Some may think this silly, some may roll their eyes, and some, may smile and agree.
Gamers enter a world, to escape the everyday. To spend time, to make new friends, or to visit with old ones. They are excited, and expectant, they wonder and they guess. What will happen, will there be Dragons? Monsters? Damsels? Wizards, Witches, treasures untold, hardships unnumbered? Will they succeed, will they fail? Will there be adventure? Will Kings beg their aid, will they visit other realms, meet new creatures, like themselves walking that path in a magical world, together.
Gaming developers, are given the arduous task of creating and maintaining that world. They are, in effect the caretakers of our dreams. While we fight on and curse our misfortune, they watch from above, attempting, to maintain a balance. They know if they flood a plain they may drain an ocean. If they level a mountain what horrors will spring forth. Their monsters however, are very real. They have strange names and wear many faces. Balance, Bandwidth, Errors and more. Risk vs reward, they are forced to endure. They cannot do simply as they please, for they also must strive to fulfill and appease. Us.. Their ever hungry, and demanding citizens of the world they created. They glimpse a realm of deities, they see the glimmer of what it must be like, to sit atop Olympus, and know.. they will never please and appease all. They will never fulfill every wish. And what of their own? What about their own hopes and dreams? What about the world they long to explore? Do they rail against the endless span of time and demand their own vision? Or do they buckle and try to fulfill ours?
Surely any such deity would have bad days. Surely they must have doubts. What of budgets and spreadsheets, storyline and more? Do they simply pluck an idea from a magic tree and cast it’s wisdom onto their subjects below? Or is it ripped from within? Torn screaming and wailing, formless and unyielding, beaten and forged, polished and straightened, only to mask blemishes, and flaws, that do not reveal themselves until they break and cause our world to fall, and crumble. All the while these subjects whom only know they want and desire, cry out for mercy, or demand calm be restored, Such creators seek to fill all of our needs, nothing more. An Ominous task to be sure. And sadly all to often, a thankless one.
Do we gather laurel leaves and scatter them in their name? No, we reward their efforts with scorn and mockery, impatience and distrust. We request, no demand, they give us all that we ask, nothing more, nothing less, as I said, an Ominous task.
Many realms have I walked through, some continue and some do not. I’ve encountered many souls in my journeys, some that have and some that have not. I wish I could say my path is filled with glory, and righteous deeds, sadly all to often it was paved in my own desire and greed. I tried in my way, to help the path be less harsh, to warm the frozen walkways, to drain every foul marsh. But all I did with any frequency, is rail at the heavens and ask why me. Why were my abilities taken from me? My once strong weapon, now tarnished and dull, no longer does it drive forth the monsters, no longer will it cull, any that dare stand and oppose me, fools they would have been, but we’re no longer gods, we now are but men.
As the path I take widens there are choices I must make, I ponder and wonder which road will I take? One thing is certain, I know not what will come, I know not what wonders, or deeds there are to be done. What unending hardships and glorious battles are there to be suffered and won? Will I be alone or with new companions, who’ll walk along with me, to lighten my journey, it will then be us, no longer just me.
Each of your memories I’ll gratefully hold in my heart, all our triumphs and failures right from the start. I won’t languish, I will instead, smile and take up my pack, a long journey waits ahead. By now some are asking will we meet again? You just never know.. Until then my friends.
(edited by Evon Skyfyre.9673)
