Futabotting

Today on League.

I decided I’m going to start a new series of writings called The Shrink Couch. Personally, I don’t know anything about the actual disciplines of psychology and physiology other than that they are actually helpful when practiced by knowledgeable professionals.

This will probably not be helpful at all. At best, I’ll be able to relate the inner machinations of my brain to others.

The Shrink Couch is likely going to be about being mad. I would venture to say that the bulk of emotions felt during the gaming experience are ones of violent rage. Here, I want to deconstruct what’s going on in my head and figure out why I’m angry, but there will be times when apathy, fear and other emotions are showcased.

However, it is important that you, the reader, keep in mind that things written here are not criticisms of the game itself, or rather, I am not saying that this game is bad because of the emotions that come from it. You, however, may feel free to like/dislike games based off of what you extrapolate from a reading. Every game has the potential to become a spotlight on The Shrink Couch, and most of the games I am willing to sit down with and talk about are good enough to keep me going back to them even after I experience a great number of frustrations with them.

In any case, let’s sit down.

League of Legends just drove me up the wall. I just lost a game and it was primarily the fault of other people. I’m not being delusional about it. I did what I could to heal the team as Soraka and, generally speaking, didn’t miss a lot. The primary cause of our loss was due to a Sion that rarely committed to a team fight and a Wukong who absolutely loved to drain his life-bar with 4-5 onlookers by himself. Previous to the team-fight phase, my friend and I obliterated our lane, netting three kills, losing none and had significantly higher minion kills. Our other lanes were doing well too. Very few deaths overall, several failed ganks by the opposing jungler. The game was looking like a perfect 20-minute surrender situation.

And then everything exploded: our towers, our team, dragon, baron. Everything. By late-game, we suddenly realized that Wukong liked going out on his own and Sion, despite his ability to obliterate his opposition, flaked at every possible opportunity. The experience baffled me, then simply made me not want to play after we struggled against super minions. At the end, however, we had the potential to win teamfights, which made me feel more irritated.

So the question is, what thoughts, rational or irrational, change me from being enthused about League of Legends to absolutely hating it after a 45-minute skirmish? As far as entertainment is concerned, League of Legends transitions from one side of the positive spectrum to the last thing I want to play in the immediate future. That’s a large bridge to cross emotionally.

I don’t like losing. Losing feels bad because it is the exact opposite of what you’re trying to achieve in a game. By mere virtue of being the antithesis of the goal, emotions well up and boil like blood in a kettle. You invest work into reaching a goal and despite those efforts, nothing comes of it. The more tangible losses follow with your score. One loss. Less IP. I want IP. I want runes and champions. No surprises there.

The emotions regarding my teammates are a little more complex. I think inside of my head, there’s an unspoken set of rules about League of Legends pertaining to common sense. Whenever a teammate exhibits an extraordinary lack of basic decision-making ability, the terrible manticore inside of my consciousness emerges. The question is, should that particular standard be there in the first place? Is it unreasonable for me to expect others in my team to play at a subjective level of competence, or am I just being a jerk about losing?

I’m not entirely sure, to be honest. On one hand, yes, League of Legends is a team game and trust, which is what is lost when players perform poorly, is essential for most victories. Therefore, the anger that stems from the absence of trust due to incompetence is a reasonable one. On the other hand, is it functional to get angry in the first place? Does anger provide anything useful to the team environment? I ask myself these questions because overall behavior goes beyond justification. Just because something is predictable does not necessarily make it right. At this point, all I know is that this reaction makes sense, but it isn’t necessarily a good one to have.

This particular inability to settle on whether being mad is right or wrong contribues to a sense of despondency. Overall, League of Legends provokes negative feelings that are difficult to overcome.

Back to the idea about losing being a tangible failure to reach your goal, there’s a certain sense of fear that comes with it. League of Legends is fairly good at highlighting this simple reality about the game itself, “No matter how good you are as an individual, there is the potential to lose.” To some degree, this translates to, “No matter how much I play or how well I play, there is always risk of losing involved with other players.” It cycles into my natural fear of making the same mistake as well as itches my desire to avoid futility as a whole.

This is a thought that, frankly, was buried deep in the back of my head. I didn’t stumble upon this particular motivation until much later. I, like many others, do not what to be a part of the frustrating side of the community. At this point, I realize how easy it is to slide into that negative, acidic attitude. This thought helps me tear myself away from the next game and isolate myself elsewhere. The fear, or rather, the maturity to understand that I will likely ruin another game out of spite makes it uncomfortable for me to play another game.

In any case, I come out of this relieved, knowing that I puzzled a small subsection of my frustrations. I still want to play League, but my internet, as if to tell me to chill out, is flaking like bad dandruff.

Bluh.