Saturday 6 September 2003

Pic of the day: Magnus has reached a new level of understanding! Rejoice! (Screenshot from Master of Magic, as is good and proper.)

Pointless opportunities

True, this example is about computer games, but I think you can easily imagine other parts of life where it would fit right in.

I've been playing Master of Magic lately, as can hardly have escaped the regular reader. I have these fads, usually lasting 1-2 weeks, where I want to play this game night and day. Building a magic empire is a rather absorbing task, so it is not something you usually store in your head and come back a month later. Therefore, while the fad lasts, I play the game almost exclusively, while it is still fresh in my mind.

Now it was Saturday, and as I checked in on the Camelot Herald web site. There was a new Friday Grab Bag as usual. There was also the server roster on the right side showing less than 300 players on Gaheris, the cooperative server where my main characters are. That's just too good an opportunity to pass up, I thought, and so I logged on. True enough, there was plenty of room. My young Enchanter finished his level, and then some people needed a tank for the diamond loop, so I logged on Itlandsen the Paladin and helped out the group (mostly young 40es) for a few hours.

The problem was, it wasn't what I wanted to do. I had intended for my computer gaming time to be spent on MoM this weekend, not role-playing games. I hope the guys in my group enjoyed the hours we spent kicking high-level monster butt, because I didn't really. Despite my cheerful slogans in battle ("Eat hot liposuction!", "Wanna buy insurance now?" and others) my heart wasn't in it. And it's not like I could blame anyone else either.

Sometimes, I guess, an opportunity is not really an opportunity. I have noticed in the past that it can be a temptation instead, and it can be hard to tell the two apart. But I guess sometimes it is just a possibility. Kinda like people who go out and buy stuff they don't need because it is so cheap. That's pretty much exactly what I did, only I paid with time instead of money. You can probably do the same with love too, but I hope we shall never find out.