Had lots of weird dreams last night, an obvious sign that I went to bed restless. It took forever for me to fall asleep after I quit the AMRN, logged off IRC due to feeling out of place, talked over some of my problems with my bosom friend and another friend from the AMRN, and finally gave up and shut down the computer. I felt horribly depressed and alone, like no one would understand my motivations, and like I will never find what I’m really looking for, because I don’t know what it is.
I was explaining part of how I was feeling to Brooke: that I play to win, and that on the AMRN that means I have to be on top of mecha and ship stats, and my eyes just glaze over whenever I see either of those, so it isn’t particularly fun to try to win…it feels like work. She said something interesting to me then.
I think you need to play something, and not win at it no matter how hard you try, and realize that it can still be fun, no matter who wins….:-)
Does Zuma count? ;P
Seriously, I don’t know. If I go into the AMRN planning on not winning, then I shouldn’t be a ship captain, right? Because a ship captain should try her damnedest to do her job well. But I could be a reluctant second lieutenant, like Mick Allen. I had a lot of fun with him without worrying too much about game mechanics. He followed a simple rule: stay with your wingman/team. That was pretty much it.
But I don’t really want to play Mick, I don’t think. :P Right now, I feel tired of all of my characters.
Vertigo suggested that I just make a brand new second lieutenant character, but I’m not sure if I would go for that either. I guess it’s just anathema to me to try to play a character who isn’t good at his/her job. Unless I’m actively trying to be the worst–in which case I would need to know how to be the best, for contrast!
I’m a perfectionist and a control freak. When I make my characters do something, I want to know what their chances of winning are, how good they are at the thing, what the possible variables are, etc. I don’t know those things when I play on the AMRN. I feel like I’m shooting in the dark. I’ve had characters succeed when I thought they should fail, and fail when I thought they should succeed. It makes me feel like I’m just groping around, like there’s no certainty to anything I do.
Sam’s posts are always so rich with detail, explaining the science behind why his actions work. I could never be that detailed, not even if I studied mecha like a madwoman. It’s like when I was trying to be an aerospace engineer. The stuff’s neat to look at, but I do not want to study it!
Why don’t I want to study it? Is it really because I don’t like it? Do I avoid it because it’s hard? This is the big question for me, but if it’s the latter it must be far more subtle than that. There must be something ingrained in my personality that dislikes anything I perceive to be difficult. Is that what it is?
I’ve risen to challenges before, haven’t I? When I really wanted to do something? Like learn how to build a website?
I just feel like there’s something wrong with me. Everyone else is having so much fun. I want to join in and have fun with them. I was there, I was trying. But I wasn’t having fun. The future stretched out bleak and tiresome before me.
So I turned around, and left all my AMRN friends behind me. And now that I’m irrelevant again, I don’t even know if I can stand to hang out in the IRC channel.
That’s what really hurts the most.