Everything’s Alright

It would be an understatement to say that I’ve been addicted to video games for the past few months. I bought an Xbox One back in June to play through Batman: Arkham Knight (which I beat 100%, including all that pesky nonsense with The Riddler (which my phone wants to auto-correct to “The Toddler”)).

My game-playing died down a bit until Halo 5 came out in October but since then my gaming has become a problem. I’ve had to set guidelines for how much I let myself play a day. I’ve had to tell myself it’s not worth staying up until 3:00 am playing online multiplayer.

It’s the online modes that bring out the worst in me. I get bored with single player modes after a while, I can only handle so much story a day. I never get sick of killing enemy players. Never.

Of course, with killing other players comes being killed by other players. With winning comes losing. There are players who don’t know what they’re doing and players who are too good and take the fun out of it. It gets frustrating and sometimes I turn into the 12-year-old I expect there to be on the other side of the TV. I’ll swear, shout, and hit the arms of my chair. Then, for Christmas, I got Star Wars: Battlefront.

I love Battlefront. In multiplayer mode, teams take turns playing as either the Rebels or the Empire trying to take each other out. Players spend most of their time as rank-and-file members of their respective militaries. By using special pickups, players can become “hero” characters like Han Solo or Darth Vader.

The other day I was playing Battlefront as Princess Leia and, after a good amount of time, was finally taken out by the enemy. In Halo, I might have been upset. In Battlefront, I said, “I was just Princess Leia, how cool.” Another time, I was a Stormtrooper who got killed by Luke Skywalker. Of course I was! That’s what Luke Skywalker does! How could I be mad?