On Turkey Day families all across America sat down to enjoy good food and each other’s company. I on the other hand had to work, so I enjoyed a Double Whopper with cheese with Beefcat, my feline roommate. It’s got all the hormones, cholesterol and MSG I need to join the army of people who live with type 2 diabetes. In lieu of spending time with my family, which usually results in shouting, crying and a mean hangover, I spent my time with my real family: the Xbox Live gaming community.
Don’t get me wrong; I love the people with whom I share genetic make-up, but I’m not keen on experiencing the soap opera-like extravaganza unfold at my dinner table. Unfortunately, there is are gamers on Xbox live that I despise as much as my drunk uncle that repeatedly tells stories that end with “I didn’t know she was only 14, but the cops didn’t care.”
The Angry Mother
We’ve all been there. Red-faced cursing a blue streak at some rat bastard 7-year-old that can’t read but has strung together more head shots than FBI agents in Waco (too soon?). Midway through describing the vulgar sex acts you performed on his whore of a mother, who happens to get on the microphone? His whore of a mother and she is a pissed. She’s taken time away from trying to get the overtly pornographic works of William Shakespeare banned from the public library and preparing organic vegan cuisine for her walking cock stain of a kid to give you an earful for corrupting her socially maladjusted child. She starts to scold you and getting a word in is impossible. Her little angel duped her into thinking the Left For Dead 2 was as wholesome as Kingdom Hearts and can’t fathom her little darling dipping his virtual nuts into your virtual mouth in Halo. After her tirade she will once again return to neglecting her child by spending all of her time crusading to save him.
Negative Nancy
Your team is losing, miserably. Instead of keeping a “glass is half-full” attitude, the Negative Nancy throws everyone under the bus. It’s not the short bus either, it’s a Greyhound. Nancy starts off buy ignoring his -25 kill death spread and insults the best efforts of the team. Positivity is absent as Nancy informs you that not only do you suck, but your mother, grandmother, girlfriend, religious prophet, sports team and value system all suck.
After the diatribe about how everything you know and love sucks, Nancy then claims one of two things: A. The other team is obviously cheating, a logical response in line with the poor sportsmanship and reckless disregard for sanity Nancy has already demonstrated. Or B. That you are kill stealing, which would obviously explain the 67 deaths in the first two minutes of the game. Luckily, with the creation of random team generation, there is always hope Nancy will find a way to another team or a way to drown a full bottle of horse tranquilizers with an equally full bottle of bourbon.
Chatty Kathy
You often overhear conversations while riding mass transit. If you’re like me, you like to listen in and try to find out interesting things. I relish the opportunity to hear about a stranger’s relationship problems, hatred for his or her boss or a weekend hook up. My gaming time is unlike riding the city bus. I may be in my underwear, there are fewer homeless people and I don’t want to hear anyone’s cellphone conversation. But there is always that guy. He seems oblivious to the fact that his mic is on and is stricken deaf except to the phone call because he cannot seem to hear the shouting for him to mute it. Worst of all, it’s never something I want to hear such as “every time my dog humps my leg, I pitch a tent,” or possibly the location of a large sum of drug money that is easily accessible and not well guarded. Instead you get to hear him hit on a more than likely underage girl. I say underage because only a girl barely into puberty would buy into the lame ass game Kathy is spinning. It’s like driving, cell phone users piss everyone off.
Dad of the Year
Positive communication; it wins games and passes along valuable information to your teammates in regards to the location of the enemy and developing general strategy. Then you hear it. It is adorable, but it’s like booze the morning after a late night bender, you don’t want it. There is cooing and giggling from both the infant and the irresponsible parent exposing his kid to the vulgar underbelly of the online gaming community.
He’s probably drunk. I don’t care how cute your kid is, a toddler saying “hi” over and over is not that funny. But I will give dad props, he’s making a half-hearted attempt at bonding with his kid. The kid will possibly remember this moment its entire life, especially when the child support checks stop coming and dad uses him or her to impress his new white trash girlfriend.
The more I think about it, the more I realized that my Xbox Live family is similar to my real family. Although there are outliers that I hate immensely (and it’s not this pussy “I hate green beans” hate, but the more intense “I hate genocide and mouth breathers” hate), I like my time with them. This is, oddly, how I feel about my own family, and although I was not home with them for the reenactment of our favorite Jenny Jones episodes (complete with interpretive dance), I had my online gaming community to be a closely dysfunctional substitute.
