Why bad players don't know they're bad.Follow

I do not suffer from this! *shakes head*

Piratess mentioned me as being good once. I'll take her word for it ..forever.

I was kidding. I think I'm a little above average. I feel I'm accurate in that assessment because I'm a realist and I'm rational. I'm also analytical, and if I use my gaming experience over the past decades as indication, then just above average would be my likely overall assessment. I excel in certain games/genres and don't do so hot in others.

Bottom line up front; I'm not bad.

That article is interesting though, and does shed light on one of the biggest issues in the gaming world, which is far more noticeable in current gen MMO and FPS titles.

Am I good? I don't know. I have always considered my self average. I have my moments of awesomeness
and of course my moment of baddieness. Simple as that.
Now if i enjoy the game a lot I spend time bettering myself.
But all around I average maybe slightly better at times.

That's one reason of why I'm not a fan of poorly moderated games where there is a lack of active punishments of cheaters or heavily gear dependent games that benefit from RMT. I've always preferred games that put the most emphasis on personal and team skill.

On that note, another post I made dealt with how I feel how people who actively challenge themselves and others constantly to raise the bar of play constantly on every front and regardless of side end up being truly good.

naked parent... how often does this happen? I wonder...

I think I'm a good player - not awesome but definitely not on the bottom of the pool. That said, so much of online competition can be hindered by poor connections / poor computer performance that sometimes the metrics don't justify how you felt you did in the game.

I know I was okay at Fury before that game fell on its face because I managed to climb to the top 30 or so people in the beta test... but I also knew that a lot of people simply couldn't handle the specs of that game.

just based on experience I think that both the internet's ability to hide identity and also social interaction can play a major factor in this type of gaming personality.

Just as with forums, in a game there is the possibility of not feeling accountable for your actions resulting in reckless behavior and sometimes this all out unfounded ability to explain away or straight up lie about your skill, actions, and gameplay. It's just a name after all.

There is also sometimes lack of opportunity. Let's say you haven't come to a game with a group of friends or a guild, or your guild doesn't really strife for accomplishments or goals, or social interaction. Your encounters with others, or the right kind of people, may become sparse.

Unless you're the kind of person that automatically migrates to people with a mentality dictated by skill and improvement you may just never have occasion to realize there is a benchmark and you haven't met it yet. You may follow that aimless path too long to the point where you'll just out of nature assume there is nothing better out their to base your skill off of.

After slowly coming to this conclusion, without even realizing it, the ground kind of falls out from underneath you when you get all out stomped one night. Taking the situation in, based off of how ingrained your personal benchmark is, it would be alot easier to chalk it up to hacking, cheating, or unfair tactics than to actually admit you're bad, especially if the aforementioned unaccountability also comes into play.