Parents Can’t Play Games with Their Kids Anymore (Just Ask Rufus Honker IV)

I can still vividly remember the quiet hilarity brewing up within my seven-year old brain as I watched my father (then forty-two years old) attempt to play Super Mario Bros for the Super NES. While he had the basic, and admittedly simple, control scheme down, he kept violently tilting the controller to the right every time Mario jumped. I guess in his head the game would somehow take pity on his valiant efforts to get Mario over that last bob-omb, or maybe he presciently predicted the advent of the Wii. Whatever the reason, my young mind found his total lack of controller competence very amusing; and this was back when games only made use of six buttons.

Today, gamers of all ages can revel in side-splitting delight as those outside the increasingly complex gamer culture betray their ignorance. If the simple concept of getting a stout plumber from point A to point B proves too difficult, how could one begin to explain the intricacies of WoW: “So, you’re a rogue, huh? Ok, then you are going to want a combat and assassination spec for PvE that transitions to a subtlety spec when you start getting more into PvP. Oh and make sure that you pack lots of agility to maximize your attack power and dodge chances, because God knows that Rogues don’t care about intellect- leave that to the Mages, Priests, and Feral Druids!”

Modern games, and particularly MMOs, require mastery of numerous, intricate skills, as well as highly specialized knowledge, such as knowing the exact equipment to equip, in order for players to compete effectively. Putting together the right gear for a WoW raid can be more difficult than packing for a skiing trip.

Games like WOW have foregone even this simple structure of protagonist gamer defeats antagonist villain in favor of leader boards ticking off the ranks of competing PvP arena teams. I can just imagine my Dad clutching that SNES controller in a white-knuckled death grip this very moment. “What the heck is a guild? Isn’t that one of those groups in which apprentices learned to forge swords and cobble shoes back in the day?”

Of course this shouldn’t suggest a lack of trying on the part of good ol’ Mom and Dad to break into the WOW scene; in fact, a Live Journal post from the aptly named Rufus Honker IV (sounds like the name of a dashing young Alliance captain to me) reflects the efforts of parents to play WOW with their children (Rufus may be thirty years old but he’s still someone’s little boy).

Rufus’ post bemuses over the telltale signs of noobishness exhibited by his sixty-something mother and stepfather: her hoarding arrows on her melee fighter and his holding on to level 20 quests with a 59 Paladin– you know, the WOW equivalent of flicking the SNES controller in hopes that Mario will respond with a graceful leap over that inexplicably bottomless pit.

One cannot hold these simple mistakes against the woefully under-skilled parents, and Honker takes careful measures to reinforce the humor in his post. When one considers the level of insider knowledge and vocabulary necessary to climb to the top of the WOW circuit, the mere fact that parents who grew up in the age of punch card computers even attempt to play WoW with their children is pretty amazing.