I was thinking of paradigms, and I realized, in Dodge-ball (at least the version I used to play) is a team sport where every man is for himself. Until you're in jail, then you depend entirely on the-limited-skills of your playground playmates.

To understand this, you have to understand my local version of dodge-ball. You dodge balls. If they bounce and connect, you aren't out. If you catch it, the thrower is out. If you are out, you go to jail. Once in jail, you stand in the back of a long row of jail-mates. There is one jail line for each of the two dodge-ball teams, playing on a rectangle painted in the pavement with a vertical line dividing it. If you step over the line you are out. Anyway, back to the jail lines. When one of your teammates catches a ball, the person first in line gets to go back into the game. Also, the number of dodge-balls in the game is limited to four. However, many late-comers bring their own balls, so the number often rises.

The point is, when you are on the field, you do not relie on your teammates at all. They are immature fifth-graders. They will not pass the ball to you. The only help you will get from them is diving behind them to evade an incoming red projectile.

Then, you are hit. Someone catches your thrown ball. After waiting in jail until you are next to be sprung, you can't stop yelling at every teammate that should of caught the ball. You scream, "I could have caught that!" Your nearby jailbirds, all equally anxious to be released, agree yelling phrases such as, "My Grandma could have got that!" "My third-grade sister could have got that!" "You couldn't hit a fly!" The fly comment never made sense to me. Do you realize how hard it is to hit a fly using a red ball larger than your head with only fifth grade strength and reflexes? I couldn't.

The point is, until your in trouble, in many situations, team mates are either unnecessary or unhelpful. The point of this post? Learn not to get in trouble, and don't depend on other people to help you out of a tricky situation unless necessary. Self-reliance is very necessary. Especially in cooperative online video games.

Nintendo needs to get things straight about gamers...

Not all gamers are casual gamers. In fact, before the Wii and Touch Generation games, most gamers enjoyed Gory Shooteverybody: Black Strike Eagle II and The Garlaxiaism Chronicles: The Life-Force King more than Let's Raise Ponies: Shetland Expansion(names have been changed). Casual games were for small children and retirement home Bingo Night parties. Now let me set today's scene; Tommy is going over to Jim's house.

Tommy: Hi, Jim

Jim: Hey Tommy.

Tommy: What new games do you have?!?

Jim: Well, let's see: CounterBlackOps III, Destroy all Lifeforms II, the remake of Angel JumpJump (man, this one's hard.) Oh! and Ukelele Achooie for my older system.

Tommy: Older system? You mean the one that has *gulp* buttons?

Jim: What's wrong with that?

Tommy: Nothing, cept for I don't like using my finger, but whatever. Al those games are too deep, nvolving, long and exciting for me. Got any Wii InShape?

Jim: No.

Tommy: Oh. What about Chefing Mother? Or Wii TennisBoxingGolfBowlingBaseballPlayForFun?

Jim No, and...What?!?

Tommy: Not even Polka Group?

Jim: Sorry...

Tommy: I'm leaving. Forever.

Jim: Bye! *turns and boots up Angel JumpJump*

30 Years later..

Jim is sitting in his executive office in the 67 floor of the Jimtendo building.He's wearing a suit that costs almost as much as his hairstyle. Tommy walks in, wearing a tan coverall with his name embroidered on the breast pocket. Tommy moves toward the solid platinum trash can.

Jim: You must be the new janitor...

Tommy: Sorry, but I'm only a temp.

Jim: A temporary janitor! They have those?

Tommy, under his breath: When you fail Sanitation Services School...

Jim: What?

Tommy: Nothing.

Jim: Say, you look kind of familiar. Have we met before?

Tommy: No. Anyway, be seeing you.

Jim: Wait just a minute, you didn't think you could steal my solid platinum trash can, could you?!?

Tommy, removing the trash can from his pants: No sir. Sorry.

Jim: Oh well. Here. Have a parting gift. *Hands him Wii ShootEmUp: Brown Ops Squad VI* Here have a copy of the worlds best selling, best reveiwed game ever. you know, GameSplat gave it an 11.3.

Tommy: Whatever.

Tommy goes home, heats up his leftover micrwave Mack and Cheese, then opens up a BudIsn'tWeiser and sits in front of the TV watching Two-Thousand,Eight-Hundred and Sixty-Two Dollar Passcode until three AM, then cries himself to sleep on his twin hydabed, wakes up at four-thirty AM, and gets arrested for indecent exposure because he left his fly down.

Jim earns enough money to open a top secret reasearch project to discover the secret of immortality. He lives forever, and buys Nintendo, devolops the Wii2, and corners the casual gaming and awsome gaming markets. Becomes richer than God

That's why casual gamers will never, ever, rule the Neverlands or Luxembourg. Thank you.

What's up with the games option in the category tab? I think that if someone maintains a blog on a gaming website it would probably be about games. But, whatever. The real reason I'm posting is that I need to start putting video games first. Any non-necessary activities must take second-tier after beating video games. And I need to stop buying more games. I'll be halfway through one game, I get an extra $60 from...somewhere...and i just go out and buy a game. Now I have about seven games that I'm only halfway through, and I'm never going to be able to beat them. None of my other gamer friends have steady monetary income to buy more games. A new game for them is a big occasion. They only have a few games each, and they've beaten all of them except maybe their newest one. I have more video games than anybody and haven't beaten more than three or four of them. So I'm not going to buy anymore games until I've beaten most of the ones i already own. Good plan. Glad that's settled.

I go over to a friend's house. He has a lot (alot?) of PC games. I borrow Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II. My computer reads CD's pretty slow, so it took an entire day of background downloading to find out that i have 52 mb less ram than is required too play the game. Pc's suck. PS3, Wii, and XBox, all the required software is bought at once. All you have to do is download occainsonall software downloads. Then again, everytime some huge hardware.....thing, comes along, you have to get a new system. I just...I mean....still....uh.....yeah.....whatever! Just keep walking!