago, and now that is her favorite hobby. She probably spends more time at it then I do. Her favorite weekend relaxation is to play online with her brothers. Sometimes they let me play too :)
posted by baegucb at 8:01 AM on August 26, 2019 [2 favorites]
I introduced my wife to video games about 20 years ago, and now that is her favorite hobby. She probably spends more time at it then I do. Her favorite weekend relaxation is to play online with her brothers. Sometimes they let me play too :)
posted by baegucb at 8:01 AM on August 26, 2019 [2 favorites]
When Fortnite came out, my pre-teen child played a few rounds, running into danger and getting slaughtered, then insisted I play. I gave up first person shooters in the late 90s, but pulled from my latent experience and came in 5th on my first go. I got more appreciation and respect from my kid for that than for anything else I can think of, before or since; he even bragged about it to his friends, and for a while listened to my advice... at least, my advice on how to play Fortnite.
posted by davejay at 8:08 AM on August 26, 2019 [5 favorites]
posted by davejay at 8:08 AM on August 26, 2019 [5 favorites]
Yeah, I remember the first time my daughter beat me at a video game - she was four.
posted by sour cream at 8:18 AM on August 26, 2019
posted by sour cream at 8:18 AM on August 26, 2019
My son and I are almost at the point where we can no longer play FIFA, and the only reason we still can is that he beats me 9/10 times and I can just barely hold it together graciously in my loss. He’s not a bad winner or anything, it’s just that competitive. On the rare occasion I win I’m just not able to stifle my joy and then the boy goes off sullen and wants nothing to do with me. Til the next night when he asks if I’m up for another match. I feel sure this is going to end with a thrown controller.
He’s an absolute bastard to his younger brother. So now I’ve changed tactics. Older brother was away at camp last week so me and younger brother downloaded Plants vs Zombies Garden Warfare 2 which older brother had been dying to get. Mom was away and screen time limits were suspended all week and me and little brother just *killed it* all week. We emailed older brother at camp on the day before we picked him up and let him know we had just downloaded it to celebrate his return. As expected younger brother destroyed him. Older brother was totally cool about it, he was just glad to be back in front of a screen, but it was so awesome to see younger brother just beaming with pride and being the boss for the first time ever.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 8:19 AM on August 26, 2019 [10 favorites]
He’s an absolute bastard to his younger brother. So now I’ve changed tactics. Older brother was away at camp last week so me and younger brother downloaded Plants vs Zombies Garden Warfare 2 which older brother had been dying to get. Mom was away and screen time limits were suspended all week and me and little brother just *killed it* all week. We emailed older brother at camp on the day before we picked him up and let him know we had just downloaded it to celebrate his return. As expected younger brother destroyed him. Older brother was totally cool about it, he was just glad to be back in front of a screen, but it was so awesome to see younger brother just beaming with pride and being the boss for the first time ever.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 8:19 AM on August 26, 2019 [10 favorites]
Yeah, I'm of the "chess with my dad" generation. He'd play me and my brother without a queen and offered five bucks to the first one to beat him. It took me years. It was a kind of a shock to realize much later that he wasn't actually good at chess-- like, at all-- but that most kids lack the patience and impulse control to do well at it.
posted by phooky at 8:30 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by phooky at 8:30 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
My kids have never beaten me at video games because they play Roblox "Adopt me", which is them racing around the immersive Roblox world pushing babies in baby carriages and it is cuter and way more entertaining than any video game I ever played well, and if it is competitive I've never seen them 'compete'.
I've been beaten at games by my kids though, because I showed my older daughter the secret to tic tac toe, and now she is a tough competitor. Also *parent tip* sometimes losing gets the game over more quickly so you can do what you want instead of play Old Maid for the 30th time in a row.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:49 AM on August 26, 2019
I've been beaten at games by my kids though, because I showed my older daughter the secret to tic tac toe, and now she is a tough competitor. Also *parent tip* sometimes losing gets the game over more quickly so you can do what you want instead of play Old Maid for the 30th time in a row.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:49 AM on August 26, 2019
My near-8-year-old beats me at Smash Bros. nearly every time and I am not gracious enough to deal with his gloating.
posted by daisystomper at 8:50 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by daisystomper at 8:50 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
I have a basically-nephew-but-not-technically 9yo in my life who, in a recent visit, just wanted to play Smash Bros on his Switch (I also have one but don't own the game), so we played hooked up to my TV. I nearly lost my shit, I am ashamed to say (though I kept it in I think?), because (a) I haven't played this kind of game in ages and (b) he wants to play with random levels and all power-ups which adds an insane level of chaos that I just cannot deal with.
After like 4 or 5 games where he was very happy to win I had to redirect to us playing another game, and even then he was like "but why?" and I had to try real hard not to say "because I'm not interested in losing to random chance in games where every third second I'm like 'what the fuck was that thing?!' and/or because you've been playing this game 24/7 for weeks".
Meanwhile I have a legit nephew who is 12yo who I started gaming (videogames and boardgames) at 6 and from the start my stance was, "I'm never going to let you win" (which is a good fit for his personality) and it's been fun to watch him grow into that kid who will kick the shit out of you in any boardgame and is like a Mario Kaizo Pro. But, I still hold my own against him in most of the kinds of games we play together, because it's more often boardgames than videogames, though he likes to design Mario Maker levels that I dutifully play a few times and lose because yeah don't always have that insane fine-grained control.
Also I was like a hero when I jumped into Tetris 99 at his place and came in 5th.
posted by tocts at 9:07 AM on August 26, 2019
After like 4 or 5 games where he was very happy to win I had to redirect to us playing another game, and even then he was like "but why?" and I had to try real hard not to say "because I'm not interested in losing to random chance in games where every third second I'm like 'what the fuck was that thing?!' and/or because you've been playing this game 24/7 for weeks".
Meanwhile I have a legit nephew who is 12yo who I started gaming (videogames and boardgames) at 6 and from the start my stance was, "I'm never going to let you win" (which is a good fit for his personality) and it's been fun to watch him grow into that kid who will kick the shit out of you in any boardgame and is like a Mario Kaizo Pro. But, I still hold my own against him in most of the kinds of games we play together, because it's more often boardgames than videogames, though he likes to design Mario Maker levels that I dutifully play a few times and lose because yeah don't always have that insane fine-grained control.
Also I was like a hero when I jumped into Tetris 99 at his place and came in 5th.
posted by tocts at 9:07 AM on August 26, 2019
Also I was like a hero when I jumped into Tetris 99 at his place and came in 5th.
The trick is to find a game that you're good at, ideally your forever game. Mine is Binding of Isaac. What's funny is that I'm not amazing at it, I'm not terrible, that being said, I've unlocked about 70% of the game (still have several endings and characters to reveal), but for someone who has never played this kind of bullet-hell. You'd be surprised how impressive it looks to just flow through that game from afar.
posted by Fizz at 9:27 AM on August 26, 2019
The trick is to find a game that you're good at, ideally your forever game. Mine is Binding of Isaac. What's funny is that I'm not amazing at it, I'm not terrible, that being said, I've unlocked about 70% of the game (still have several endings and characters to reveal), but for someone who has never played this kind of bullet-hell. You'd be surprised how impressive it looks to just flow through that game from afar.
posted by Fizz at 9:27 AM on August 26, 2019
At some point you risk not having a friend/sibling to play with...adjust your play style so that it makes things fair for your opponent.
OTOH, I used to give up a few underdog victories to my youngest brother and kept most of the rest of our games close; I think it was worse.
He thought he was close. He became more emotionally invested and the losses, which he never really could prevent anyway, were even more crushing as a result.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:30 AM on August 26, 2019
OTOH, I used to give up a few underdog victories to my youngest brother and kept most of the rest of our games close; I think it was worse.
He thought he was close. He became more emotionally invested and the losses, which he never really could prevent anyway, were even more crushing as a result.
posted by Reasonably Everything Happens at 9:30 AM on August 26, 2019
We got an Amiga 500 when I was a kid, our first family computer, and among the games we had for it was Tetris. And we hadn't been a Tetris family before, so while we were like aware of it culturally I think actually getting hands on it was a whole other thing.
And my dad and I spent what felt like a couple years but probably was a lot less getting up to speed at it, taking turns back and forth an hour or two at a time sometimes in the computer room, hammering away on the numpad as background art and midi Russian folk and classical music wheeled through—it was like so much of the software that we, uh, acquired for this popular-in-Europe machine, definitely a Eurasian version of the game rather than an American release—and that went on for as long as it did with me getting a high score, Dad beating that, me beating that, back and forth with a score standing for hours sometimes, minutes, weeks.
And then at some point something clicked for me and I cracked the high score by a solid margin, and then cracked it again, and cracked it again, in one sitting there in the dark with Dad. And he basically called it, then. Didn't give up on playing Tetris with me, but gave up on expecting to keep up. It became more of just a shared parallel past time at that point, enjoying watching each other play just for the sake of it, him there to watch in silence if I was having a good night. I stopped getting better about the time I rolled the odometer, something like twice his last high score.
I think it was less of a weird passing-the-torch thing because we both started playing at the same time and played together; it's not something where he'd been playing Tetris as a teenager too. But it also felt like a little bit of its own sober acknowledgement of aging, that my dad essentially said "well, I'm too old and slow to keep up with you now".
And he was probably about as old as I am now, then, so I'm gonna go have a lie down now I think.
posted by cortex at 9:33 AM on August 26, 2019 [9 favorites]
And my dad and I spent what felt like a couple years but probably was a lot less getting up to speed at it, taking turns back and forth an hour or two at a time sometimes in the computer room, hammering away on the numpad as background art and midi Russian folk and classical music wheeled through—it was like so much of the software that we, uh, acquired for this popular-in-Europe machine, definitely a Eurasian version of the game rather than an American release—and that went on for as long as it did with me getting a high score, Dad beating that, me beating that, back and forth with a score standing for hours sometimes, minutes, weeks.
And then at some point something clicked for me and I cracked the high score by a solid margin, and then cracked it again, and cracked it again, in one sitting there in the dark with Dad. And he basically called it, then. Didn't give up on playing Tetris with me, but gave up on expecting to keep up. It became more of just a shared parallel past time at that point, enjoying watching each other play just for the sake of it, him there to watch in silence if I was having a good night. I stopped getting better about the time I rolled the odometer, something like twice his last high score.
I think it was less of a weird passing-the-torch thing because we both started playing at the same time and played together; it's not something where he'd been playing Tetris as a teenager too. But it also felt like a little bit of its own sober acknowledgement of aging, that my dad essentially said "well, I'm too old and slow to keep up with you now".
And he was probably about as old as I am now, then, so I'm gonna go have a lie down now I think.
posted by cortex at 9:33 AM on August 26, 2019 [9 favorites]
Oh the joys, such joys, of thrashing my little brother at mario kart in the nineties - to the soundtrack of 'now that's why I call music 36(?)' - it had the original ' I like to move it, move it' and also smashing pumpkins I think. This is a great article, many thanks.
I went to one of the first video game exhibits and the science museum in London in the mid-2000's and yeah, the SNES muscle memory kicked in and I was also thrashing little kids even though I was in my twenties. I had to reel it in, but it felt good for a while...
My brother has two kids now - 5 and 2, and he hasn't let them play anything yet, although we've talked about it. I've kept up with what is current, and when he and my sister-in-law are happy, I'm keen to pop round with the switch or whatever works. Of course, brother and me will then have to argue about how one of the switch controllers is better or worse than the other, even though they're the same. Kids now with their chance to have two fairly cheap branded controllers *get off my generic see-through argos controller lawn grumble grumble *
And I used to be really horrible playing Zelda on the SNES and make my brother 'read the map'... Guess at least now you can often both play in some way which is better!
posted by sedimentary_deer at 10:22 AM on August 26, 2019
I went to one of the first video game exhibits and the science museum in London in the mid-2000's and yeah, the SNES muscle memory kicked in and I was also thrashing little kids even though I was in my twenties. I had to reel it in, but it felt good for a while...
My brother has two kids now - 5 and 2, and he hasn't let them play anything yet, although we've talked about it. I've kept up with what is current, and when he and my sister-in-law are happy, I'm keen to pop round with the switch or whatever works. Of course, brother and me will then have to argue about how one of the switch controllers is better or worse than the other, even though they're the same. Kids now with their chance to have two fairly cheap branded controllers *get off my generic see-through argos controller lawn grumble grumble *
And I used to be really horrible playing Zelda on the SNES and make my brother 'read the map'... Guess at least now you can often both play in some way which is better!
posted by sedimentary_deer at 10:22 AM on August 26, 2019
One of my favorite recent tweets, on the release of Tetris 99:
"Tetris 99 has taught me there is an entire roiling underbelly of god-tier Tetris degenerates out there that have been unknowingly training for this week their entire lives.
Having a good time watching Twitch streamers get destroyed by accounts named "Eileen" and "LuvMyKids72.""
posted by praemunire at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019 [9 favorites]
"Tetris 99 has taught me there is an entire roiling underbelly of god-tier Tetris degenerates out there that have been unknowingly training for this week their entire lives.
Having a good time watching Twitch streamers get destroyed by accounts named "Eileen" and "LuvMyKids72.""
posted by praemunire at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019 [9 favorites]
Oof, just missed the edit window, but soundtrack to SNES mariokart was 'Now That's What I call music 27' . Best compilation album ever - don't agree? I'll deploy a red shell...
Wanted to say too - a lot of my friends (who all have kids) have come to me to ask advice about playing video games because hardly any of them did. But things are so different now (and because I don't really play online), that I usually point them to askme. I'll be sending this article as a counterpoint to all the scare stories.
EDIT - aug, sorry mods. Just saw the tetris posts. After much argument, I got a gameboy from some american relatives around 1992. Around 1995, my mum got COMPLETELY addicted to tetris, and she was SO good. If you are ever facing 'alison56' watch out...
posted by sedimentary_deer at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019
Wanted to say too - a lot of my friends (who all have kids) have come to me to ask advice about playing video games because hardly any of them did. But things are so different now (and because I don't really play online), that I usually point them to askme. I'll be sending this article as a counterpoint to all the scare stories.
EDIT - aug, sorry mods. Just saw the tetris posts. After much argument, I got a gameboy from some american relatives around 1992. Around 1995, my mum got COMPLETELY addicted to tetris, and she was SO good. If you are ever facing 'alison56' watch out...
posted by sedimentary_deer at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019
I have a rough history with competitive games... Since I was rarely the most skilled in my peer group, I learned various methods of psychological warfare - if I couldn't compete directly with reflexes, I learned to attack other weaknesses. Coincidentally, I'm a huge fan of stealth games.
Anyways, the last time my (older) brother and I ever played competitively against each other was playing the original star control 2 against each other. The game supposedly "balanced" teams based on how the individual ships were weighted and scored, with the more strong ships or ships with special abilities weighed heavier. He insisted we keep the scores fairly balanced, because that's just the sort of guy he was. What the scoring did not take into account was trolling potential... and while he built out a well balanced team that should be capable of handling anything, I built one expressly around the purpose of trolling. Scoring does not take this in to account.
My teams consisted mostly of really fast moving and erratic ships - None super powerful, but all really irritating - one of which had a random chance of respawning after defeat, and seemed to do so very often. After way too long of a game of this, I managed to experience him literally rage-quitting in front of me - While I guess you could say I technically "won", I had royally pissed him off, and I immediately felt horrible. We haven't played competitively since, unless you count immediately going for each other during the bonus round of Balloon Fight.
Ever since then, playing competitively really just hasn't held the same interest for me - I never learned to turn off the psychological warfare component of it.
Now on the topic of people who are new to a game knowing a ton more about it - My wife has been watching me play the new Fire Emblem. This is her first time experiencing these games, and I am a very old veteran with them, who has played through all but the very hardest challenges (Conquest Lunatic is my nemesis), and I've done several self-imposed challenges on the older games. She does not play games in general, let alone strategy games - she got sucked into this because asking "is that a pegasus?" lead to her wanting to know much more about it and then getting sucked into the story, so we proceeded to dissect every single aspect of the game. Since then, she has a knack of taking one look at what I'm doing and asking a very simple "Is there any way you could ____" question that shows a level of strategic thinking and nuance well beyond the most advanced players I've known, and usually leads to a much easier way out of things than I could ever think of - she has ended up guiding me to victory in ways I would have never conceived. She is significantly better than me at the game, having literally has never played any of them before, and while I'm really impressed with her, it's left me questioning my own understanding of the games quite a bit.
posted by MysticMCJ at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019 [4 favorites]
Anyways, the last time my (older) brother and I ever played competitively against each other was playing the original star control 2 against each other. The game supposedly "balanced" teams based on how the individual ships were weighted and scored, with the more strong ships or ships with special abilities weighed heavier. He insisted we keep the scores fairly balanced, because that's just the sort of guy he was. What the scoring did not take into account was trolling potential... and while he built out a well balanced team that should be capable of handling anything, I built one expressly around the purpose of trolling. Scoring does not take this in to account.
My teams consisted mostly of really fast moving and erratic ships - None super powerful, but all really irritating - one of which had a random chance of respawning after defeat, and seemed to do so very often. After way too long of a game of this, I managed to experience him literally rage-quitting in front of me - While I guess you could say I technically "won", I had royally pissed him off, and I immediately felt horrible. We haven't played competitively since, unless you count immediately going for each other during the bonus round of Balloon Fight.
Ever since then, playing competitively really just hasn't held the same interest for me - I never learned to turn off the psychological warfare component of it.
Now on the topic of people who are new to a game knowing a ton more about it - My wife has been watching me play the new Fire Emblem. This is her first time experiencing these games, and I am a very old veteran with them, who has played through all but the very hardest challenges (Conquest Lunatic is my nemesis), and I've done several self-imposed challenges on the older games. She does not play games in general, let alone strategy games - she got sucked into this because asking "is that a pegasus?" lead to her wanting to know much more about it and then getting sucked into the story, so we proceeded to dissect every single aspect of the game. Since then, she has a knack of taking one look at what I'm doing and asking a very simple "Is there any way you could ____" question that shows a level of strategic thinking and nuance well beyond the most advanced players I've known, and usually leads to a much easier way out of things than I could ever think of - she has ended up guiding me to victory in ways I would have never conceived. She is significantly better than me at the game, having literally has never played any of them before, and while I'm really impressed with her, it's left me questioning my own understanding of the games quite a bit.
posted by MysticMCJ at 10:32 AM on August 26, 2019 [4 favorites]
I'm 44, and I've never managed to beat my dad at Scrabble. Even the time I managed to play "assembly" on two triple word scores - an amazing move, possibly the highest-scoring play I've ever made - but he still won that game.
posted by nickmark at 11:09 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by nickmark at 11:09 AM on August 26, 2019 [1 favorite]
When I started getting good at Trivial Pursuit in high school, my parents would insist on playing the "Baby Boomer edition." Not only would they demolish me, but the game would stretch for hours because of all of their anecdotes.
My kids can't beat me at MarioKart. ANY MarioKart. But when we got Smash Bros for the switch, it was around the holidays. My 7 year old was home from school and I was at work and one day I came home and he was unstoppable and also insufferable about it. So I did what any sane parent would do: I asked my single adult coworkers to bring their Switch with Smash into work and we played every lunch until I had a couple of mains I could consistently win with. Then I went home and demolished my son several times in a row. Now he prefers we play teams with both of us on the same side.
posted by sleeping bear at 11:36 AM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
My kids can't beat me at MarioKart. ANY MarioKart. But when we got Smash Bros for the switch, it was around the holidays. My 7 year old was home from school and I was at work and one day I came home and he was unstoppable and also insufferable about it. So I did what any sane parent would do: I asked my single adult coworkers to bring their Switch with Smash into work and we played every lunch until I had a couple of mains I could consistently win with. Then I went home and demolished my son several times in a row. Now he prefers we play teams with both of us on the same side.
posted by sleeping bear at 11:36 AM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
With a competent player on Mario and an inexperienced (but excited!) player co-piloting Cappy, it suddenly turns into a _fantastic_ game for parents with young kids. It's the best (and only) example of parent-and-young-child gaming I've ever seen, a same-couch co-op game that's accessible and fun for two people of profoundly different skill levels. If there are more games out there like that, I'd love to hear about them.
If you're into Pokemon, Pokemon Let's Go has a co-op mode which lets player 1 run about the overworld, and then whenever you get into a battle, player 2 joins in with a second Pokemon. This makes the majority of the battles 2-on-1 fights and thus a) makes them somewhat easier, and b) lets you strategise together about which Pokemon to use.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 11:55 AM on August 26, 2019
If you're into Pokemon, Pokemon Let's Go has a co-op mode which lets player 1 run about the overworld, and then whenever you get into a battle, player 2 joins in with a second Pokemon. This makes the majority of the battles 2-on-1 fights and thus a) makes them somewhat easier, and b) lets you strategise together about which Pokemon to use.
posted by EndsOfInvention at 11:55 AM on August 26, 2019
I used to play dial-up Fifa with one of my friends. I was generally the better player but we'd each win games so it wasn't totally one-sided. What ended our playing that game was a match where I was Canada and he was Brazil. I was up by a goal or two and then somehow I was able to score a goal from my own half. I wasn't even trying to take a shot but something happened and the ball lobbed up and into the net with his keeper just looking at it. Soon after the line got mysteriously disconnected and we never played again. He did beat me at later versions of Fifa that I hadn't really played but it wasn't the same and we both knew it.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:23 PM on August 26, 2019
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:23 PM on August 26, 2019
When I started getting good at Trivial Pursuit in high school, my parents would insist on playing the "Baby Boomer edition."
There is a metaphor in there......
posted by thelonius at 12:53 PM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
There is a metaphor in there......
posted by thelonius at 12:53 PM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
When I started getting good at Trivial Pursuit in high school, my parents would insist on playing the "Baby Boomer edition." Not only would they demolish me, but the game would stretch for hours because of all of their anecdotes.
Starting to wonder if this universe isn't just sleeping bear's personal hell here
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 1:03 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
Starting to wonder if this universe isn't just sleeping bear's personal hell here
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 1:03 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
The real sibling betrayal is when they save over your save file, which you have very clearly identified is yours, and yours is always in the same spot, and they claim to have just forgotten which was which and you do not believe this for ONE INSTANT.
(It’s cool I’m not still hung up on this at all)
posted by curious nu at 1:48 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
(It’s cool I’m not still hung up on this at all)
posted by curious nu at 1:48 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
I'm 44, and I've never managed to beat my dad at Scrabble. Even the time I managed to play "assembly" on two triple word scores - an amazing move, possibly the highest-scoring play I've ever made - but he still won that game.
Ten years ago in an online Scrabble game against a university acquaintance, I played “upwafted” across two triple word scores. 238 points.
Reader, I married her.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:33 PM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
Ten years ago in an online Scrabble game against a university acquaintance, I played “upwafted” across two triple word scores. 238 points.
Reader, I married her.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:33 PM on August 26, 2019 [6 favorites]
I'm not sure I'm all the bothered by my child beating me at games but I am most definitely bothered when his knucklehead friends beat me.
posted by Ashwagandha at 3:53 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by Ashwagandha at 3:53 PM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]
Having a good time watching Twitch streamers get destroyed by accounts named "Eileen" and "LuvMyKids72."
Back when I dabbled in commercial recreation attractions, I had to spend a lot of time at family entertainment centers. FECs usually have go carts, slick tracks or some other kind of motorized racing options. I love them. Often the winner can take another turn for free.
One time a 12-ish kid was winning repeatedly and deservedly: he was the best driver. I studied the cars and figured out which one had the best engine, since I outweighed him by —cough— pounds and ran out to it. In my suit. And heels. Off we went, going at it hard, jockeying for position and rubbing, trying to shove each other off the track. Eventually I eked out the win.
Afterwards, he came running over to me, all breathless about how great it was (and it was). I was climbing out of the car, having decided to let him have my free turn, when he said, “What’s your deal, anyway?” as he eyed my business attire and grocked that I was older than his parents. “I’ve always loved this stuff and never saw any reason to stop,” I replied. I really hope he got a life lesson out of that vis-a-vis judging books by their covers.
posted by carmicha at 9:21 PM on August 26, 2019 [10 favorites]
Back when I dabbled in commercial recreation attractions, I had to spend a lot of time at family entertainment centers. FECs usually have go carts, slick tracks or some other kind of motorized racing options. I love them. Often the winner can take another turn for free.
One time a 12-ish kid was winning repeatedly and deservedly: he was the best driver. I studied the cars and figured out which one had the best engine, since I outweighed him by —cough— pounds and ran out to it. In my suit. And heels. Off we went, going at it hard, jockeying for position and rubbing, trying to shove each other off the track. Eventually I eked out the win.
Afterwards, he came running over to me, all breathless about how great it was (and it was). I was climbing out of the car, having decided to let him have my free turn, when he said, “What’s your deal, anyway?” as he eyed my business attire and grocked that I was older than his parents. “I’ve always loved this stuff and never saw any reason to stop,” I replied. I really hope he got a life lesson out of that vis-a-vis judging books by their covers.
posted by carmicha at 9:21 PM on August 26, 2019 [10 favorites]
I'm pretty good at some games and terrible at others, but I have incredible beginners luck. My brother and my ex stopped playing against me because even though I'm just mashing buttons and have no idea what I'm doing I would absolutely crush them - Madden, NBA Jam, Mortal Kombat, Tekken - didn't matter. Many a controller got thrown across the room.
Still those times on the N64 with my siblings were the funnest ever.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:14 AM on August 27, 2019
Still those times on the N64 with my siblings were the funnest ever.
posted by LizBoBiz at 4:14 AM on August 27, 2019
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posted by Fizz at 6:08 AM on August 26, 2019 [3 favorites]