The title of this post comes from a line from a very funny and accurate comic strip over at The Oatmeal that we quote often around here. Any romantically attached adult who delves into the online multiplayer game world should be able to relate.
I seem to be nearing the end of yet another flirtation with the world of EVE Online. I’ve had these accounts going now for almost three years, and each cycle seems to be a bit shorter than the last: at first I played for about a year before hanging it up and letting the account go inactive, now I’m down to about three weeks. Basically, I fire up my exploration Anathema for a null sec adventure when I’m not distracted by anything else – and there’s always some other game ready to capture my attention. XCOM. Civilization. Fallout Shelter. Fallout 4.
And the thing is, I really want to love EVE Online, the way I do love Fallout. So what’s the deal? I’m starting to suspect that it’s an adulting thing.
At first glance, you’d think EVE would hit all my buttons, and for the most part it does. The game’s damned beautiful. Rich background lore. Sparkling spaceships and fluid play mechanics. Complex in all the right places, simple in all the right places.
I’m sure part of the issue is that, at heart, I’m not much of a social gamer. I’m not really much of a social person. And while I absolutely love the opportunity to spend quality time with my wife, brother or close friends killing zombies in Left 4 Dead, usually the experience of doing the same with StonerDude420 on Steam doesn’t level up to quite the same enjoyment plane. But I’m thinking it’s more than just that.
I’d already been thinking about this a while before I read an article this morning over at Cracked, entitled “5 Features Every Video Game Should Have If You’re Married”. It’s a wonderful little manifesto outlining the real life challenges of being a married gamer who wants to stay a married gamer.
A quote from one of the authors, Lisa Olsen:
“The only way to make a relationship with a gamer work is if your partner is willing to determine a point where they will stop for the evening to spend quality time with you. And it helps if they play games that facilitate that. To give credit where credit is due, my husband does a great job of having a set time every night that he is ready to come downstairs. And I in turn am flexible about it. If he’s in the middle of a boss fight, he can have a few more minutes if needed. As long as he takes that bosses’ death as a clue that it’s time to give it up for the night.”
That right there is one of our top rules. When the other one says that it’s time to hang it up in favor of some Married Time, that’s it. Veto rights, hang it up, DONE. Preferably on a voluntary basis before the veto becomes necessary. And it’s a damned good rule, one that dovetails nicely with another rule:
Never get into a video game that is more demanding than your spouse.
Because, you know, sometimes you have to drop the game like a hot rock to clean up cat puke, or fetch a few Advil, or make/eat dinner, or simply pay attention when your wife is talking to you. And some games – and EVE Online is one of them – kinda demand a priority that supersedes those seemingly mundane distractions. They want your full attention.
Babe, the dog’s whining at the door. Could you let her out?
Let the dog out? BAH! What careth I for the momentary concerns of the house canine, when the moment of BATTLE arrives! The fleet needs me as we defend our honor in the farflung Stacmon solar system!
No, seriously: let the dog out. Please.
Umm.. BUT..
Dog. Out.
And yes, you realize that the dog’s full bladder is a significantly more important priority than is pushing a bunch of colored electrons on a screen. So you get up, let the dog out, come back, and maybe you can slide back into the game and maybe you can’t.
EVE Online isn’t really a check-in-check-out kind of game.
And the thing is, my wife isn’t very demanding at all. I’ve got a great wife. But that does mean that the “no video game more demanding than spouse” rule, for me, kinda applies to any game that I can’t easily pause and put down on a moment’s notice, which definitely includes EVE Online.
Complaining that your wife cuts into your video game action is a little like complaining that real life sex is interfering with your porn watching, when that was sort of the main point of getting married. What I’m complaining about is that many of the best games out there these days aren’t designed with the married adult in mind.
Video gaming as a married adult is a completely different prospect than doing the same as a single younger adult, and these MMO-type games are dominated by people who have all the time in the world and no real world adult obligations. Forum pissing matches over KDRs, endless debates over perfect loadouts and that guy on Youtube who TOTALLY figured out the ONLY way to play that level, guys with no life who have nothing better to do than camp for twelve hours and wait for a perfect griefing opportunity.
They stink of Mountain Dew and Ritalin, sir!
As Aristotle once said, fuck that shit sideways. So I appear to be on my way out of EVE Online again. Does that mean that, ultimately, it’s a life of Angry Birds for me?
Nah. I still enjoy big, complicated, messy games that I can really dive hard into. I just need games that are designed with some basic awareness that gamers aren’t all 15-year-old boys on summer break or unemployed stoners with nothing better to do. And I just don’t know anymore that EVE Online falls into that category, at least for me, at least until CCP Games gets around to installing that “Pause For Real Life Shit” button that I just don’t foresee happening.
I’m probably asking for too much, and I know it. But I’m sorry, EVE Online. You have gorgeous graphics and solid gameplay, but the resolution on real life is still better.
Obligatory South Park clip:
Happy gaming, all.