Fight Night

Okay, so my ultimate goal for this blog is to write a major post every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Sundays will be sort of overview weeks of what I'm doing and plan on doing. Tuesday and Thursdays will be smaller posts, if anything. And, eventually; Saturdays will be my day off.

However, until the wedding, I'm going to update this everyday.

So why did I say all that stuff before if it's not going to matter for a month? Well, maybe it's just an excuse for the fact that today's post is going to be shorter.

Milwaukee Fight Nights

So right now, I am writing from Milwaukee. I'm chilling at Pooplos's place after playing Street Fighter for 5 hours straight.

See, every Tuesday in Milwaukee, a bunch of Wisconsin gamers get together to play fighting games all evening. Normally, there's a tournament involved, but today we all just played casuals all night long. There were four TVs running Super Street Fighter IV, one with Street Fighter: Third Strike, and one with the newest Tekken. There were 17 people all gathered in one room, sitting in front of six different TVs and all having a lot of fun.

The best way to play

So as I'm sitting there, looking around the room, I realized: This is what I miss with online play. Don't get me wrong, I love my matches online with Ridah Kick and Menchi, but the whole vibe is different.

There's something that feels so right about playing someone face-to-face. For one, when you lose, they can tell you what you did wrong. Not to mention, even when your not playing, you can watch any of the six screens around to see how other people are playing. You can cheer your friends on. Or tell them how much they suck. (By the way, you suck, Pooplos.)

Ultimately, though, it comes down to a different atmosphere. People don't get salty in person like they do online. Yeah, maybe some people will get a little annoyed if they keep losing, but you don't get the same level of rage as you do when everything becomes impersonal.Yeah,maybe it's the anonymous thing, but I think it's more than there. When you lose to someone online, you don't see them. You don't see their reaction. You just lost. That's it. When you're face-to-face, they're still there. You can say, "Good games, man," and offer up your seat to someone else. Or, you can ask them for a rematch. Most importantly, it's not some video game character that beat you, it's a human being who you can see and talk to. It's no longer "You lose." It's "They won." And yeah, there's a difference.

Anyway, I'm just sort of ranting. I wish arcades were bigger, because online? It's just not the same.

And sorry about the lackluster post today. I'll try to make up for it tomorrow.