10 Signs You're Way Too Old To Be A Gamer
10. You Play Games On 'Normal'
Advertisement
To a gamer in his prime, the Normal difficulty level is akin to the way the unconventionally-abled bowl: with beanbag snakes in the alleys, and the ball at the top of a ramp pointed at the 1 pin that they merely have to prod with a cushioned stick. At your peak, you were far from normalyou were exceptionaland you had the mountain of beaten games, Gamerscore resembling a Kuwaiti princes per diem, cupboard full of battered peripherals, and bowel-shaking online rep to prove it. Normal was for babies; for meek, pathetic tourists who began cringing in horror whenever a bloody indicator informed them they were being shot in the back of the head. And these daysas hard as it is to acceptthat's you. Even games themselves keep telling you how badly you're acquitting yourself, taking the opportunity on every death screen to gently suggest that maybe, just maybe, given that you're making approximately three feet of forward progress per life, it's time to take it down a notch. Meekly, you acquiesce. Of course, you justify the demotion by telling yourself that itll help you in the long run; that youre working your way back up through the minor leagues. But deep down, you know the truth. You no longer have any right to play on Hardcore. Youre too old, you're too slowyou're just too ... normal.