Seriously, come on, guy. We totally get that there’s never an opportune time for a power outage, but the sword was probably just the teensiest smidge of an overreaction.
Now, some people may tell you that video games are nothing to get too passionate about. It’s just a game, non-gamers will tell you. That’s all well and good, but the industry’s become such a behemoth these days that its influence (and opportunities to make a heckload of cash) continues to skyrocket. There are tournaments with huge, absurd prize pools, enormous audiences on Twitch, YouTube, and others ripe for the taking… it’s a big deal.
As such, whatever naysayers may tell us, gaming sessions are serious business. You don’t have to be playing in a high profile, higher stakes tournament, either. Even if it’s just your online pride and some arbitrary ranking points on the line, nobody wants to lose. Even worse than losing is taking a loss to a strategy you think is ‘cheap.’ That’s when the hatemail really starts to flow.
As such, yes, emotions run super high while gaming. Rage quitting is rife. Developers understand this, too, which is why they implement penalties and/or snarky jokes aimed at those who disconnect, such as Mortal Kombat 11’s returning ‘Quitalities.’ That’s just sore losers being poor sports, though. Sometimes, however, things get all too real.
Back in March of 2018, a Pokémon GO player in Washington was charged with assault after angrily brandishing a tire iron at a group of friends, believing that one of them had taken over ‘his’ Gym. That was frightening enough, but now here comes another incident of super-extreme gamer rage.
Over in Florida, Game Rant reports, a young man experienced a power outage while mid-game. Yes, that’s always a darn pain, but in this instance, things took a turn for the worse very quickly. Apparently, a handyman had cut the power, which damaged the console. This caused the player to grab a sword he owned and threaten his family and the worker with it.
“Ballard grabbed his sword and began to yell threats. Ballard’s father says that his son said “I am going to kill you” while brandishing the dangerous weapon,” the report goes on.
No actual harm was done, but needless to say, some people take a bit of a dim view of sword-waving and death threats. As such, police soon arrived and surrounded the barn where the incident had taken place. The defendant had locked himself inside but came out and gave himself up when asked.