Video Game Justice

Possibly the most important thing about a healthy relationship is that you share a major hobby. That you spend several hours a week doing the same thing, together. And the thing which ultimately destroyed countless relationships for me (aside from me being a major dickhole) is my dedication to gaming. I'm a gamer, my girlfriends were not. Some of them thought they were, because modern society has somehow made it hip and socially acceptable to call yourself a gamer.

Stop eating my fucking controller, you slut!

Seriously, this is getting way out of hand! The first thing I have to do every day is shoo random bitches out of my living room, who try to eat, fondle and make love to my gaming peripherals. I don't know how the fuck they get in here, I don't know where they come from, but I'm getting seriously annoyed with this bullshit.

Actually, you can stay for a bit...

Point being, you can be as blonde, horny and underage as you want, if you can't tell your trolls from your goblins, you can GTFO.

So, the Bear and I have that one thing in common. Gaming. That's probably it, but it's good enough. I don't know if she's into anything else and I only call her the Bear because I can't really remember her name right now, but we're solid. We're a great couple. We play our video games together. Usually co-op, because when we end up on opposite sides in pvp, it usually ends with somebody getting slapped in the face by a penis. Seriously though, that was an accident. We're just really bad at sex. We don't deliberately hit each other or anything.

If you're a regular visitor to this blog or my FB profile, you will have noticed that our favourite game right now is Dark Souls. We're about to start our 4th cooperative playthrough. And if you're somewhat familiar with Dark Souls, then you'll know that the game is designed to team you up with random strangers rather than friends, there is no real communication, no coordination, you just invite a random guy and hope he's competent enough.
There are mods and workarounds for that, Bear and I play with each other all the time, but the vast majority of players out there either plays alone or with people they don't really know. Make a mental note, that's gonna be important in a bit. :P

And whenever I team up with the Bear, we get harassed by invaders. The game actually calls them that. There's a mechanic in Dark Souls, which lets you invade other people's peaceful pve sessions and your only objective is to kill these players. Why the fuck anyone would think this is a great design idea, which generates nothing but grief, frustration and abuse is beyond me, but that's Japanese game design for ya.
Mind you, Dark Souls also offers consensual pvp if you aren't a total pussy. First of all, there's an arena, which allows you to queue up for duels, 2vs2 and so forth. There is also a pvp summoning stone. Using it will place a red marker on the ground for everyone who is currently playing to see, and if anybody is looking for a fight, they may activate said marker and summon you for a duel.

The pvp crowd is very active across all platforms. They're also the biggest bunch of whiny cunts you'll encounter anywhere outside a Blizzard-hosted internet forum. They live by some made up code of honour: Using magic makes you a faggot, you're a cunt when you use tower shields and wearing plate armor makes you a noob and so forth. They're the kind of people who used to demand 32 timeouts in a 5 minute game of dodgeball in school.
Still. Whiny or not, if you're looking for people who are willing to fight you, there are several quick and easy ways to get in touch with them and exchange a few friendly blows. And if you're a coward, a complete dickhead and an untalented loser, who wants to fight people with pve builds, zero experience with pvp and no desire to engage other players in combat, you invade other players against their will.

The Bear and I don't invade people. We don't challenge players in consensual pvp. We don't even fight each other in pvp. We're like the Klitschkos. We're a team. We don't fight. That only complicates things and causes bad blood. But we get invaded a lot, like I said.
Now, remember when I said that most people either play their pve solo or with random strangers and zero communication? Bear and I sit in the same room. We talk. We're a team. We're lovers. There's some chemistry going on here. And whenever some dickhead invades our session, we position our asses in opposite corners of a room and wait to ambush them. We put the bad guy right between us. Like so:

Half of the time, the invader doesn't even notice there's two of us and will just start attacking one of us and ignore the other. So we close in and beat the shit out of them:

If an invader starts running circles around Bear and attempts to outmaneuver us, she simply turtles up (tower shield ftw) and I shoot them in the back with my repeating crossbow:

Alternatively, they go after me, I do the turtling and she does the backstabbing.
As you can see, this isn't rocket surgery, there is no master strategist at work, it's just basic 2vs1 exploited in the most unfair manner possible. But no matter how simple the whole thing is, pulling it off becomes so much easier and more efficient if you can communicate with your partner. Random strangers can't talk to you (outside of windows live chat), there's no coordination, they might be drooling morons for all you know. And invaders know that. That's why they fucking invade you in the first place. Unfair advantage and all that.

So we did our thing last night, killed one invader, killed another and after the first one I was greeted by this message here:

Mkay. So you invaded our game against our will, clearly hoping for an unfair advantage and instead we ganged up on you and kicked you ass, so we're noobs and gankers. Love that logic.

Well, you know how it goes. I was stupid enough to write back, of course. Told him I didn't invite him and I couldn't remember forcing him to invade our fucking game. Funny how he tried to fuck up our co-op session and then insults us when we kick him out.
And of course he just kept on going on and on and on about how we're noobs and faggots and the usual stuff you get to hear on just about every online game with a pvp component.

So let me get this straight: You invade pve sessions because you don't have the balls to play consensual pvp with people who are ready and willing to fight. You do so with only one goal in mind - to kill generally helpless players, take away their experience points and currency (pardon, 'souls') and force them to start over from the nearest safe spot, yet you start complaining when they fight back and kick you the fuck out? Seriously?

Okay, he's talking about "ganking" here, probably referring to the fact that we sandwiched him and went Ken Barlow on his ass. But that only makes it more hilarious. What the fuck was that asshole expecting? A formal bow, maybe a kiss on the cheek, the two of us taking turns and maybe waiting for him to send us a note on all the gear and spells we were or weren't allowed to use? You invaded our fucking game! We didn't ask you to do it, we didn't message you and say, "Hey, come here and attack us, we promise not to fight back!" or some shit. You come into my session, try to kill me, attack my partner and I'll take you down by any means necessary, no holds barred. No fucking rules, no bullshit imaginary code of honour, you're going to die and that's that. And where I'm from, people have the common sense to expect that sort of reaction, they take it like a man and shut the fuck up about it, not start whining like a 12 year old who has to buy female hygiene products for the first time in her life. What the fuck is wrong with you stupid kids? You didn't see that kind of bullshit back in Quake or Unreal. At least not on that level. We just played our fucking games and shut the fuck up. This new generation of gamers whines about "endgame content" and "balancing" and feeds greedy publishers by purchasing shitty DLC and competes over who wears the fanciest dress at fucking cosplay conventions. You don't like me kicking you out of my game any way I see fit? Then stay the fuck out! Or do it like the last cowardly cunt and Alt+F4 your way to safety. Which was just as pathetic, but at least he didn't bother me with his stupid opinion.

-Cat