Part 1: A Two-Part Series

Well, that took all of three days into the year to miss my first "daily deadline." But you know what, that's OK. I decided after I realized that I'd missed it that I would just have to write twice today to catch up, so this here is my first of a two part series called, "A Two-Part Series."

I love games. I'm not sure if I've talked about this yet and I'm not about to scan down the page and read through what I've already written to check, but I'll say it again: I love games. Any game. You could make one up right now and, odds are, I'll want to play it.

I've often tried to figure out exactly what it is that makes me so addicted, and I've narrowed it down to three things: entertainment, competition, and achievement. This is why I particular enjoy games online where I can compete with others, particularly my friends, and games where I can play for an extended period of time without having to restart or reload or beat it too quickly. Facebook, kongregate.com, the XBOX 360, they're all constant distractions and attractors haunting my world and calling my name. Whenever someone beats me? I have to play again... immediately... and do everything that I can to prove that I'm the best.

Entertainment is where my true passion lies. It's why I do the vast majority of what I do: I like to both entertain myself, but more importantly, entertain others. And when they're happy? I'm happy. I've always got my mind running with schemes and games to try on others to see what works.

As far as competition goes... I'm not sure what it is that drives me to want to beat other people. I think part of it is just wanting to be a part of something, to know that I'm at the very least involved, and at the very best, superior at something. Growing up I always felt that I was good at several different things; I've always prided myself on being diverse and competent at most anything I apply myself at. However, I never fully believed that I was the best at anything. I remember participating in an art competition where we basically had to draw whatever we want to on a certain size piece of paper, an 11"x17" if I remember correctly. I drew a picture of our school cafeteria. That's probably because that was the only free time I had in the 3 grade to draw without getting into some kind of trouble. On the back of the picture, I implored whomever would be judging the competition to keep in mind that I had "never won anything before," so that, if they were on the fence about whether or not my finely crafted Crayola creation was championship material or not? They would have a little extra justification to make their decision.

That probably also ties into my desire for achievement. One of my favorite aspects of playing Call of Duty online is "leveling up" every once and a while or competing challenges as you play against friends and strangers alike. It shows that I'm getting better. It gives me new weapons and "perks" to work with to further accelerate my achievements. It's addictive to say the least. You can probably guess where I was last night when I was supposed to be writing... Welcome to my world!

All of this explains why I played most every sport available in high school, why I hold the high score in nearly every facebook game that I'm privy to, why I spend at least a little time every night (if possible) hunting down strangers in the back alleys of a Kerbleckistan drug house or a smoking missile silo, my undying love for laser tag, and why I make up random games to play in my head as the day goes along.

But does it satisfy me? That, my friends... might be part two. I haven't decided yet. Stay tuned.