Eight words. That’s all it takes to strike fear and despair into the hearts of parents around the world. Those eight words puncture relationships right at the heart. Destroying even entire lives with a single utterance. Those words of course being:
“I’m going to go play World of Warcraft!”
The beast that calls itself an online role-playing game has it’s teeth sunk deep into our society. Reaching a level of popularity and massive player output that lends itself to the wet-dreams of thousands of video game designers, WoW has lived up to it’s name. Wow. Just… wow.
Think WoW is just for losers? It is. However, occasionally losers do something right. Take the case of Stephen Gillett the CIO of Starbucks. It has recently come up that the fast-rising, MBA-bearing business man has spent a lot of time as a successful guild leader in World Of Warcraft. And one of his former bosses believes it has played a part in his rise in power.
He has claimed that being a guild leader requires “a high degree of influence…you have to be able to influence and persuade people–not order them to do things. Ordering people in most of these guilds doesn’t get you far.” That’s right! The face of tomorrow’s leaders will soon resemble THIS:
That’s some serious shit, ain’t it? And how does one gain this power? How do you gain this “high degree of influence”? Well, how else do you influence nerds? The same way you lead any group. You have to be something special. Someone they could look up to. You have to have things that they dream of. You have to acquire things that they only wish they could have.
So, that probably means this guy has seen boobs that weren’t downloaded. Hell, he may have even TOUCHED THEM!
“That’s right, lowly peons…”
(Seriously, that’s how a lot of them talk…)
“…I have gone into the Cave of The Blonde Amazoness with the Tramp-Stamp of Destiny and have come out, having cast my Seed Of Mighty Quick Coming upon her heaving bosom! I have achieved more than you could ever dream. I shall now lead you into the great unknown… WHAT MOM?! I’M TRYING TO PLAY WORLD OF WARCRAFT, I’LL TAKE THE LAUNDRY UPSTAIRS LATER, GOD!”
This guy continues with his praise of high-powered WoW players, saying they “conduct extensive after-action reviews of their performances as well as that of the leader”.
Which, as far as I can gather, means after they slay imaginary monsters, they sit around and talk about it.
“Did you see me slash that ogre to pieces! I was so bad-ass!”
No, no you are not. You hit Shift-K and clicked the left mouse button until your fingertips bled. That is not bad ass.
“I devised a strategy using my high intellect stat and my upgraded magical armor to infiltrate the dragon’s nest and cut out it’s heart! And I did it all while downloading porn in another window!”
A good business leader knows how to conduct performance reviews on his subordinates as well:
“Hey, Larry, the hell were you thinking, using Fire magic on a Flaming Salamandra?! They absorb fire, you idiot!”
“Hey, Jim… I heard your dad’s an alcohol and thinks you’re queer.”
“…that was low, Larry…”
And once more, this guy continues his praise of WoW players, saying they “customize their own game interfaces to offer statistics and rate performance in areas they consider critical to their strategy”.
Areas that are critical to their strategy? Such as? Rationing out their Doritos and Mountain Dew to last the entire campaign? Making sure their black-out curtains are tightly pulled over their window so the natural light doesn’t cause a glare on the computer screen? Those kinds of critical strategic areas?
This Gillett guy has an entire blog related to linking power in WoW to power in the real world of business. I’m sure ultimately he has a point, but it’s just so fucking weird. Taking something like playing video games to the business world. Can this kind of thing work for other aspects of life as well? I do believe I’ll give it a shot.
So, now that the introduction is out of the way, I’d like to provide you with an exert from my latest life strategy guide:
The Counter Culture Clown’s Guide On How To Apply Video Game Smarts To The Real World!
We’ll look at one special area of your life. I refer to them as “levels”.
Level One: Love And Relationships
Scenario 1: You’re at a club. Horribly shitty dance music is being vaulted at you from all sides. To the left, you see a white guy trying to dance like a black guy. He just tried to pull off “The Sprinkler”. He is clearly a total fucker. However, you can’t be distracted by that, because to your right, at the bar, is a beautiful blonde. Sitting all by herself. You have to make your way over to her before someone else does.
How To Play It: Let’s use our Frogger skills to evade the oncoming traffic of drunk sorority girls and douchey macho-men wearing too much Axe body spray. Hop across the dance floor without getting plowed into by the inevitable fist fight that will break out. I say inevitably, because men are idiots and when confronted with conflict, they like to implement their Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out skills and repeatedly smash the problem in the face. Once you get around that, you have reached the princess, and it’s time to woo her.
Scenario 2: Alright, hotshot, you’re at the bar. You’ve taken your seat next to the beautiful vixen, and it’s time to work your magic. What do you say?
How To Play It: Let’s use our skills from Text-Based adventure games. Those shitty “games” that simply TELL YOU about cool things happening with plain and boring text, and you just type in what you hope is the correct solution. This helps you with your “bull-shitting” and “saying the exact right thing” skills. You have to find the exact correct combination of words to type in, or else you’ll be maimed to death by mutants or something. By the way, if you type in “Hey babe…” the game will immediately end for you. That command is not recognized! “Hey babe…” is not what the woman hears. What she hears is: “I am an immense tool”. However, if you’re tactful in what you say, you may gain her interest. Which leads us to…
Scenario 3: You’ve won the first round! You’re now back at her place, and things are heating up. She wants to, how can I put it tastefully, fuck you until your legs are less useful than FDR’s. Sex is a whole different game in and of itself. It requires a lot of video game skills to pull it off well.
How To Play It: First off, you need to know what goes where. Imagine you’re playing a big game of Bed-Tetris. Your penis is one of those four by one long pieces, and her vagina is a nice, straight four by one gap waiting to be locked into. If you fuck up and accidental place it in the wrong spot, you really fuck up the game for good.
Then, of course, you have to make sure she’s enjoying it. This requires you to locate a special spot on her body. The “G-Spot”. What video game skills do you implement here? Why, you have to use your boss-fighting abilities! Every good gamer knows that in order to defeat a boss, you have to find it’s weak point and exploit it. Just as you must plunge your mighty blade into the eye of the cyclops, or the big glowing orb-y thingy on the back of the beast to kill it, you must locate the g-spot. If you’re good at it, you can get the boss fight done nice and quick, and score bonus points for a quick kill.
Congratulations, you’ve successfully engaged in sexual intercourse with a willing woman. And you did it without having to enter the World of Whorecraft. You’re a real man among men! But now she’s into you…
Scenario 4: The relationship stage has begun. Either because you two actually get along sober, or because you accidentally leveled up inside her and now she’s got a mini-boss in her dungeon. Either way, it’s time to get serious!
How To Play It: The game “Sim City” gives you the ability to manage and create your own city. You choose how to place buildings and districts, and manage all the shit to make your city flourish. It’s an overwealming game at first, because none of it makes any sense. And like Sim City, making a successful relationship out of nothing is really fucking hard. And not really all that fun.
At the start, you have to lay down the foundation. You don’t have much substance yet, just a few tools to start out with. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you just end up laying out lengths of road that lead to nowhere, and you feel like a total ‘tard.
Once you get things rolling, you’ll notice little windows popping up constantly. Demands from the townsfolk:
“The people want a school”.
“Fuck you, I can’t afford a school, I spent all the money on a sports stadium.”
“The people need a fire department.”
“Naw, I’m sure they’ll be… oh shit, the entire town’s on fire…”
“You never take the people dancing!”
“What?! I took you dancing… once…”
But alas, you eventually end up married. The town is fully built, and now all you can do is pray the major natural disaster known as “Divorce” doesn’t come and destroy everything. Because if it does, you’ll notice that half your town is suddenly the property of another mayor…
—
Ultimately, life is not a game. There is no “restart”. There are no “extra lives”. There are no cheat codes in life. You can’t pull off the Konami Code to get rid of your prostate cancer or make your 15 year old daughter NOT date that douchebag with the spikey green mohawk.
You can simply use some of the skills you learn to solve problems. However, not EVERY skill you learn is a good one to use. Do not, under any circumstances, attempt to pull off a Ryu from Street Fighter-style Hadouken attack when you’re in an actual street fight. No matter how many times you try, you cannot fire a giant ball of energy from your palms. Believe me, I’ve tried…
However, if people could do that, it would make those UFC cage matches really fun to watch.
Anyway, Mr. Gillett is living proof that not all video gamers are total useless bottles of Loserade. So, consider this article about this one man a major “Fuck You” to all those people that think video games are stupid.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I accidentally killed a hooker…
Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A START!
…shit, she’s still there. Um… does anyone have a shovel I can borrow?
Game Over
