Safe Spaces? Save Spaces? What?

Given my … nothing so distasteful as a predilection, more of a penchant¹ … for at least violence, if not outright brutality, you might be surprised to learn that, when gaming, although I have a distinct preference for ‘killing and lots of it’ (bodycount is very important to me), even though I do enjoy the slapstick² of charge-’n’-blast beserking … it is, after all, my instinctive response to solve problems by pounding them until they stop twitching³ … I have an acquired (learned) inclination towards stealthplay. Not only is it safer (you’ve just gotta be quick and/or stash the corpses somewhere they won’t be found) but there’s an (almost visceral) intellectual thrill to be gained from silent kills (especially with a sniper rifle, which is the ultimate in rationality): quite apart from the fact that no-one knows you’re there and, with a suppressor attached to your weapon, you don’t give your position away, there’s the simple aspect of not leaving anyone behind to wake up and raise the alarm — particularly if, like me, you’re inclined to play it safe and eliminate people whether they seem to pose an immediate threat or not, just in case (I do so hate it when I see a message telling me I died because I killed a civilian/innocent party).

As a result, I spend an awful lot of gaming time, creeping around the environment, leading to the discovery of areas that, at first sight, seem to be either completely spurious or else must, surely, hold some secret the player is meant to discover.

Often though, there is no secret to be found … no hidden switch revealing a secret entrance to a hidden area … and you wonder what on Earth possessed the designers to … well, design it — at which point it dawns on you that it was so with a multiplayer option in mind.

Often, such areas are clearly designed with deathmatch mode in mind, but sometimes you come across a space that is so far off the beaten track that you wonder who in the World would ever lie in wait there on the offchance that someone would come wandering by, because … believe me … the only thing that will happen is that, no, you won’t die (because no-one is going to come wandering by) but, no, you aren’t going to win either (because you aren’t going to make any kills).

I don’t do co-operative play … my consoles are set up for singleplayer (or local multiplayer) mode and otherwise (appropriately enough) stealthed to the World of online gaming: I don’t need to join a team of thirteen-year-olds, thanks very much (nor one of people whose developmental progression ended there); I’m not interested in fragging your ass … I’m just gonna kill you quickly, efficiently and move on⁴ — I have other people to kill⁵ and no time, therefore, to waste.

So, perhaps one of you who do play co-operatively could enlighten me as to what these spaces are all about — are they safe spaces for team (de)briefings, bases for ‘capture the flag’ style games, what?

Thanks.

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¹ Yes, that’s a joke because they’re synonyms: no, it isn’t, because albeit subtle, there is a significant difference in nuance — and I’m not a pervert!

² Hitchcock was slapstick … Laurel and Hardy his forebears. Likewise, brutality is the humourous aspect/facet of violence.

³ As much as anything else, the approach of resolving a dispute by taking off and nuking the planet from orbit is a matter of education by example; an object lesson in “Don’t let this happen to you” (i.e. “Don’t make me hurt you”) — as much, if not more, a preventative measure, discouraging repeat faults by others, as retribution against offenders.

⁴ I may mutter “Live through that, you c*nt” when the deed is done, but only if it was a particularly emotional experience for me (likely involving the unconscionably unrestrained use of unprecedentedly excessive force).

⁵ Every single living thing that it is possible to kill; I don’t care who or what, just so long as there is no-one and nothing left breathing when I’m done — although I’ll settle for no humans left alive (or at least no evil ones anyway⁶).

⁶ Even though it’s often more fun than meting out Justice to the deserving⁷, I don’t always slaughter the innocent in preference to the guilty; just on those occasions when I’m in the mood to explore whether there is something deeply wrong with me psychologically that I shouldn’t divulge to anyone ever — and, yes, ‘explore whether’ is probably just a transparent attempt to rationalise it away⁸ … and, yes, the use of the ‘probably’ a pitiful attempt to mitigate that⁹.

⁷ There is no Karma but there is me … and guns don’t kill people, I do.

⁸ Because, truth be told, like George Higgins (a.k.a. ‘Machine’) in the film/movie 8mm: “I wasn’t beaten. I wasn’t molested. Mommy didn’t abuse me. Daddy never raped me. I’m only what I am and that’s all there is to it. There’s no mystery. Things I do, I do them because I like them.”

⁹ I’m not sure whether years of focus on ‘Cluster B’ personality disorders has simply given me an insight into how those afflicted think and behave, or (alarmingly) had a more profound effect on my mentality — if you stare into the abyss long enough …¹⁰

¹⁰ I mean, sure, this is a carefully contrived piece that only seems confessional … really I’m lovely, by inclination prefer to be a good guy protecting the weak, defending the innocent, doing the right thing regardless of the cost to myself … but, on the other hand, is it?