| 
| | March 10, 2006
The Cat’s Out of the Bag!
Our new Texas Hold’Em game is finished! I’ve been just itching for weeks to tell you about it, but the team didn’t want to tip their hand in advance (no pun intended, honest!). And what a way to kick it off, with a shot at playing some serious poker in Vegas! I’m not sure what’s more exciting: the brand-new game, or the 10-week tournament. | |
| Actually, let me amend that: for me, it’s definitely the game. Not just because I can’t enter the tournament, but because I’ve been playing this game for a month now, against the same people all the time, and I’m really looking forward to playing with opponents who don’t sit right near me and mock me for squeaking “woot!” when I have a good hand.
Well, okay, that may have only happened once or twice, but the embarrassment remains.
One way or the other, the advantage of playing online poker is obvious: it’s as if every single player has a face of stone and a pair of mirrored sunglasses. Nobody can tell when you’re bluffing; it’s a great equalizer! Of course, if you’re going to participate in the tournament, there’s a chance you’ll end up playing face-to-face in Vegas. So you might want to practice your expression of bored disdain in front of the mirror. I’ve seen those poker shows on cable; everyone looks like they’re two hours into a four-hour staff meeting or Poli-Sci lecture.
Moral of the rambling story: play Texas Hold’Em on MSN Games, and you can grin like crazy or gloat over a good hand whenever you want; as long as you play your cards right, you’ll still be able to win. | |
| Hearts and Laundry
We’ve had a lot of conversation around here lately about why people play games. For some people, of course, the answer is just, “Ummmm, because they’re games.” But not everyone who plays is a hardcore gamer; many of them wouldn’t call themselves “gamers” at all. They play because they need to de-stress after a conference call, or they want to improve their vocabulary, or they’re killing time between classes, or they like to chat with friends who play on Tuesday evenings… or maybe because they hate doing laundry?
That last reason is courtesy of Red@Zone, to whom Hearts and laundry are the carrot and the stick.
Laundry is one of those necessary chores that few people really enjoy. And you can’t really do it quickly, either, since you have to wait on each load of it before you can do the next load. It’s easy to lose an entire afternoon to laundry, and when you’re done… well, you’ve got a pile of clean laundry, but you really can’t say you’re having a fun weekend.
Red@Zone does laundry on Sundays. She says the process puts a sort of natural rhythm in the afternoon. To fill those pauses between starting the washer and moving everything to the dryer, or starting the dryer and folding the clothes (or ironing as many things as she can stand and then ironing as many more things as she can stand), Red prefers a good game of Hearts.
Why Hearts? “Because the rules are easy, the game is fun, it takes about the same amount of time as a load of laundry, and you can pay as much attention as you want and still do pretty well,” she says. Too much complexity in a game, and it loses the welcome-distraction factor. “I can’t have what I do for relaxation make me stressed, because then I’d need relaxation from my relaxation.”
Okay, that makes sense. Of course, losing every time would be stressful too, so she doesn’t just muddle her way through games. “I do tend to pay careful attention when passing. Making the right pass can make a huge difference in how the game goes,” she admits. And after a nice, relaxing game against other people who are also enjoying a little afternoon distraction, it’s that much easier to venture back into the laundry room.
“We’re all escaping our own personal laundry hell. Or maybe it’s dusting hell, or kids hell, but whatever, we’re all stuck at home for the duration, and it’s nice to actually speak with human beings.” On the whole, the people she plays against are nice, although some are chattier than others: “You can often go a whole game and see nothing but ‘GG’ or ‘NM’, but that’s fine too.”
For those who don’t share her attitude, or are too competitive for casual play, there’s always the “Do Not Match” feature. By and large, though, it’s easy to find three good players, and every bit as easy to get lost in the game… and then be brought rudely back to reality by a load of insistent laundry.
As Red says, “The two worst sounds in the world on Sunday are the da-DAH you hear when the Queen of Spades is played, and the BWAAAAAAA of the dryer being done.” | |
| Tech Time
Since we’re talking poker this week, it seemed like a good idea to feature this letter from Joseph (who must have an MSN Games username, albeit an unspoken one).
“Dear Moxie: I cannot see my cards. I can play, bet, and everything, but it does not show my cards when I move my mouse over them. Needless to say, it is difficult to play very well when I don't know what my cards are.”
I can certainly imagine how that could be difficult: let’s see, should I play the ace of nothing, the deuce of nothing, or the jack of squat? Fortunately, it’s an easy fix. Just download the latest version of Macromedia Flash, and you’ll be back up and running. Not to mention bidding with a bit more authority.
If you need more info about installing Flash, just take a peek at this support article.
See you next week! | |
