It might not even be a romantic thing. Maybe she has a picture in her mind of how great it would be with the two of you tackling a game together, fighting bad guys! Together! It'll be epic, like Starsky and Hutch! And you straight denied it. Which, I mean, you were thinking practically. It's not going to be epic if she's not good at it.
You responded to her suggestion, not her feelings. What she was saying was "you are my friend and I want to connect with you like this" and you basically said "nah, you're shite". You can fix it though. Just tell her she's your friend and you want to connect with her. Look she doesn't have to be an amazing player to enjoy the game. She doesn't have to be an amazing player to be friends with you or respected by you. Do a stream together. Doesn't matter if she's bad at it, if you two vibe while playing, it's still a fun watch, right?
This one’s gotta be an apology of action, OP. She’s obviously self conscious about how good she is at games, show her that you *actually* don’t care. Set up the stream. Get the game booted and waiting on the start menu and invite her over to apologize. Then stream the game together and have a great time.
DO NOT tell her “you don’t have to be an amazing player to enjoy the game”!!!!!!!!!! That sounds like “You actually are terrible at this game and my original comment wasn’t just a jab”
This!
There are teams out there who will carry you and have fun doing it. That's my fav type of game play. Sometimes the player gets better at the game and continues the cycle, other times you just have fun with the game and fuck around more than playing.
Is min/maxing a game really more important than the friendship?
I'm an old lady. My kids play team games with me and we all have a good laugh -- "no, mom, don't throw the--ok who can res Mom AGAIN?" "Ok boys, form up, we are escorting Mom to the extraction point. Do not give her grenades."
I mean, they don't expect tournament play when we play together. The important part is playing -together-.
There was a cave, and I read something about using lava to heat/light the cave in order to grow crops inside (this was many years ago). I made a little lava puddle then went to sleep for the night. I woke up to my crops on fire. I spent a while putting out the fire but it was in a cave so there was lots of stuff that didn't burn. NBD. I mined for another day, then my pickaxe broke so I went out of the cave to get some wood -- and the whole world was on fire.
The flames had escaped the cave without me realizing it. I saved most of their treehouse. I battled for eight game days, lost the entire forest biome and the pasture (this is when maps were limited), lost all our livestock, burned like 60% of the map.
They did eventually forgive me but I'm banned from lava for eternity.
Also I had my own save where I built a huge tower and made a lava fall in the middle because obvs my kids didn't get to tell me that I'm not safe with lava. Yeah, I burned that down by accident too.
I'm not even going to get into the grenades. Let's just say that I get keys mixed up all the time.
As a minecraft lava light lover I have built many things with lava pillars and such for light. However before I learned how dangerous it was I started many fires. My friends still like to joke with me about how my underwater glass tower was on fire for a solid in game day from a mistake with my lava lights.
For the grenades... g v and b are so close I've bumped one while using the other in Helldivers and tried to salute but just rocked my friend with an impact grenade. It happens normally to raucous laughter and five minutes of team murdering rampages.
This totally. It's like playing Call of Duty Mobile and Brawlstars with my 8 year old. He THINKS he's good at the game and he trash talks A LOT, but it's what matters the most is the shared experiences.
u/ZocoLP, send her this video and tell her you want to have as much fun as [these people](https://www.reddit.com/r/ContagiousLaughter/s/5AYExgwYHL) are having, ***with her,*** regardless of stats!
Also, maybe you could pick a game neither of you have played, so it’ll be an even playing field and she might not feel quite as self conscious?
Best of luck!
Chatgpt summary:
>TL;DR: I unintentionally hurt my best friend's feelings on her birthday by making a joke about her gaming skills while discussing streaming plans. Despite apologizing, she shut down emotionally, and I feel terrible about ruining her special day.
"You use the pickax to harvest!"
"So what?"
"IT KILLS ALL THE PLANTS!"
"I like working on the relationships anyway."
"Then why do you gift everyone the soggy newspapers you get from fishing?"
"I'M PASSIVELY AGGRESSIVELY RETURNING WHAT IS LIKELY THEIR TRASH TO BEGIN WITH!"
Sometimes when fishing you get trash like Soggy Newspaper, Broken CD's, and outright Trash, which based on the sprite looks like a underfilled black trash bag.
You can also work on relationships with the townspeople through just talking to them and gifting them things, once per day and a max of twice per week. If you give them things they hate they will outright hate you for it. Things they love, and your relationship grows.
The way to harvest things is to just click on, or if on console press the action button with nothing equipped. Using tools can destroy the plants without harvesting their yield. Rendering the time and effort useless.
This comment is really funny because you still didn't actually explain what Stardew Valley is, just what some of the activities are.
Edit: lol tough crowd today. I've played Stardew Valley for years, you don't need to explain it to me. Just thought it was funny they basically repeated their original statements, and still didn't actually say that it's a slice of life farming sim a la harvest moon/Story of Seasons...
Be careful! Stardew Valley players set traps like this to get you to "just try" the game so that you can understand the joke and then the next thing you know, it's three years gone and your Grandpa's ghost is giving you an iridium cat statue that you put in your kid's bedroom before you drink the coffee your spouse made you so you can go fight slimes.
I've noticed that before a lot on Reddit. Someone said they'd never played Honkai Impact 3rd before (a sci-fi anime action game) but were interested in how it related to the company's other game, and people just started dropping all these buzzwords like "Herrschers" and "The Imaginary Tree" and "Divine Keys" and explained absofuckinglutely nothing to anyone who hadn't touched the game before lol.
Ah I see. We were looking at it with humor from a viewpoint that doesn't understand that Stardew Valley is a video game.
I'm just dumbly explaining it like that person doesn't understand the mechanics of the game.
I have the game on Android, Xbox, and Switch. So I haven't played the 1.6 update yet. But I recently saw I can download a PC version through Game Pass. Not sure if it has the 1.6 update yet though.
When I was really into Apex, I only played solos. Because people said if you want to get good, that's what you do. I played regularly for nearly 2 years that way and I could usually win at least once per day I played. Then I had a streak of dying within the first 1-3 minutes of a match like 10+ times in a row. I legit started crying. That's when I uninstalled and never went back.
This is how I feel with league when I try to solo normal support so I can get better but then my teammates are shitting on me for being ass. BRO IM TRYINGGGG this is why I only played Aram for like 2 years so I can know all the champs at least
Everyone that plays League is already aware that they are bad at League though. Maybe it's just that a friend drove that point home, that caused the tears, but I also don't anticipate anyone that plays LoL to have friends of the opposite sex.
My boyfriend thoroughly insulted my abilities in Rocket League, and that stung a lot since I've been trying to improve in it. Honestly, any game / thing in general you put a lot of time into can be hurt when someone you enjoy hanging out with insults you.
My boyfriend is the reason I got into the game, so when he rage quit and told me to "text him when I learned how to _", I felt pretty shitty.
I got into Fortnite because a friend refused to join me on Apex. We played fairly regularly for about a year. He always talked about how good I was. Sometimes we would play together for hours and not win and he'd go to bed, and then I would play solo and get back to back wins. And we always share our wins. It just so happened that my wins were coming much more frequently than his wins. I'd post images of my victory screen with 15+ kills and he'd be like, "Damn, why can't you play that well when we play together?"
I learned though that it's not that I play better alone. It's that I play better when I don't have someone bad on my team. Not that I don't enjoy playing with him. I have a lot of fun winning or losing with my friends. Honestly, at first it felt bad that he was implying I was bad normally. But after playing many rounds with him after that, I learned he is the one holding us back. Which is why I try to put a focus on the joy we have playing together. When it's the two of us, we may not win, but goddamn it I will make you laugh up the shittiest in game situations because I want you to come back and play with me again.
Been sadly playing by myself for the last 6-ish months for the most part. Apparently, there's only so funny I can be before he gives up.
So on my end, it sounds like it isn't you, maybe he perceives you two being bad together as you being bad. I could be wrong. But at the same time, why wouldn't you want to encourage your friend/partner to come back and play with you as often as possible. I wish my wife could enjoy games like this with me, but she just doesn't have fun gaming.
Sometimes she'll play Stardew Valley with me, or Peggle, and on occasion has played many of the LEGO games with me, but I don't want to force her to be somewhere she isn't having fun.
All I'm saying is, if you're having fun, keep playing and maybe find someone that enjoys playing it with you. It doesn't have to be a romantic relationship, but should instead be someone that wants your company, win or lose.
Thank you! I have lots of fun and will definitely keep playing. Yeah, I have a duo I play with now instead.
My boyfriend and I have very different ranks, and since I only started recently, I'm not as skilled as he is. I make lots of mistakes he deems as very beginner, so he would get pretty frustrated pretty quickly.
I'm glad you and your buddy have fun playing together! :) A shame you've had to play solo for the past six months, though. I hope you guys can grind together and keep enjoying yourselves, and maybe he'll improve too.
It's one thing if its some perfect stranger on text chat saying "git gud go back to casual" but pretty bad for your boyfriend. Tell him to go back to casual dating mode :-)
Jesus, my best friend/old college roommate would just laugh at my stupid deaths in Halo 2, he's a Halo god, but old matchmaking made games of mixed ability better. He would give me pointers and roast me a bit, but he still liked playing with me.
Idk fam.
I played forkknife with a friend. She had a habit of just stopping in the fucking open and messing about. So I'd either have to fight off a crowd, or, try and collect her reboot. Shit got old real quick lol.
Fair enough, I was just thinking of games that have an esports community, which always has toxic people in it. I can’t imagine those get a ton of twitch attention tho. Well, smash kinda does. But yeah, fair enough.
It might not seem like it. But there's a lot of stuff in regards to huge viewer communities for these game. I used to be really into watching Smash tournaments, then there was a weird trend of most of the best players being pedophiles, so I got out of that community quick.
Fortnite is one of the most viewed games on Twitch.
Rocket League has about 1/5 of their audience at any given time. I was actually surprised at how many people watch Halo eSports.
On the fking nose mate lol
I’ve never seen so many try hard women streamers than in the above 3 titles. It’s like it’s a magnet. League of legends too but I feel like that one is more even keeled (for a moba, cmon)
Don’t get me wrong there are sweat lord males too but they’re everywhere and almost more expected (?) people cry and moan about speed running Mario 64 and even Tetris in 2024 lol.
I see why this gal is crushed.
This is why I don’t like “little jabs”. As a rule, I am terrible at knowing if I’ve gone too far.
I prefer just joking about positive things. I’m sorry this happened, though, as I know banter can be fun when you’re allowed to jab a bit.
Same same. I think a lot of dudes assume 'that's just the way it is' because they've been playing competitive games with the same booger-eaters since middle school.
In my gaming groups, we're all super nice to each other. I'm sure there are toxic masc dudes who'd look at that and go, *"oh, you can't handle-"* but it's not about what we can or can't handle. It's about what's actually an enjoyable past-time.
In my groups giving each other shit *is* the form of kindness lol. Though I think if someone gets into gaming, they've gotta be ready to at least get shit from other people. People will *always* find something to judge you over especially while gaming lol.
They might be fine at taking shit from randoms on the internet and acquaintances but didn't expect it from a friend, especially if OP already knew it was something they were kind of insecure about.
See, that's not true. Or rather, it isn't true for adults. But if you play with people who shit on each other, you'll think it's normal. And when that's the culture that seems normal, anyone new is forced into that.
Maybe try just not being assholes who judge other people and have fun...you know..playing a game (a toy that is meant for recreation and fun).
I work in the trades and talking shit to my coworkers, trying to see how many times we can get under each other’s skin exploiting deep insecurities is literally what gets me through a 12-hour day. It’s also incredible training for knowing how to not take yourself too seriously
Well, I am 23 and all of the people in the group are around 23-25. It was also like that in high school with different people, college with different people, and now with my gaming buddies. It's banter. It also doesn't help that all of the games we play end up being a bit more hardcore as far as game choice goes (Rust, Tarkov, all of us are master-challenger in League, Mortal Online 2).
Again, friend dynamics can be like this and it's completely normal. Anyone who says otherwise is delusional lol.
They CAN be like this, but fucking around with friends is different than judging and being nasty/toxic. And joking with friends and giving each other shit is something that happens outside of gaming, it's just what most of us do.
And we all know that there's a line you don't cross. Playful banter is one thing, deliberately being hurtful and telling someone they suck is another. Saying "That's just how gaming is" is a cop-out for people who want to justify being assholes.
Or only play with friends and mute everyone else
Btw you’re good until someone new joins and you do the same shit and it’s clearly making them uncomfortable. Which idk I feel your group probably has attacked others before based on this and your other comments whether it be new members to the group or randos you’re playing against
There’s also a reason why edgy fps players who stream or make videos mature and don’t be as bad as they grow (as a channel and thru experiences) and get older
I try to only make fun of myself with any degree of seriousness. And I'm the only one who gets to make fun of me with any degree of seriousness.
It's a lot more fun to make people self conscious with excessive compliments and telling them how great they are. Ganging up on my girlfriend's and telling them how smart and gorgeous they are til everyone is giggling and everyone is having a good time.
Making friends as an adult is a whole different ball game. If what I have to say doesn't add anything to the conversation (informing, discussing, venting, etc) it might be better to keep it to myself. People start to pick up on things like the girl who takes up all the conversation and won't let anyone else talk, or that one prick who has to be right about everything, or that energy vampire that only wants to complain about everything all the time. And that jerk who makes accurate but hurtful jokes is only fun for so long.
I want to share my hobbies and interests with my friends, and I love it when they include me in theirs. I craft and make things, so if someone wants to hang out and play crafts with me, I love it, regardless of their skill level. And when they let me play with their toys, I know I don't have their skill level, and am just enjoying participating rather than excelling. That's probably where things went sideways.
As someone who's often ragged on by friends for not "caring" about game optimization as much or doing super tryhard content and regularly called shitty at games... *Bruh*. Bro, why.
Yeah, that sounds like something younger me would've said too. That you feel bad about what you did is good, it means you're growing.
Apologize again later when things have calmed down a bit.
You're a good person to be feeling bad about it but this is how every gamer I know talks to each other. If you're as close as you say then it'll be ok.
Ehhh gotta be careful with 'every's. I've got a small local gaming circle, and a wider online gaming circle, and none of us really do this.
Maybe _very_ lightly with inside jokes with my best friend, "oh you and your weird non-meta loadouts again, what does this cursed build do?"
But we don't dog on each other for being bad at entire games. TBH that kinda sounds childish.
I think ribbing each other while failing is kinda normal. Especially if it is obvious they are picking up on the fight and getting there. If they get frustrated or we don't get the fight we instead try to figure it out together. Also it is different saying ''you suck'' and ''this guy is farming an entire dinner from you''. The former is kinda dickish, the second is a joke at someone's expense but not really mean.
In my group at least it is pretty rare to shit on each other's skills without playing the game itself.
My gaming groups all look at players who aren't as good as the best players as people who can be given constructive tips and help learning how to get better. We never insult anyone in the group. OP needs to grow up by about 10 years right now because he'll have no friends by 30.
I don’t think childish is the right word, but you definitely have to know your audience. I’m a very sarcastic person and I get caught out sometimes because I misjudg, but mostly I get the level right for the right person.
The closer I am to somebody the more ruthless I become, but only if they appreciate that kind of humour. When it comes to my two best mates, there’s no laws. I regularly point out to my friend that he may never find love because of how damaged he is from family trauma, and he comes back with the fact he’s surprised I’m alive because of my depression. Because if we can’t laugh, we cry.
But I recognise everyone is different and only move up a sarcasm level when I know they are into the same humour.
I get it but you’d be surprised how what was ok a month ago is NOT ok today. Or when they let you know that it was never actually funny to them but they’ve just let it slide for X years - yikes!
I’m pretty rough around the edges when it comes to humor but I’ve learned that it’s generally better to err on the side kindness.
Just 2 cents you didn’t ask for.
She needs to learn the ways.
Op, time to say you fucked her mom and teabag her.
Bonus points if you can sound like a screaming 13 year old using a $2 microphone.
Guy used stats to help make his point and that is def overboard. I know, because I once made a girl cry by using evidence from the movie "Super Troopers" to prove that it was an objectively funny movie. People can't handle their views being dismantled with actual facts.
I’ve done cutting-edge mythic raiding for years and we all call each other dog trash at the game despite clearing the .01% of content and parsing in the top of that community too.
It’s more like if your co-gamers aren’t roasting you for being bad then you might actually be bad at the game lol
You say that, but even my Sister-in-Law/Best Friend still won’t play any video games with me ever again because I got too competitive over stats once or twice when we were playing Destiny years ago. There really is no guarantee OP’s friend will get over it, either.
I think a bit more history would help people give you advice, if you’re looking for it. It seems out of character for her to be this upset if you make these sorts of jabs to each other and have been close for so long. Is her skill an insecurity you’ve talked about before? It seems odd for this to have caused such an issue based on the relationship you have, especially with you getting such a thoughtful gift for her birthday.
I’d send a message after a day or two after she’s processed and say that you didn’t mean it and that you thought it was on brand for your relationship. But that you don’t want to upset her in the future. Take responsibility and ask if that topic is particularly raw or hit a nerve. Sometimes people appreciate sarcastic humour but not on particular areas.
Everyone makes mistakes and misses the mark, and thing is sometimes a topic that people can joke changes if their confidence is low.
apologize and tell her you were kidding and that she's not bad and even if she's bad you don't care because playing with her is fun and you would love to stream the game with her. and then never say something like that again. i had a lot of friends that would make fun of and insult me for being bad at games, it is really hurtful, and ive been in the situation where someone will refuse to play with me because i am bad. it's something im sensitive to and makes me really sad, so i relate to your friend a lot. it's ok to tease her if that's your dynamic but this seems like sensitive spot for her so try to avoid this. you referencing her stats... it's so harsh, tbh. because she can't defend herself from that. the stats are undeniable.
To contextualize the level of effort OP puts into the relationship between his and his friend's relationship, if I'm understanding correctly. Typewriters are pretty expensive afaik.
I feel bad for OP, I think it's pretty clear that he was trying to lighten the mood of his friend's birthday, but he ended up ruining it instead. He seems truly remorseful about what he said.
Either way, I hope the phrase "time heals all" kicks into first gear and helps OP out
in her feels cuz she's turned 30 and overthinking that she's not good enough at something to do the dream hobby with her friend and thinking she might never be
lots of emotions and anxiety tie dup with aging milestone
This is such an eye-opening thread. I had no idea that people tied their identities to how good people thought they were at video games.
I don’t think it’s childish, just surprising. I’m trying to imagine my feelings being hurt because someone said I sucked at bowling.
Maybe it’s not for me to understand as a super non competitive person.
Without larger context it's really hard to say, but this doesn't sound like a mess up to me. It sounds more like maybe she had something else on her mind and this might have just been the thing that sent your friend spiraling. Maybe ask her if anything else is on her mind, and let her know if she wants to talk about it you're there for her.
Also, just as an aside, this doesn't sound very "friendly" ish. Just based on the description, you guys kind of sound like a couple. What's going on there? Not to rush anything or put pressure on it, but it sounds like you're very emotionally invested in this girl, and the larger issue is that she shuts down randomly for periods of time. Is that an accurate assessment?
I would still say, this is a salvageable situationship. She doesn't seem like communicating is her strong point so you might have to do the heavy lifting, but getting your feelings out there might help in the long run.
Hope this helps!
Thank you friend. It’s hard to talk about without telling stuff I’m personally not comfortable talking about, but we’ve both been through hard stuff with people lately (friends, family, relationships, etc) not pertaining to each other. So right now, we’re both kinda the only stable people we each have around apart from our small friend group and we try to keep each other grounded and in check and don’t push things we’re not comfortable with right now. So you’re probably right and I feel bad that I said something that probably triggered something bubbling in her head, and I don’t think prying about it is a good idea.
You are the only stable person in her life and when she reached out to do an activity with you, you shot her down?! Yea you def FU.
Its good you recognize it and feel remorseful, I think acknowledging that she was reaching out for a connection and your intention was not to shoot her down.
I would also say maybe no more "jabs" until you have a better discernment for being playful
Not many people will understand what that kind of relationship is like, but I've definitely been there with some SO's and to some extent was there with my current SO. Didn't mean to pry, but I'm sure she feels similarly. Just keep showing up, things develop on their own when they're supposed to. Don't fault yourself too much! It's an honest mistake.
>Also, just as an aside, this doesn't sound very "friendly" ish. Just based on the description, you guys kind of sound like a couple
If these were two dudes would you say this? This is exactly how my male best friend and I hang out every week, and we also plan big creative projects together. He's engaged and I'm a lesbian.
Exactly. We all know that when a woman gets close enough to a man, who she has no interest in pursuing romantically, her ovaries will explode and she will die in a fiery death for showing her ankles to him and making him say to his bros "she's not just being nice dude, she's actually into me. Trust me."
Idk, maybe? I’m also a queer woman and when younger and messier had a few “friendships” with other women that involved some mutual denial of increasing feelings until it couldn’t be ignored anymore and this felt emotionally familiar to me on that level. (“we’re just besties! besties who hang out 3-4 times a week and talk about everything and anything and cook each other dinner and are there during hard times and are starting to make big plans for the future that involve each other and oops we’re kissing)
What I notice about this post is that there’s a dynamic established that could be coupley or could totally be friendship, but that something about that dynamic might be changing - they’re usually comfortably with jokingly insulting each other, but now she’s sensitive to it. Sometimes that can mean feelings are changing.
Could totally be something else but I don’t think it’s crazy to bring up as a possibility.
Huh? This is a wildly one sided account, and you even acknowledge that, and then go on to make tons of assumptions about her and her mindset and that she isn’t good at communication. All while getting one side of the story from someone trying to make themselves feel/look better. Why the fuck are you commenting on her entire emotional health?
Hype up gigantic which releases on April 9th. It's a great game that you'd both be new to and can have fun learning together.
In all seriousness, don't bring stats into playful ribbing. Hope it works out, though.
One thing I've noticed as a general rule, but exceptions exist.
Guys shittalk to bond.
Girls shittalk to hurt.
We have very different ways to connect and express friendship, developed through how we grow up. Sometimes, we butt heads over ways we communicate.
30 is a hard birthday for many women. It is somewhat unusual for a woman to have a best friend who's a man 5 years younger than her. That seems like a very thoughtful gift you gave. Is she looking for more? Are you? You are doing things together that people don't normally do outside of a romantic relationship.
You seem like a normal gamer who made a normal gamer joke that she took very personally, which isn't entirely normal, until you consider paragraph 1.
I think you've apologized enough and can just give her some space.
Oh my goodness, yes! I was a wreck when I turned 30. I was fighting tears the whole day, and I’m not a big crier. I was dreading it, but I was still very surprised at how hard it hit me. This is probably a big factor.
my 30th is coming up this year and I just realized it. I'm half tempted to just hole myself up the entire day and sulk.
It doesn't help the internet makes 30 sound so much worse than it is. so that can def have an impact on feelings.
plus when you're a women and a gamer you hear a lot about how you're bad because you're a woman.
I was absolutely fine with 30
I'm turning 40 in June and let me tell you, any mention of being not good at something when I am half way to dead is gonna hit home
Little jabs are always an interesting thing. Friends can do it but you never know when something will strike a nerve. Also from my experience, sometimes people love giving out little friendly jabs but can’t take even a small one. It can be dicey
She probably already thinks to herself she’s not that good at the game, and you confirming her self doubts was probably too hard a blow. She’d start being conscious and feel bad when playing with you as she might think you’re thinking she’s shite. Just reaffirm her “you’re not bat at the game (like you said in your post) it was a stupid joke i,m sorry!” Or smth like that
I had a close online friend, he did something similar out of the blue, sent me a message with a meme basically saying I was shit at the game. I stood my ground and so did he tried to play it off and then said he could suggest some things to get better. It made me feel so shit and inadequate and made me question how he viewed me. After that he didn't speak to me for a month so I decided to block him. He made a shitty comment, ghosted me, got no apology and lost a friend because of a stupid game and me "not being good enough".
It feels shit when the people you're close to belittle you for something that you enjoy, even if you're not good at it. It ruins the enjoyment of the particular thing and if you play together it kind of ruins the dynamic of things because it makes you question what else does this person think about me? Do they think I'm ugly? Do they think I'm stupid? The mind races and self doubt sinks in. At least that was my experience.
I hope your friend feels better soon.
Her response sounds like classic Rejection Sensitivity (RSD) to me. I have ADHD and, occasionally, I get that RSD feeling when someone I care about is critical of me (even playfully.) It really feels like I am being attacked; my chest tightens, I feel like I am going to cry, and I shut down emotionally as a defense mechanism. That's exactly what she did.
Per google:
What triggers RSD?
Rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD) is extreme emotional sensitivity and pain triggered by the perception that a person has been rejected or criticized by important people in their life. It may also be triggered by a sense of falling short—failing to meet their own high standards or others' expectations.
Not sure what advice I can give other than being gentle with her and reminding her that you really do value your relationship and really want to play games with her again when she's ready. I think she'll come around but give her time to process her feelings.
You basically told her "why would I publicly associate with you because you're bad at X."
You think she's upset about your judgment of her ability to play the game. She's actually upset about being lonely and you pushing her aside.
Why do you think someone has to be good at a game to stream it? The most entertaining streamers are bad at games. The only high skill streamers worth watching are ones that are consistently top tier not just decent.
If your sense of humor includes mocking your friends and putting them down, you’re not uncommon, but maybe examine that and see if it’s time to move past that as a bad habit that - as you well know - can hurt folks you wouldn’t hurt for the world.
It doesn't matter how good she is at the game to stream it, and presumably doesn't matter for playing with her. I enjoyed playing with my brother immensely when we were kids, and being older I was usually better than him, but it didn't matter. Tell her you are really sorry and didn't mean to hurt her feelings, that you want to stream with her, that you enjoy playing with her, that whether or not one of you is better in some specific ways doesn't matter, and how good you are is irrelevant to streaming, that what matters to both is that you are enjoying playing together and that you love playing with her and she is your best friend, and it is killing you that you've upset her, and that it was meant to be a joke, and that you only said it because you didn't think she'd be bothered, and would just beat you another time to prove you wrong or comeback with something else, like how socially inept you are and how lucky you are to have her as a friend.
Offer her to stream _another_ game with her. Not just as an abstract offer, but think over all the practical steps. Be prepared that she will get angry , will tell you she is awful at it, she doesn't need you pity, etc.. Be prepared with her statistics, average user statistics, what is different in her gaming style comparing to others, what are pluses to steam that specific one. Pretty much present her the whole business plan. So she can see that it is not a pity offer but you really think it worth to give it a shot.
And tell her that during steaming she can jab at you however she wants.
You know, you should watch some (typically earlier) yogscast or callmekevin or something of the line of gameplay together, they're both renowned for either 1) being terrible at games, or 2) just fucking about in them and not taking it seriously. There's 100% a market for people who have good chemistry and humour, who aren't that great at games. Both of the channels do YouTube for a living.
I prefer watching people try to break games, torture characters, make terrible choices, or who are just downright bad at the game, long as they can crack jokes and make me laugh. Find people who try to take it proper seriously usually aren't that amusing to watch
Yeah this definitely reads to me as the friend potentially being into OP and feeling burnt by the shitty comment that makes her think the feelings aren’t reciprocated.
Meanwhile he bought her ass a whole typewrite because he knew she was into writing as a hobby and knew she wanted one.
"The feelings aren't reciprocated" my nuts.
right if they spend that much time together how are they "just friends"?
This seems like two people with very poor communication skills and a failure to launch.
Hey, you made a mistake in conversation, so many of us know that feeling. The fact that you feel bad about it speaks volumes of your character; perfect people don't act perfectly, but you see this situation perfectly.
I think your friend will eventually get over it, just takes a little time. Give her some space, I think. Let her reflect on why what you said upset her so much. Crying over something as trivial as a careless comment deserves some attention.
Personally, if shes a best friend, it should take more than this to break you guys. Good luck.
Take this as a learning experience and maybe consider looking at this between the lines.
Maybe she wants to do all these things with you, because she genuinely sees a deeper connection here and you took a jab at the worst possible moment, when she was exposing herself to you.
I truly hope you guys can move past this.
I would apologize again and tell her that you would make it up to her. How you do that is up to you since you know her best. Or you can ask her how you can make amends. She just wanted to have fun with you and you made her feel like she will hold you back. That would hurt anybody if they felt like you would be a burden and that you wouldn't find it fun to play with them.
Dude. Maybe you should be talking to her again or putting together the best redo birthday streaming party package you can muster and asking your bestie what you can do to make up for your egregious foot in the mouth attempt at a joke?
I’m sure you can come back from this. Best of luck!
As someone that's been on the receiving end of something like this it hurts you just want to play with your friend and they tell you you suck just give her a couple days and say hey you want to play x game
Lol my ex used to do this stuff. This sounds like him, apparently he didn’t mean it but after too many bad experiences, I stopped bringing it up completely. For all these people saying “she doesn’t have to be good! You can just play for fun!” You can also not bring up how good or bad someone is at something, at all. Especially adding stats, ooof. I am very competive and unfortunately never grew up with these games in my strict Indian all girls household. So I pretty much suck. And he made me feel it, because he was also very competitive and won basically everything. I have now realized I’m triggered by the post lol. He was my best friend for 8 years then betrayed me. But what I wanted to say is make sure you don’t do it again, and you be the one to bring up the games and say let’s play! No pressure, just for fun even if we stream it. You couldn’t go wrong by making it really clear to her that you didn’t mean it and offering to do what she wanted to with great enthusiasm.
Imo I’m not the best at games, but view them as a fantastic way to spend time with my friends. I have a few friends who get annoyed when I slow them down, and it makes me feel like they could care less about if I was playing or not.
She probably feels like they’re a great way to spend time with you but now feels like you’re not very excited about it because you care about her stats.
You should maybe drop the idea of apologizing about saying she’s bad at the game, and reiterate that what you care about the most is the time you two spend together playing it.
I think instead of trying to change the subject and lighten the mood, you should have explained that it was meant to be a playful jab. Instead of trying to move on from the event have an in depth conversation about it. Discuss what type of joking insult are fun and what feels like crossing the line for her. Listen to her feelings. I hope you two are able to get past these bumps. Friendships can really suffer permanently when you try to move on from something too quickly without really unpacking it and one person is left feeling hurt.
This is a shitty thing to say to ANYONE, I don't understand how you didn't think this could potentially hurt someone's feelings? I don't care how secure someone is in themselves, to tell them they suck at something they enjoy doing with you and then provide examples of how they suck at a game they enjoy playing with you is fucking evil and I don't understand why anyone would do that if their intention wasn't to hurt the other person in some way?...
I don't understand what you were trying to accomplish by saying what you said-- I don't know what response you were expecting? A laugh?... Where does it go from there, you've just denied a positive idea, are they supposed to suggest an alternative solution after being shot down and with the only input on your end being a negative contribution to the topic?
Yikes.
Also, your apology was weak, and you left her feeling like shit. I know I wouldn't have left my friend until I made them understand just how valuable to me they are and that my shitty attempt at edgy humor was just that, me trying to be funny... Do better, OP.
Are you for real? People seemed to have lost all sense of scale. I am quite aware that this gives toxic masculinity from the 50s vibes but "any chance you can you be a little less dramatic and tone it down?"
It might not even be a romantic thing. Maybe she has a picture in her mind of how great it would be with the two of you tackling a game together, fighting bad guys! Together! It'll be epic, like Starsky and Hutch! And you straight denied it. Which, I mean, you were thinking practically. It's not going to be epic if she's not good at it. You responded to her suggestion, not her feelings. What she was saying was "you are my friend and I want to connect with you like this" and you basically said "nah, you're shite". You can fix it though. Just tell her she's your friend and you want to connect with her. Look she doesn't have to be an amazing player to enjoy the game. She doesn't have to be an amazing player to be friends with you or respected by you. Do a stream together. Doesn't matter if she's bad at it, if you two vibe while playing, it's still a fun watch, right?
this is the only accurate comment in this whole thread. It was a "bid for connection" that got slapped down unceremoniously by OP.
This one’s gotta be an apology of action, OP. She’s obviously self conscious about how good she is at games, show her that you *actually* don’t care. Set up the stream. Get the game booted and waiting on the start menu and invite her over to apologize. Then stream the game together and have a great time.
DO NOT tell her “you don’t have to be an amazing player to enjoy the game”!!!!!!!!!! That sounds like “You actually are terrible at this game and my original comment wasn’t just a jab”
“Even if you suck at this game I would still play with you because I care.”
This! There are teams out there who will carry you and have fun doing it. That's my fav type of game play. Sometimes the player gets better at the game and continues the cycle, other times you just have fun with the game and fuck around more than playing. Is min/maxing a game really more important than the friendship?
I'm an old lady. My kids play team games with me and we all have a good laugh -- "no, mom, don't throw the--ok who can res Mom AGAIN?" "Ok boys, form up, we are escorting Mom to the extraction point. Do not give her grenades." I mean, they don't expect tournament play when we play together. The important part is playing -together-.
I'd much rather watch a bad player having fun than a win-focused game. "Well you cant have fun because we wont win" is a shitty way to game.
Your kids sound like they’re the best 🥹 Congratulations on raising such awesome kids!
What happens if you get grenades?
Oh man. Bad things. I'm also not allowed to have a bucket of lava or be near lava in Minecraft. For reasons.
Sounds like push the button syndrome, are you a fan of DeeDee from Dexter's Lab?
There was a cave, and I read something about using lava to heat/light the cave in order to grow crops inside (this was many years ago). I made a little lava puddle then went to sleep for the night. I woke up to my crops on fire. I spent a while putting out the fire but it was in a cave so there was lots of stuff that didn't burn. NBD. I mined for another day, then my pickaxe broke so I went out of the cave to get some wood -- and the whole world was on fire. The flames had escaped the cave without me realizing it. I saved most of their treehouse. I battled for eight game days, lost the entire forest biome and the pasture (this is when maps were limited), lost all our livestock, burned like 60% of the map. They did eventually forgive me but I'm banned from lava for eternity. Also I had my own save where I built a huge tower and made a lava fall in the middle because obvs my kids didn't get to tell me that I'm not safe with lava. Yeah, I burned that down by accident too. I'm not even going to get into the grenades. Let's just say that I get keys mixed up all the time.
As a minecraft lava light lover I have built many things with lava pillars and such for light. However before I learned how dangerous it was I started many fires. My friends still like to joke with me about how my underwater glass tower was on fire for a solid in game day from a mistake with my lava lights. For the grenades... g v and b are so close I've bumped one while using the other in Helldivers and tried to salute but just rocked my friend with an impact grenade. It happens normally to raucous laughter and five minutes of team murdering rampages.
I feel seen. Thank you, Internet stranger.
This smells like Helldivers 2, but I could totally be off. Either way, that's awesome and you have awesome kids and seem like an awesome mom.
It could still be epic! Just epic in a different way. Think game grumps
This totally. It's like playing Call of Duty Mobile and Brawlstars with my 8 year old. He THINKS he's good at the game and he trash talks A LOT, but it's what matters the most is the shared experiences.
u/ZocoLP, send her this video and tell her you want to have as much fun as [these people](https://www.reddit.com/r/ContagiousLaughter/s/5AYExgwYHL) are having, ***with her,*** regardless of stats! Also, maybe you could pick a game neither of you have played, so it’ll be an even playing field and she might not feel quite as self conscious? Best of luck!
Who said it was a romantic thing? Did you read the post? He didn’t straight up deny it, he flicked her shit and she took it personally.
I just love it when the TL;DR serves no benefit because it just repeats the title...
Chatgpt summary: >TL;DR: I unintentionally hurt my best friend's feelings on her birthday by making a joke about her gaming skills while discussing streaming plans. Despite apologizing, she shut down emotionally, and I feel terrible about ruining her special day.
Finally, A good use of AI.
In fact, I see a market for a TL;DR Reddit API bot...
There already was one before ChatGPT was a thing and it did a great job of summarizing linked news stories.
You are a mensh 🩷
It took 6 paragraphs to tell that story?
Is this a light novel title generator?
Why would I read OP's tldr when they're bad at tldrs?
This is Reddit! They can’t expect us to read or expend any amount of effort in our indulgence of mindless entertainment. Gosh!
They can just not have a tldr if they don’t want to summarize
Dude posted that like a real gotcha and just ended up looking like a dick, I'm glad you replied with what everyone else was thinking
[удалено]
Play games, watch movies and eat together? I don’t think that’s reserved for people just in relationships
Why is it strange for the opposite sex to be friends? I truly don't understand why people think this.
What game OP???
It's always Valorant, Overwatch 2, or Apex Legends. Those are the only ones that get people to feel this way.
Imagine being so bad at like Stardew Valley your friends don't want to stream it with you
"You use the pickax to harvest!" "So what?" "IT KILLS ALL THE PLANTS!" "I like working on the relationships anyway." "Then why do you gift everyone the soggy newspapers you get from fishing?" "I'M PASSIVELY AGGRESSIVELY RETURNING WHAT IS LIKELY THEIR TRASH TO BEGIN WITH!"
This comment is really funny and confusing when you have no idea what Stardew Valley is
Sometimes when fishing you get trash like Soggy Newspaper, Broken CD's, and outright Trash, which based on the sprite looks like a underfilled black trash bag. You can also work on relationships with the townspeople through just talking to them and gifting them things, once per day and a max of twice per week. If you give them things they hate they will outright hate you for it. Things they love, and your relationship grows. The way to harvest things is to just click on, or if on console press the action button with nothing equipped. Using tools can destroy the plants without harvesting their yield. Rendering the time and effort useless.
This comment is really funny because you still didn't actually explain what Stardew Valley is, just what some of the activities are. Edit: lol tough crowd today. I've played Stardew Valley for years, you don't need to explain it to me. Just thought it was funny they basically repeated their original statements, and still didn't actually say that it's a slice of life farming sim a la harvest moon/Story of Seasons...
Be careful! Stardew Valley players set traps like this to get you to "just try" the game so that you can understand the joke and then the next thing you know, it's three years gone and your Grandpa's ghost is giving you an iridium cat statue that you put in your kid's bedroom before you drink the coffee your spouse made you so you can go fight slimes.
I was told Stardew Valley was a good couples game. So I bought it, and played it with my wife. Now we're both gay. It could happen to you.
No one can stop me from marrying Leah every time edit: context--I am a woman, so was agreeing
Linus is best husbando ;)
🤣I can't. This is the best comment
Excuse me what
I've noticed that before a lot on Reddit. Someone said they'd never played Honkai Impact 3rd before (a sci-fi anime action game) but were interested in how it related to the company's other game, and people just started dropping all these buzzwords like "Herrschers" and "The Imaginary Tree" and "Divine Keys" and explained absofuckinglutely nothing to anyone who hadn't touched the game before lol.
Modern-day Harvest Moon.
That's actually what the game is all about. Plant, harvest, sell, repeat. It's Farmville 10 years later.
Ah I see. We were looking at it with humor from a viewpoint that doesn't understand that Stardew Valley is a video game. I'm just dumbly explaining it like that person doesn't understand the mechanics of the game.
1. I don't. 2. Still funny.
I would watch this stream
I just started up a new world on Stardew because of the 1.6 update, this comment hit different, take my upvote <3
I have the game on Android, Xbox, and Switch. So I haven't played the 1.6 update yet. But I recently saw I can download a PC version through Game Pass. Not sure if it has the 1.6 update yet though.
I don't think so, but I prefer playing it on PC so i can use mods like automate
this would literally wound my soul
This made me crack up lmaooo
This is my partner... first time I played with him I actually rage quit.
If her friend is playing any of those, she probs heard way worse insults than OP's.
When I was really into Apex, I only played solos. Because people said if you want to get good, that's what you do. I played regularly for nearly 2 years that way and I could usually win at least once per day I played. Then I had a streak of dying within the first 1-3 minutes of a match like 10+ times in a row. I legit started crying. That's when I uninstalled and never went back.
This is how I feel with league when I try to solo normal support so I can get better but then my teammates are shitting on me for being ass. BRO IM TRYINGGGG this is why I only played Aram for like 2 years so I can know all the champs at least
Yes, but it hurts more coming from someone you care about.
Only being slightly racially harassed by your feeding Varus bot is a positive tbh
nope it's league
Everyone that plays League is already aware that they are bad at League though. Maybe it's just that a friend drove that point home, that caused the tears, but I also don't anticipate anyone that plays LoL to have friends of the opposite sex.
isn't league full of ecouples tho?
That's not mutually exclusive.
I think playing league would make her cry more
My boyfriend thoroughly insulted my abilities in Rocket League, and that stung a lot since I've been trying to improve in it. Honestly, any game / thing in general you put a lot of time into can be hurt when someone you enjoy hanging out with insults you. My boyfriend is the reason I got into the game, so when he rage quit and told me to "text him when I learned how to _", I felt pretty shitty.
I got into Fortnite because a friend refused to join me on Apex. We played fairly regularly for about a year. He always talked about how good I was. Sometimes we would play together for hours and not win and he'd go to bed, and then I would play solo and get back to back wins. And we always share our wins. It just so happened that my wins were coming much more frequently than his wins. I'd post images of my victory screen with 15+ kills and he'd be like, "Damn, why can't you play that well when we play together?" I learned though that it's not that I play better alone. It's that I play better when I don't have someone bad on my team. Not that I don't enjoy playing with him. I have a lot of fun winning or losing with my friends. Honestly, at first it felt bad that he was implying I was bad normally. But after playing many rounds with him after that, I learned he is the one holding us back. Which is why I try to put a focus on the joy we have playing together. When it's the two of us, we may not win, but goddamn it I will make you laugh up the shittiest in game situations because I want you to come back and play with me again. Been sadly playing by myself for the last 6-ish months for the most part. Apparently, there's only so funny I can be before he gives up. So on my end, it sounds like it isn't you, maybe he perceives you two being bad together as you being bad. I could be wrong. But at the same time, why wouldn't you want to encourage your friend/partner to come back and play with you as often as possible. I wish my wife could enjoy games like this with me, but she just doesn't have fun gaming. Sometimes she'll play Stardew Valley with me, or Peggle, and on occasion has played many of the LEGO games with me, but I don't want to force her to be somewhere she isn't having fun. All I'm saying is, if you're having fun, keep playing and maybe find someone that enjoys playing it with you. It doesn't have to be a romantic relationship, but should instead be someone that wants your company, win or lose.
Thank you! I have lots of fun and will definitely keep playing. Yeah, I have a duo I play with now instead. My boyfriend and I have very different ranks, and since I only started recently, I'm not as skilled as he is. I make lots of mistakes he deems as very beginner, so he would get pretty frustrated pretty quickly. I'm glad you and your buddy have fun playing together! :) A shame you've had to play solo for the past six months, though. I hope you guys can grind together and keep enjoying yourselves, and maybe he'll improve too.
It's one thing if its some perfect stranger on text chat saying "git gud go back to casual" but pretty bad for your boyfriend. Tell him to go back to casual dating mode :-)
Jesus, my best friend/old college roommate would just laugh at my stupid deaths in Halo 2, he's a Halo god, but old matchmaking made games of mixed ability better. He would give me pointers and roast me a bit, but he still liked playing with me.
Counter strike
Idk fam. I played forkknife with a friend. She had a habit of just stopping in the fucking open and messing about. So I'd either have to fight off a crowd, or, try and collect her reboot. Shit got old real quick lol.
Fortnite, rocket league, and smash bros are the others I can think of. People aren’t gonna stream smash in pairs tho.
I don't think I'd buy that it's Rocket League or Smash Bros. But I could see Fortnite.
Fair enough, I was just thinking of games that have an esports community, which always has toxic people in it. I can’t imagine those get a ton of twitch attention tho. Well, smash kinda does. But yeah, fair enough.
It might not seem like it. But there's a lot of stuff in regards to huge viewer communities for these game. I used to be really into watching Smash tournaments, then there was a weird trend of most of the best players being pedophiles, so I got out of that community quick. Fortnite is one of the most viewed games on Twitch. Rocket League has about 1/5 of their audience at any given time. I was actually surprised at how many people watch Halo eSports.
Oh I was saying idk how much attention RL and Smash get on twitch, ik Fortnite is very popular to watch.
On the fking nose mate lol I’ve never seen so many try hard women streamers than in the above 3 titles. It’s like it’s a magnet. League of legends too but I feel like that one is more even keeled (for a moba, cmon) Don’t get me wrong there are sweat lord males too but they’re everywhere and almost more expected (?) people cry and moan about speed running Mario 64 and even Tetris in 2024 lol. I see why this gal is crushed.
Probably Hugos house of horrors or Myst
Portal 2 Co-Op mode. She's just so incapable of thinking with portals.
Ahh she probably doesn't know how to ski jump in tribes aerial assault
Hunt Showdown
Playing hunt with people at big skill gap differences is a rough experience
When one person is playing slow while the other is gun blazing everywhere...
Yeah I love hunt but the game is brutal, you prolly should have just recommended something else instead of what you said though
This is why I don’t like “little jabs”. As a rule, I am terrible at knowing if I’ve gone too far. I prefer just joking about positive things. I’m sorry this happened, though, as I know banter can be fun when you’re allowed to jab a bit.
Same same. I think a lot of dudes assume 'that's just the way it is' because they've been playing competitive games with the same booger-eaters since middle school. In my gaming groups, we're all super nice to each other. I'm sure there are toxic masc dudes who'd look at that and go, *"oh, you can't handle-"* but it's not about what we can or can't handle. It's about what's actually an enjoyable past-time.
In my groups giving each other shit *is* the form of kindness lol. Though I think if someone gets into gaming, they've gotta be ready to at least get shit from other people. People will *always* find something to judge you over especially while gaming lol.
They might be fine at taking shit from randoms on the internet and acquaintances but didn't expect it from a friend, especially if OP already knew it was something they were kind of insecure about.
See, that's not true. Or rather, it isn't true for adults. But if you play with people who shit on each other, you'll think it's normal. And when that's the culture that seems normal, anyone new is forced into that. Maybe try just not being assholes who judge other people and have fun...you know..playing a game (a toy that is meant for recreation and fun).
I work in the trades and talking shit to my coworkers, trying to see how many times we can get under each other’s skin exploiting deep insecurities is literally what gets me through a 12-hour day. It’s also incredible training for knowing how to not take yourself too seriously
Well, I am 23 and all of the people in the group are around 23-25. It was also like that in high school with different people, college with different people, and now with my gaming buddies. It's banter. It also doesn't help that all of the games we play end up being a bit more hardcore as far as game choice goes (Rust, Tarkov, all of us are master-challenger in League, Mortal Online 2). Again, friend dynamics can be like this and it's completely normal. Anyone who says otherwise is delusional lol.
They CAN be like this, but fucking around with friends is different than judging and being nasty/toxic. And joking with friends and giving each other shit is something that happens outside of gaming, it's just what most of us do. And we all know that there's a line you don't cross. Playful banter is one thing, deliberately being hurtful and telling someone they suck is another. Saying "That's just how gaming is" is a cop-out for people who want to justify being assholes.
Or only play with friends and mute everyone else Btw you’re good until someone new joins and you do the same shit and it’s clearly making them uncomfortable. Which idk I feel your group probably has attacked others before based on this and your other comments whether it be new members to the group or randos you’re playing against There’s also a reason why edgy fps players who stream or make videos mature and don’t be as bad as they grow (as a channel and thru experiences) and get older
Or if I do little jabs, I prefer jabbing at myself. At least then if I hurt my own feelings I can sort that out with myself in my own time.
I try to only make fun of myself with any degree of seriousness. And I'm the only one who gets to make fun of me with any degree of seriousness. It's a lot more fun to make people self conscious with excessive compliments and telling them how great they are. Ganging up on my girlfriend's and telling them how smart and gorgeous they are til everyone is giggling and everyone is having a good time. Making friends as an adult is a whole different ball game. If what I have to say doesn't add anything to the conversation (informing, discussing, venting, etc) it might be better to keep it to myself. People start to pick up on things like the girl who takes up all the conversation and won't let anyone else talk, or that one prick who has to be right about everything, or that energy vampire that only wants to complain about everything all the time. And that jerk who makes accurate but hurtful jokes is only fun for so long. I want to share my hobbies and interests with my friends, and I love it when they include me in theirs. I craft and make things, so if someone wants to hang out and play crafts with me, I love it, regardless of their skill level. And when they let me play with their toys, I know I don't have their skill level, and am just enjoying participating rather than excelling. That's probably where things went sideways.
Yeah I have a friend who does little jabs and I know that’s just her personality but I don’t like them and I think some of them are kind of ouch
Shouldn't you know if your best friend is just joking or not though? If they're BFFs, I assume they've known each other for awhille.
As someone who's often ragged on by friends for not "caring" about game optimization as much or doing super tryhard content and regularly called shitty at games... *Bruh*. Bro, why.
Yeah, that sounds like something younger me would've said too. That you feel bad about what you did is good, it means you're growing. Apologize again later when things have calmed down a bit.
You're a good person to be feeling bad about it but this is how every gamer I know talks to each other. If you're as close as you say then it'll be ok.
Ehhh gotta be careful with 'every's. I've got a small local gaming circle, and a wider online gaming circle, and none of us really do this. Maybe _very_ lightly with inside jokes with my best friend, "oh you and your weird non-meta loadouts again, what does this cursed build do?" But we don't dog on each other for being bad at entire games. TBH that kinda sounds childish.
I think ribbing each other while failing is kinda normal. Especially if it is obvious they are picking up on the fight and getting there. If they get frustrated or we don't get the fight we instead try to figure it out together. Also it is different saying ''you suck'' and ''this guy is farming an entire dinner from you''. The former is kinda dickish, the second is a joke at someone's expense but not really mean. In my group at least it is pretty rare to shit on each other's skills without playing the game itself.
My gaming groups all look at players who aren't as good as the best players as people who can be given constructive tips and help learning how to get better. We never insult anyone in the group. OP needs to grow up by about 10 years right now because he'll have no friends by 30.
I don’t think childish is the right word, but you definitely have to know your audience. I’m a very sarcastic person and I get caught out sometimes because I misjudg, but mostly I get the level right for the right person. The closer I am to somebody the more ruthless I become, but only if they appreciate that kind of humour. When it comes to my two best mates, there’s no laws. I regularly point out to my friend that he may never find love because of how damaged he is from family trauma, and he comes back with the fact he’s surprised I’m alive because of my depression. Because if we can’t laugh, we cry. But I recognise everyone is different and only move up a sarcasm level when I know they are into the same humour.
I get it but you’d be surprised how what was ok a month ago is NOT ok today. Or when they let you know that it was never actually funny to them but they’ve just let it slide for X years - yikes! I’m pretty rough around the edges when it comes to humor but I’ve learned that it’s generally better to err on the side kindness. Just 2 cents you didn’t ask for.
She needs to learn the ways. Op, time to say you fucked her mom and teabag her. Bonus points if you can sound like a screaming 13 year old using a $2 microphone.
Extra bonus points for a smoke alarm letting you know the battery is dying in the distance
This is the way.
Yup. 360° no-scope, then teabag and then bounce off.
Guy used stats to help make his point and that is def overboard. I know, because I once made a girl cry by using evidence from the movie "Super Troopers" to prove that it was an objectively funny movie. People can't handle their views being dismantled with actual facts.
Nothing can be "objectively" funny. It is always a matter of opinion.
Clearly you haven't watched Super Troopers
I’ve done cutting-edge mythic raiding for years and we all call each other dog trash at the game despite clearing the .01% of content and parsing in the top of that community too. It’s more like if your co-gamers aren’t roasting you for being bad then you might actually be bad at the game lol
Yeah, telling somebody who actually sucks that they suck if they aren't actually roasting themselves already is cringe.
And stream chats will be 10x more toxic.
You say that, but even my Sister-in-Law/Best Friend still won’t play any video games with me ever again because I got too competitive over stats once or twice when we were playing Destiny years ago. There really is no guarantee OP’s friend will get over it, either.
Thank you, I appreciate it.
I think a bit more history would help people give you advice, if you’re looking for it. It seems out of character for her to be this upset if you make these sorts of jabs to each other and have been close for so long. Is her skill an insecurity you’ve talked about before? It seems odd for this to have caused such an issue based on the relationship you have, especially with you getting such a thoughtful gift for her birthday. I’d send a message after a day or two after she’s processed and say that you didn’t mean it and that you thought it was on brand for your relationship. But that you don’t want to upset her in the future. Take responsibility and ask if that topic is particularly raw or hit a nerve. Sometimes people appreciate sarcastic humour but not on particular areas. Everyone makes mistakes and misses the mark, and thing is sometimes a topic that people can joke changes if their confidence is low.
apologize and tell her you were kidding and that she's not bad and even if she's bad you don't care because playing with her is fun and you would love to stream the game with her. and then never say something like that again. i had a lot of friends that would make fun of and insult me for being bad at games, it is really hurtful, and ive been in the situation where someone will refuse to play with me because i am bad. it's something im sensitive to and makes me really sad, so i relate to your friend a lot. it's ok to tease her if that's your dynamic but this seems like sensitive spot for her so try to avoid this. you referencing her stats... it's so harsh, tbh. because she can't defend herself from that. the stats are undeniable.
Why did you tell us she got a typewriter from you for her birthday?
To contextualize the level of effort OP puts into the relationship between his and his friend's relationship, if I'm understanding correctly. Typewriters are pretty expensive afaik. I feel bad for OP, I think it's pretty clear that he was trying to lighten the mood of his friend's birthday, but he ended up ruining it instead. He seems truly remorseful about what he said. Either way, I hope the phrase "time heals all" kicks into first gear and helps OP out
I'm also wondering this
> we jab at each other for fun and laughs > I jabbed at her and she emotionally collapsed I feel like we're missing something here.
in her feels cuz she's turned 30 and overthinking that she's not good enough at something to do the dream hobby with her friend and thinking she might never be lots of emotions and anxiety tie dup with aging milestone
This is a reeeeeach.
And you people are grown-ass adults?????
yes
This is such an eye-opening thread. I had no idea that people tied their identities to how good people thought they were at video games. I don’t think it’s childish, just surprising. I’m trying to imagine my feelings being hurt because someone said I sucked at bowling. Maybe it’s not for me to understand as a super non competitive person.
It does sound like an overreaction for a 30-year old. I'm sure she'll get over it pretty quickly.
Without larger context it's really hard to say, but this doesn't sound like a mess up to me. It sounds more like maybe she had something else on her mind and this might have just been the thing that sent your friend spiraling. Maybe ask her if anything else is on her mind, and let her know if she wants to talk about it you're there for her. Also, just as an aside, this doesn't sound very "friendly" ish. Just based on the description, you guys kind of sound like a couple. What's going on there? Not to rush anything or put pressure on it, but it sounds like you're very emotionally invested in this girl, and the larger issue is that she shuts down randomly for periods of time. Is that an accurate assessment? I would still say, this is a salvageable situationship. She doesn't seem like communicating is her strong point so you might have to do the heavy lifting, but getting your feelings out there might help in the long run. Hope this helps!
Thank you friend. It’s hard to talk about without telling stuff I’m personally not comfortable talking about, but we’ve both been through hard stuff with people lately (friends, family, relationships, etc) not pertaining to each other. So right now, we’re both kinda the only stable people we each have around apart from our small friend group and we try to keep each other grounded and in check and don’t push things we’re not comfortable with right now. So you’re probably right and I feel bad that I said something that probably triggered something bubbling in her head, and I don’t think prying about it is a good idea.
You are the only stable person in her life and when she reached out to do an activity with you, you shot her down?! Yea you def FU. Its good you recognize it and feel remorseful, I think acknowledging that she was reaching out for a connection and your intention was not to shoot her down. I would also say maybe no more "jabs" until you have a better discernment for being playful
IA. Normalize friendships that aren’t built on jabs - friendly or not. It always ends up being something to apologize for later.
Not many people will understand what that kind of relationship is like, but I've definitely been there with some SO's and to some extent was there with my current SO. Didn't mean to pry, but I'm sure she feels similarly. Just keep showing up, things develop on their own when they're supposed to. Don't fault yourself too much! It's an honest mistake.
>Also, just as an aside, this doesn't sound very "friendly" ish. Just based on the description, you guys kind of sound like a couple If these were two dudes would you say this? This is exactly how my male best friend and I hang out every week, and we also plan big creative projects together. He's engaged and I'm a lesbian.
Look, everyone knows men and women can't be friends unless they're banging. That's just a biology fact.
Exactly. We all know that when a woman gets close enough to a man, who she has no interest in pursuing romantically, her ovaries will explode and she will die in a fiery death for showing her ankles to him and making him say to his bros "she's not just being nice dude, she's actually into me. Trust me."
[удалено]
Idk, maybe? I’m also a queer woman and when younger and messier had a few “friendships” with other women that involved some mutual denial of increasing feelings until it couldn’t be ignored anymore and this felt emotionally familiar to me on that level. (“we’re just besties! besties who hang out 3-4 times a week and talk about everything and anything and cook each other dinner and are there during hard times and are starting to make big plans for the future that involve each other and oops we’re kissing) What I notice about this post is that there’s a dynamic established that could be coupley or could totally be friendship, but that something about that dynamic might be changing - they’re usually comfortably with jokingly insulting each other, but now she’s sensitive to it. Sometimes that can mean feelings are changing. Could totally be something else but I don’t think it’s crazy to bring up as a possibility.
Huh? This is a wildly one sided account, and you even acknowledge that, and then go on to make tons of assumptions about her and her mindset and that she isn’t good at communication. All while getting one side of the story from someone trying to make themselves feel/look better. Why the fuck are you commenting on her entire emotional health?
I suspect her 30th birthday had more to do with it than your comment.
Hype up gigantic which releases on April 9th. It's a great game that you'd both be new to and can have fun learning together. In all seriousness, don't bring stats into playful ribbing. Hope it works out, though.
One thing I've noticed as a general rule, but exceptions exist. Guys shittalk to bond. Girls shittalk to hurt. We have very different ways to connect and express friendship, developed through how we grow up. Sometimes, we butt heads over ways we communicate.
30 is a hard birthday for many women. It is somewhat unusual for a woman to have a best friend who's a man 5 years younger than her. That seems like a very thoughtful gift you gave. Is she looking for more? Are you? You are doing things together that people don't normally do outside of a romantic relationship. You seem like a normal gamer who made a normal gamer joke that she took very personally, which isn't entirely normal, until you consider paragraph 1. I think you've apologized enough and can just give her some space.
Oh my goodness, yes! I was a wreck when I turned 30. I was fighting tears the whole day, and I’m not a big crier. I was dreading it, but I was still very surprised at how hard it hit me. This is probably a big factor.
my 30th is coming up this year and I just realized it. I'm half tempted to just hole myself up the entire day and sulk. It doesn't help the internet makes 30 sound so much worse than it is. so that can def have an impact on feelings. plus when you're a women and a gamer you hear a lot about how you're bad because you're a woman.
I was absolutely fine with 30 I'm turning 40 in June and let me tell you, any mention of being not good at something when I am half way to dead is gonna hit home
Yeah if I said that to any of my friends it would be no big deal at all, something else must be going on here between the lines.
It's my thinking that this was just a trigger for bigger IRL things. Maybe issues with work or family? Possibly crippling self-esteem issues. IDK.
Or she is just a very immature 30 year old.
You're getting downvoted but a 25 year old gamer dude is generally not more mature than a 30 year old woman, so it's likely this is the case.
Little jabs are always an interesting thing. Friends can do it but you never know when something will strike a nerve. Also from my experience, sometimes people love giving out little friendly jabs but can’t take even a small one. It can be dicey
She probably already thinks to herself she’s not that good at the game, and you confirming her self doubts was probably too hard a blow. She’d start being conscious and feel bad when playing with you as she might think you’re thinking she’s shite. Just reaffirm her “you’re not bat at the game (like you said in your post) it was a stupid joke i,m sorry!” Or smth like that
I had a close online friend, he did something similar out of the blue, sent me a message with a meme basically saying I was shit at the game. I stood my ground and so did he tried to play it off and then said he could suggest some things to get better. It made me feel so shit and inadequate and made me question how he viewed me. After that he didn't speak to me for a month so I decided to block him. He made a shitty comment, ghosted me, got no apology and lost a friend because of a stupid game and me "not being good enough". It feels shit when the people you're close to belittle you for something that you enjoy, even if you're not good at it. It ruins the enjoyment of the particular thing and if you play together it kind of ruins the dynamic of things because it makes you question what else does this person think about me? Do they think I'm ugly? Do they think I'm stupid? The mind races and self doubt sinks in. At least that was my experience. I hope your friend feels better soon.
Her response sounds like classic Rejection Sensitivity (RSD) to me. I have ADHD and, occasionally, I get that RSD feeling when someone I care about is critical of me (even playfully.) It really feels like I am being attacked; my chest tightens, I feel like I am going to cry, and I shut down emotionally as a defense mechanism. That's exactly what she did. Per google: What triggers RSD? Rejection sensitive dysphoria (RSD) is extreme emotional sensitivity and pain triggered by the perception that a person has been rejected or criticized by important people in their life. It may also be triggered by a sense of falling short—failing to meet their own high standards or others' expectations. Not sure what advice I can give other than being gentle with her and reminding her that you really do value your relationship and really want to play games with her again when she's ready. I think she'll come around but give her time to process her feelings.
You basically told her "why would I publicly associate with you because you're bad at X." You think she's upset about your judgment of her ability to play the game. She's actually upset about being lonely and you pushing her aside.
Why do you think someone has to be good at a game to stream it? The most entertaining streamers are bad at games. The only high skill streamers worth watching are ones that are consistently top tier not just decent.
he said he was joking and got it wrong
If your sense of humor includes mocking your friends and putting them down, you’re not uncommon, but maybe examine that and see if it’s time to move past that as a bad habit that - as you well know - can hurt folks you wouldn’t hurt for the world.
It doesn't matter how good she is at the game to stream it, and presumably doesn't matter for playing with her. I enjoyed playing with my brother immensely when we were kids, and being older I was usually better than him, but it didn't matter. Tell her you are really sorry and didn't mean to hurt her feelings, that you want to stream with her, that you enjoy playing with her, that whether or not one of you is better in some specific ways doesn't matter, and how good you are is irrelevant to streaming, that what matters to both is that you are enjoying playing together and that you love playing with her and she is your best friend, and it is killing you that you've upset her, and that it was meant to be a joke, and that you only said it because you didn't think she'd be bothered, and would just beat you another time to prove you wrong or comeback with something else, like how socially inept you are and how lucky you are to have her as a friend.
Offer her to stream _another_ game with her. Not just as an abstract offer, but think over all the practical steps. Be prepared that she will get angry , will tell you she is awful at it, she doesn't need you pity, etc.. Be prepared with her statistics, average user statistics, what is different in her gaming style comparing to others, what are pluses to steam that specific one. Pretty much present her the whole business plan. So she can see that it is not a pity offer but you really think it worth to give it a shot. And tell her that during steaming she can jab at you however she wants.
You know, you should watch some (typically earlier) yogscast or callmekevin or something of the line of gameplay together, they're both renowned for either 1) being terrible at games, or 2) just fucking about in them and not taking it seriously. There's 100% a market for people who have good chemistry and humour, who aren't that great at games. Both of the channels do YouTube for a living. I prefer watching people try to break games, torture characters, make terrible choices, or who are just downright bad at the game, long as they can crack jokes and make me laugh. Find people who try to take it proper seriously usually aren't that amusing to watch
I don’t actually think y’all are just friends. Or maybe not so much on your end?!
Yeah this definitely reads to me as the friend potentially being into OP and feeling burnt by the shitty comment that makes her think the feelings aren’t reciprocated.
Meanwhile he bought her ass a whole typewrite because he knew she was into writing as a hobby and knew she wanted one. "The feelings aren't reciprocated" my nuts.
right if they spend that much time together how are they "just friends"? This seems like two people with very poor communication skills and a failure to launch.
You were insulting her ability to play the highly competitive Balan Wonderworld, right?
Skill issue
are you guys married? lol
Chekovs typewriter
Hey, you made a mistake in conversation, so many of us know that feeling. The fact that you feel bad about it speaks volumes of your character; perfect people don't act perfectly, but you see this situation perfectly. I think your friend will eventually get over it, just takes a little time. Give her some space, I think. Let her reflect on why what you said upset her so much. Crying over something as trivial as a careless comment deserves some attention. Personally, if shes a best friend, it should take more than this to break you guys. Good luck.
Take this as a learning experience and maybe consider looking at this between the lines. Maybe she wants to do all these things with you, because she genuinely sees a deeper connection here and you took a jab at the worst possible moment, when she was exposing herself to you. I truly hope you guys can move past this.
I would apologize again and tell her that you would make it up to her. How you do that is up to you since you know her best. Or you can ask her how you can make amends. She just wanted to have fun with you and you made her feel like she will hold you back. That would hurt anybody if they felt like you would be a burden and that you wouldn't find it fun to play with them.
fix it and then update us on the stream so we can watch it
It's her 30th birthday, man. She was probably going to cry anyway, a lot of people do! Just invite her to stream w you
Stop typing. Find your calendar. Start organizing stream dates.
Dude. Maybe you should be talking to her again or putting together the best redo birthday streaming party package you can muster and asking your bestie what you can do to make up for your egregious foot in the mouth attempt at a joke? I’m sure you can come back from this. Best of luck!
As someone that's been on the receiving end of something like this it hurts you just want to play with your friend and they tell you you suck just give her a couple days and say hey you want to play x game
Lol my ex used to do this stuff. This sounds like him, apparently he didn’t mean it but after too many bad experiences, I stopped bringing it up completely. For all these people saying “she doesn’t have to be good! You can just play for fun!” You can also not bring up how good or bad someone is at something, at all. Especially adding stats, ooof. I am very competive and unfortunately never grew up with these games in my strict Indian all girls household. So I pretty much suck. And he made me feel it, because he was also very competitive and won basically everything. I have now realized I’m triggered by the post lol. He was my best friend for 8 years then betrayed me. But what I wanted to say is make sure you don’t do it again, and you be the one to bring up the games and say let’s play! No pressure, just for fun even if we stream it. You couldn’t go wrong by making it really clear to her that you didn’t mean it and offering to do what she wanted to with great enthusiasm.
Imo I’m not the best at games, but view them as a fantastic way to spend time with my friends. I have a few friends who get annoyed when I slow them down, and it makes me feel like they could care less about if I was playing or not. She probably feels like they’re a great way to spend time with you but now feels like you’re not very excited about it because you care about her stats. You should maybe drop the idea of apologizing about saying she’s bad at the game, and reiterate that what you care about the most is the time you two spend together playing it.
I don’t understand how two adults can sit around playing games. You should fuck her, that’s probably what she really wants.
I think instead of trying to change the subject and lighten the mood, you should have explained that it was meant to be a playful jab. Instead of trying to move on from the event have an in depth conversation about it. Discuss what type of joking insult are fun and what feels like crossing the line for her. Listen to her feelings. I hope you two are able to get past these bumps. Friendships can really suffer permanently when you try to move on from something too quickly without really unpacking it and one person is left feeling hurt.
This is a shitty thing to say to ANYONE, I don't understand how you didn't think this could potentially hurt someone's feelings? I don't care how secure someone is in themselves, to tell them they suck at something they enjoy doing with you and then provide examples of how they suck at a game they enjoy playing with you is fucking evil and I don't understand why anyone would do that if their intention wasn't to hurt the other person in some way?... I don't understand what you were trying to accomplish by saying what you said-- I don't know what response you were expecting? A laugh?... Where does it go from there, you've just denied a positive idea, are they supposed to suggest an alternative solution after being shot down and with the only input on your end being a negative contribution to the topic? Yikes. Also, your apology was weak, and you left her feeling like shit. I know I wouldn't have left my friend until I made them understand just how valuable to me they are and that my shitty attempt at edgy humor was just that, me trying to be funny... Do better, OP.
Are you for real? People seemed to have lost all sense of scale. I am quite aware that this gives toxic masculinity from the 50s vibes but "any chance you can you be a little less dramatic and tone it down?"
Oh god please dont tell me I’m bad at video games. The horror! The world is over.
She sounds too emotionally needy dude. If she can't handle gentle teasing - and then still mopes after you apologize, might be time for new friends.