There are many many things that I love about gaming. So many in fact that in conversation, when inadvertently the topic may come up and I'm asked what it is about gaming that I love, I'm generally at a loss for words. Too much to articulate to an average person without sounding a bit obsessive. I love the windows into other worlds that great games give me a peek at. I love the camaraderie that forms when playing online with others, that sheer interactivity that only the medium of videogames can truly produce over other forms of entertainment. Playing games cooperatively with a common goal no matter the difficulty or even the quality of the game itself is eased because of the shared act itself. It's when playing videogames competitively that a certain sect of gamers start materializing and rearing their ugly heads.

Just who are these gamers and what nefarious deeds do they do that will finally get to the point of this monthly musing? Well simply put...

They are the gamers who are fine, even peachy keen, when they are winning. But when they start to lose, when their proverbial jig is up or their lack of skill comes to light, they transform. Their Mr.Hyde persona emerges when they come to the realization that they indeed suck. Yet unlike a good sport instead of taking it in stride and issuing the good game clause, they instead, in their mind come to the conclusion that the reason they are sucking is not because they were bested by the better gamer, no no my fine readers. It is because you somehow or another cheated. You exploited a glitch or a bug within the game. Has to be.That's the only logical reason because if you weren't cheating, they would of won. Like a broken record that keeps repeating that snippet of music over and over again, they all sound the same too.

Their reasons or excuses of those amounting losses are legion and to the practitioners of online competitive gaming, the overwhelming surplus of them are heard on a daily basis. They consist of the following:

Lag.

When they're winning, miraculously there is not a breath of it mentioned. Yet when the losses start piling on, the occurrence of lag is without question. It doesn't matter that you're on dedicated servers. That their ping is significantly lower than yours. Lag is the culprit and the real reason why you won.

Spamming.

You are only beating them because you keep spamming that same action that works successfully on them. Actions include repeated hadokens, throws, a combo they can't seem to block, ultras, finishers, blocking their moves, using a character's drive attacks, and or basically pressing buttons that may yield an action detrimental to them repeatedly. The nerve.

You're bullet proof / Camping.

You obviously must of sprayed some form of bullet repellent spray before starting the match because those headshots that he swears he is nailing you with just aren't registering. Not only that but you are not running around like a retarded idiot out in the open ( like he is ) for him to shoot you dead. How dare you use cover or stealth mechanics built within the game in order to succeed. That is cheating and you need to refrain from doing that.

Being Drunk.

Prior to the match, the sobriety of the gamer in question was not in dispute. The telling signs of being intoxicated never made an appearance until you mopped the floor with him. Then out of the blue his alcohol level spiked to that of Dtoiders during PAX. They act almost as belligerent and drunk as bloggers who pretend they're drunk to write a drunk blog. The old Yeah I'm drunk but if I was sober I would of kicked your ass. card is played to trump and negate your victory.

The Game is Cheap or Broken.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that if everything else doesn't apply to their downfall, the very game itself is broken. The game is cheap. It's a button masher, no skill, your luck just happened to be better than his, albeit on a repeated basis but that's beside the point. You somehow tapped into your latent telepathic game coding powers to exploit this to your benefit.

The sad part of it all is that once they know they can't beat you at that game, they simply refuse to play with you on whatever the game may have been. Notice I said that game. Now that other game they know they can beat you in is all good. Invites will be overflowing then. There are even more reasons and excuses, some more obscure than others, depending on the gender of the gamer but what it all boils down to is simply this: They are the greatest gamers in the universe and no matter what their win/loss ratio is, that fact will always remain true.

After all, if you do happen to win, if you really put on a display of skill that dwarfs and shames theirs, they may very well look like they suck but it is only so because you are a dirty rotten cheating bastard.