X-Boxing

Online gaming, eh, allegedly the future. Playing games against other people without them even being in the same room or even country as you. Brilliant. No more awkwardness as your mate outstays their welcome in your flat, or accidentally takes the Player 1 control pad so you have to talk them through everything. Just fire up the game and it’ll find someone from the Internet to play against.

The problem is… almost everyone on the Internet is, at best, a massive pain in the arse.

My game of choice is FIFA on the Xbox. Through hours of wasting my life waving my thumbs at it, I’m quite good. Not brilliant, but can play without embarrassing myself. Cos I’m new to the Internet gaming thing, it doesn’t know that I’m the thumb equivalent of Eric Cantona and pairs me up against other new or rubbish people.

The first game I played saw me winning two nil after not very long, so he started to cock about – trying to get players sent off, watching the entirity of cut-scenes and fucking about making needless substitutions. So far so bland, but I scored a couple more past him and he quit after 85 minutes of the match.

Is that what people really do for fun? Start losing then throw their toys out of the pram and strop like a baby? The second guy disconnected at half time. The third after the third goal went in. And that’s where online gaming falls down:

In real life, you can punch your friends for being dickholes.

I did the next best thing and sent him a message that said “knob”. Me one, internet stranger nil.

On an unrelated note, I once bought two tickets to see Stewart Lee from a stranger online. They were selling four, and I took two of them. This bloke bowls in at the start and sits next to us, stares at us for a bit and then asks: “Are you from the Internet?” “No,” I replied, “I’ve never heard of it.” I spent the next two hours not making eye contact with him.