2old2play

The year was 1961. America was a heady place. Camelot reigned in the White House. The Korean Conflict was a dim memory for everyone but the veterans-just like when it was being fought. Vietnam was a place known only to a young CIA Deputy Director named George Bush. The Wrath of God 4 x 4 Geezer Gamer Challenge was just starting. 4536 teams signed up for the quadruple elimination tourney of attrition. It took a team of MIT grad students seven years to work out the details of the tourney ladder. When the dead were weeded out of the initial rosters and replacements were born and raised to geezerdom in Soviet bloc training camps, play began amidst the mightiest Nor’easter in modern memory in the spring of ’71.

Agnew and Nixon came and went. The economy waxed and waned. The nation fought Iraq twice and elected a George Bush to the office of president twice- where they served a combined three terms. Stephen King actually finished the Gunslinger saga. Eventually, the Xbox was invented and the pace of play picked up a little.

While scheduling was excruciating the games were a fast and furious blur to many of the participants. Team Uber dealt a shocking loss to the pre-tourney faves the 2old2play team- picked as favorites by themselves, to send them to the loser’s bracket. A showdown loomed on the horizon.

As the two teams crept backed towards each other through the brackets, fierce psychological warfare broke out on the forums (note: revisionist history is the only real history). Bad blood was brewing and prostate exams were not helping anyone’s mood. Eventually, PSA levels dropped to acceptable limits and the finals were scheduled for the last day of March in the year of Our Lord (well…some of our’s Lord anyway) 2005.

Game On Dorks!*

Game one did not include me so it will not be reported on. We won.

--> GAME ONE LINK

Game two was a masterful display of skill by me so it will be lovingly depicted in excruciating detail.

--> GAME TWO LINK

To be entirely honest, the masterful strategy achieved by me in this round was telling doodirock and Trihunter that under no circumstances were they allowed to sit out a round. While TMAN, Kung Fu Fenster and I did a yeoman’s work in backing up our fearless leader’s, the two of them did the lion’s share of the killing and hill sitting while I solidly held down meatshield duty and sold lemonade during lulls in play. Flashes of brilliance by the rotators were seen, and we would be remiss to not mention MNRedRyder who got us to this point with his work in the early rounds- but fair is fair. MVP awards were clearly due to dood and Tri. Check the Stats if you don’t believe me.

Game three was deeply embarrassing to me personally and will not be reported on. We won.

--> GAME THREE LINK

Game four was one of those flashes of brilliance that demonstrated the depth of team 2old 2play. While dood ran around killing everything that ever moved on Ascension, Kung Fu stepped up and racked up nearly a minute of hill time. Even more impressively, out of 15 kills, seven of them were king kills, and 6 of them were as the king. It was a truly awe-inspiring display of clearing the hill, taking the hill and holding the hill. Which the rest of the guys told me this morning was apparently the “objective” of the game…whatever that means.

--> GAME FOUR LINK

Game five, my controller was unplugged…really. So it will not be reported on. We won.

--> GAME FIVE LINK

Game six, by any standard, was a masterpiece.

--> GAME SIX LINK

I have avoided talking about team Uber’s play because they are all freakishly better than me and have very few embarrassing personal habits to berate them on, but it needs to be said now. The first five games were in no way represented by the final scores. In all of them, we were pushed to the limit, and a strategy we completely stole from them after our first loss in the tourney, and then worked on for months in a sequestered bunker at the Bungie studios, was the difference. We consistently got the jump on Uber and set up defensive points early. But when we got trapped into individual combat with them we were outclassed frequently (all except dood and I think we have made it clear that this freakish, savant-like ability of his cost him his sight and hearing and caused him to suffer humiliation at the hands of his evil Uncle Ernie).

Game six was the proof that you can indeed teach an old dog new tricks- it just takes five games to do it. Game six was a screaming, ugly, reeking, body-littered landscape that would readily satisfy Wrath of God’s lust for blood in a final match. Every time we got to a hill, Uber was waiting with rockets, swords, banshee’s, shotguns, trained wolverines and gum that kept sticking to our shoes.

Larboz and Wasted Hope cut a swath of destruction through our ranks and nevdesign and AMonkeyWithAFez ably guarded their flanks as Uber erased an early deficit and stormed to seeming victory.

One last time the hill moved.

One last time, 2old got beat to the hill- badly.

The second’s counted towards 3:00 minutes and dood was heard to say from the far side of the map “it’s over.”

And then the Guardians smiled upon Team 2old and said unto Uber “nice try.” TMAN and I spawned within feet of each other and gawked in surprise at the rocket launcher we each held. The hill rose before us and explosions bloomed like poppies in Afghanistan. With one man left on the hill and the timer at 2:58, I finally killed someone besides myself with a rocket launcher. The last five seconds clicked off and the most epic battle in the history of geezerdom (maybe) came to an end with team 2old 2play of the Geezer Gamerz Clan on top of the virtual world.

*** Thanks to Wrath of God for putting on a great tournament. Thanks to all of the teams that we played with and had a blast, winning, losing and drawing against! Thanks to an awesome team for carrying me through a large part of the tourney. Special thanks to the GGz clan for bearing with us while we endlessly debated strategy and tactics in pre-game lobbies and who then honed us to a razor’s edge in practice sessions. Thanks to the founders for creating a space for it to happen in. Finally, thanks to my wife, who inexplicably, remains married to me despite these boyish antics.

We will now cease being gracious and commence to being insufferably big-headed.

*special thanks to Mrs. Fade for our new battle cry and for letting Fade to Black play!

A Story By Bubba/Freyn Ap Thyr