Playing Games

Introduction

I don't know if it's age or what but I still enjoy playing games, especially with friends, but although the general aim of games is usually to win, I love to just succeed.

What Is Success, For Me?

While I was reasonably OK about physical games, apart from cricket which I spent trying to avoid the cork cricket ball with great success but can't remember scoring any runs, and in football I was usually a goalkeeper or defender and team captain and we usually won.

I love games where the opponent is the game, not the person you are playing with.

I love solving problems, that has been and still is my life's work someone gives you source material and wants a finished product and it is up to me to deliver that finished product and I have done that for the last fifty years and intend to do it for many years to come.

So a game like Scrabble, while you want to win, but it is mainly about working out the best words, often in cahoots with the one you are playing with.

I used to play online but advertising popups killed that for me.

On a daily basis, I play Wordle and Quordle and share my Wordle result with Dharsheena, but this is to solve it in six guesses and we both usually do it. Quordle is similar but you have to solve four words in nine goes. But here I play against the game and just share any success with the friends I play with.

We also both play Weaver, which I love because although there is a recommended number of turns, there is no limit, although sometimes it is quite difficult. Here is a piece I put together on these three games.

These games don't take too long so are not a drain on my time or the power on whatever device I am on.

These are the only games that I have on my phone.

While I have played games like Doom and Quake, I cannot say I am a fan of the point-and-shoot , maybe because I usually end up shot.

A few months back my great friend Les put me on to "The Room" on Steam and I absolutely loved that as it was about puzzle solving rather than playing against another person, and Les gave me a lot of pointers to help me solve some of the puzzles.

I suppose this is a bit like the work I do, in gathering information and putting it together to finally come to a solution.

On my Kindle, I play Backgammon at the top level, and I do get beat but I look at the stats and usually the one with the highest dice throws (did you know that dice is the plural of die) and the most doubles comes out on top, and when I see that losing to the computer does not seem so bad, because it got the best numbers.

Conclusion

So I do like puzzle-solving games, and I see Backgammon like that as well. In the past, I have played Chess and Draughts (Checkers) then games like Jenga, and I do love to play with others, though failing that the computer is adequate.

When I started writing this piece I thought I would struggle to say much, so I thought it may be a Critique piece, but I have pulled in a lot more than I expected so it can go in Gamers or Geeks, whichever has the most appropriate tabs.

Thank you if you have lasted this long, your read is greatly appreciated.

This is an older piece about my own gaming history that the comment by Dana Crandell reminded me of.