February 13th, 2008
Notagame
An extraordinary chess master died recently. They said his game was not about winning, but about humiliating his opponent. Are there any meta-games you play? Are you ever a perfectionist for strange reasons?
Transcriptorial: Not just a game!
I play people the way Bobby Fischer played chess.
I play strange games with my mother. I alternately say things or hide things to make her proud of me and then I’ll do anything to expose to her the daughter she doesn’t want to see. It’s a weird dance.
I’m not sure which are meta games and which are just living. People play games.
I too play games with people, but I believe it is not the point : the question is whether, when you have mastered the rules that everyone has to follow to play the game, you then invent new rules to make the game your own. I do that too.
Some video games are perfect for that kind of thing : they aspire to a realism they can never completely achieve ; therefore, if you want them to be realistic, you have to invent new limitations for yourself that are not originally there.
I do the same thing with computer games, force myself to play in certain ways.
I play games to win, though I enjoy the process.
You could say that I approach life in the same way: I want to go to heaven when I die, but I want to enjoy the journey.
I had a friend who, though not a very good chess player, nonetheless did pretty well in tournaments back in school, because he didn’t play to win. He deliberately played for stalemate, and his opponents were so confused by his apparently irrational decisions that he won more often than not.
Personally, when I play Spider Solitaire I consider it a loss if I can’t have the red and black cards in a pleasingly symmetrical pattern as I complete sets and clear them off the “table”.
In games more complex than solitaire, though, I take whatever advantage I can get, because, frankly, I’m not good enough to survive with additional restrictions on myself. And I have nowhere near the understanding of people necessary to play them. Having been played, myself, on several occasions, though, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, even had I the necessary skills.
I play D&D.
Sometimes, when a DM sets a few specific rules, I play in a way that would make her realize those rules are bad.
More often than not, common sense doesn’t really cut it.
We all set many rules to our lives, automatically considering those who break them as “losers”.
Condolences on Gary Gygax’s recent death. I always liked that game, as many rules as it has. I’ve really enjoyed all your comments, by the way.
I play card games with people just to figure out who they want me to be. What opponent gives them the most pleasure to fight against?
When you’re actually trying, who are you? How do I keep that side of you around?
I was trying not to comment any more, but this one got me.
I play copious hours of computer games. I play copious hours of Roleplaying Games too. But I choose to use those “outlets” for “playing games with people” rather than amnipulating them in RL. Because while influencing other people is pretty easy in general, and may give some people a bit of a rush that they have some sort of “power” over others, I have no personal need for validation and verification that way.
So my personal credo is: I don’t play games with people’s emotions.
That’s not to say I don’t get into tough situations where I have to make tough choices or trade-offs between people - just to say I don’t orchestrate the situations intentionally.
> An extraordinary chess master died recently. They said his game was not about winning,
> but about humiliating his opponent. Are there any meta-games you play? Are you ever a
> perfectionist for strange reasons?
To answer the second part of your question: what are “strange reasons”?
I tend to be a perfectionist because in general I like the things that I do to reflect well on me. I would prefer code I wrote to be reviewed later (if anyone ever did) and not have the person doing it to think “God, what a mess.”
In general, the only “meta-games” I play involve holding mirrors up for people to see who they are, and if they are not interested in looking, I usually smile politely, and move along.
Oh damn.
And after all that I forgot to add what I started the reply to say in the first place.
I have no interest in humiliating others. That sort of need comes from people who have been humiliated in one way in the past, and feel a need for retaliation and vengeance. Those have always felt petty and “small” to me.
There is a scene from The Matrix where Neo wants to meet the Oracle, but all he finds is the GateKeeper who says : “You must fight me to pass.”
The coolest thing about this is that the gateKeeper has no interest or investment in either winning or losing - he fights only to know his opponent and from that knowledge to determine if he should pass or not.
THAT to me is the purpose of roleplaying, or of meta-games, or any other pursuit that sets people against each other. Winning or losing is not (to me) important at all. It’s what you learn about people and your own progress on your personal path.
If the comment on the Chessmaster was accurate, then I feel sorry for him, because to a large degree I feel he would have missed the purpose of his life, and I suspect he would have felt lonely, and likely empty.
I play games with my head to see how much I much I hide from myself.