Friday, May 05, 2006

The Ca-nasty World of On-line Gaming

When Dan and Penny were here, they introduced us to the card game Canasta. Canasta is a game for four players, somewhat like Gin Rummy, but played in partnerships. A game consists of 4-7 hands and each game takes about 1 hour or so. We found this game to be fun and challenging, and it led to many late nights trying to win the final hand.

Once the in-laws left, Nick and I were suddenly left without an in-house partnership to challenge. Being the resourceful sort that I am, I wondered, "Google, can one play Canasta on-line?". Always helpful, Google pointed me towards Yahoo games, which for a username, password and internet connection, you can play Canasta against other players around the world for free! So, I signed up and entered the world of on-line gaming.

I was expecting to find a place where you could play an interesting card game, plain and simple. Instead, I found a new world with a separate language structure and different expectations -- and a lot of blather. First, all players can chat during the game -- there is a space under the "table" where the cards are played for communication. Comments about the game were shortened to acronyms (npup = nice pick-up partner; gha/p= good hand all/partner; nrc = nice red canasta; thank you = ty). Entering the game was strange, I kept seeing the codes scroll across the bottom of my screen: NPUP, NRC, GHA/P, TY. I finally asked for some clarification and a (rare) helpful player let me in on some secrets. The first game I played, there was quite a bit of chatter, a lot of it having to do with the fact that our table was so nice.

I soon realized why this table was deemed "nice." My second game, I was doing fine, not playing any horrible cards or discarding poorly. (Without getting into the details, Canasta is a game where you need to be very careful about which card you discard or it can cause the other team to get a whole bunch of points.) Towards the end of the first round my comptuer assigned partner discarded poorly, and then sent me a text message that stated that I was a complete f------ idiot! How dare I try and play on-line! Granted I'm just learing the game, but really, why the hate? I was playing with other self-described beginners. We lost the hand, and then my partner quit the game. I've also forever ended my foray into on-line gaming. I've always thought it was a bit strange to play anonymously against other folks on-line and I've know had my suspicions confirmed.

posted by Peggy C. at 5:09 PM