Competitive Gaming and Me

Why do you play video games?

For me, they’re something I grew up with. Some of my earliest memories involve my family sitting around the TV and taking turns playing games for the NES. It was great to win, but it was all about having fun and playing together.

I’ve taken part in competitions and tournaments before. That’s another early memory. There used to be these pop up competitions that recruited children out of malls to compete on different console’s games around a specific brand. I remember my brother and I doing very well playing all these Disney games on the NES. The promoters tried to convince my brother that he wanted to enter the competition, but he wasn’t interested. In the time it took those adults to realize he wasn’t budging, I had already beaten TailSpin; that would make me the first kid to beat that game at that location. My brother said no, so they didn’t even try asking me.

I have very fond memories of competing in rhythm game tournaments for fun. Dance Dance Revolution was my specialty. I could do very well on Maniac/Heavy mode, but that wasn’t as fun as playing Trick/Standard mode and enjoying the music. I would compete in the easier category for high score or enter on Double (where you played on both game mats instead of just one) or even Freestyle (an actual performance category where you were scored on your dancing/performance while passing the stage). My goal was to have fun with other people who also liked the game.

What’s happened to me again and again in competitive gaming is burnout. I’m not cutout for a win at all costs mentality. What you see on Twitch or a convention is not the whole story. You don’t see me have a day-long panic attack as I advance in a tournament and go hide somewhere between matches to meditate, breathe, and get away from that energy. I can put on a show for the cameras and walk away feeling like they have drained me of all my life force.

It doesn’t matter what kind of game it is. Once I’m put in that competitive environment, it’s game over. I can get to the top of the leaderboards with a little practice on games as varied as Crypt of the NecroDancer, Hearthstone, and Dead by Daylight; I just shut down and lose interest in the game when I do.

There are layers happening here. For one, I put an immense amount of pressure on myself to get everything as right as I can. That’s a combination of my OCD (if it’s not perfect, you’ve ruined everything, and here’s why…) and being raised a gifted child through the public school system (I see you didn’t read more books than anyone else this semester: are you having family problems? What went wrong?). I grew up with internal and external forces telling me nothing short of perfection was good enough, and any new interest had to be justified with skill and accomplishment. If I’m not the best at the game, then I’m wasting time that could be spent on something I’m actually good at.

Another element is the other competitors. People are intense at competitions. I don’t do well with that energy. I understand that they’re stressed and saying things they normally wouldn’t in the moment; that doesn’t mean I handle it well. I can’t play video games with voice chat anymore because if one person says the wrong thing to me, I shut down. Again, I know how to put on a show and take an interview before or after to hype up my performance or dissect what went wrong, but I also know that if I say “yeah, being called a [slur] or told to [unalive] myself made me not even try anymore” that I’m going to be targeted for being weak or not really a gamer. Just look at any video I make talking about toxic gamer culture for proof.

Yesterday, I chose to participate in a gaming tournament for the first time in years. One of my favorite streamers hosted a community tournament for Dead by Daylight. This was open to any gamer of any experience level. You chose if you wanted to play survivor, killer, or both. Everyone got to play two games each (on each role if they chose to) and the winners had the highest score in the game.

The tournament was not a bad experience. The chat and host are so supportive and kind to everyone that I knew I would feel safe participating. Still, those flight or freeze instincts kicked in and my anxiety was far higher than it should’ve been. I had a game plan going in knowing it was a tournament for fun and still was terrified that someone was going to wreck my day.

Dead by Daylight has a variety of killers with different powers. Admittedly, some are more competitive than others. I do just fine playing the killers I want to play and feel confident handling quite a few that are not considered super competitive in tournament play: Demogorgon, Pig, Plague, Trapper, and Hag. I don’t play the game enough to be at that elite level where even a less effective killer can make a good tournament run, and that’s okay. I play the game for fun.

I played two rounds of Demogorgon with two very different builds and play styles. I have five builds I’m comfortable swapping in and out for Demogorgon that all function in different ways. The only constants are my add-ons (Mew’s Guts for an extra portal/Shred Recovery and Thorny Vines for tracking/slowing down survivors). I have builds that reward keeping people injured and builds that punish survivors for doing objectives. I have builds that rely on chance and builds that speed up Demogorgon as the game progresses.

The thing with tournaments is what’s fun for me is rarely fun for other competitors. I put on a show for the crowd. I’ll use the powers. I’ll go for the harder plays. I’ll play the characters people think aren’t as good and either showcase what they do well or exceed expectations. There’s a reason I’m a Jigglypuff main in every Super Smash Brothers game.

Other players play to win. That’s fun for them. They want to take every opportunity to earn points and come out on top. Meanwhile, I’m happy to aim for my own objectives that maintain my standing or move me up the ranks.

For Dead by Daylight, if I hook everyone at least once and get to use my powers, I feel good about the game. I obviously feel better if I 4K and defeat everyone, but that’s a nice bonus for me. I can play in a way to make that happen more often than not, but then I’m more focused on winning than having fun. I know I don’t enjoy going up against a killer that plays like that, so I choose not to.

Part of the joy of games for me is learning how a game works. I love finding weird little strategies that work well. If you’ve never experienced the joy of beating a Pokemon game with a team comprising six variants of the same Pokemon, what are you waiting for? I don’t mean different Eeveelutions, either; I mean a team of six Jigglypuff or six Mimikyu with different stats, attacks, and items just for the fun of it. That kind of strategy won’t last long in a competitive setting, but neither will I. Once it’s not fun, I shut down.

I’m not sure when I’ll enter a tournament again. I know that I need to be in the mindset to handle that kind of environment. I have to feel like I’m safe in the structure of the organizer’s rules and community. And I have to have an angle where I can have fun and still play well by my standards.