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"It's just a Game..." why this phrase is worst than anything else.

Teufel Monkey··19 votes·11,357 views

When entering any mode in League of Legend the goal is generally to do your best for both your benefit and the benefit of your team, bar of course maybe the odd custom game here or there. Usually playing with 1 or 2 friends at a time, there are of course the 2-4 random players I am paired with when playing my usual temporarily available game-type (in this case hexakill) or a good o' aram. Quite nearly 90% of the games I've played in the past week have resulted in losses, mostly due to feeding or other players refusing to allow someone to play a champion and inevitably doing very poorly with that champion. Now of course there is room for error, everyone makes them, but even when trying to convey some sort of advice in chat, the phrase "It's just a game," almost always pops up. Of course it's a game, i am playing it after all. But to everyone I've seen use this phrase, it means "here's my excuse for not putting in an earnest effort to not just win, but to help others enjoy their experience as well." The simple utterance of this phrase which used convey at least good intentions no longer seems to do so in the League community. If you are going to state, hey this is just a game, then PLAY the game especially since you are playing it with others, especially if they are strangers who may not enjoy your unconventional or disruptive antics as much as your friends. Now i am wording this much more kindly then most probably feel about this subject, but I just want to establish a frustration that I am sure is shared between a lot more players than just myself and a few friends. Reply if you know the feeling bros!

33 Comments

Wynsl13 votes

Well just because someone says "Hey it's just a game" doesn't mean they're not trying. They are trying but they don't want people raging over their performance. I mean come on. If someone does bad in a game and they ARE trying what then? You rage at them?

MidEvilKnight3k12 votes

Who say's they aren't playing the game to the best of their ability? The phrase "it's just a game" when said usually means you shouldn't get upset at your allies, or you should move on after a bad fight. Sure it might have caused the loss, but that isn't a reason to quit, get so mad you can't play (tilt), or stop trying.

However, most people read it and think it means that they are not trying because it is just a game.

As a result, people should stop using the phrase because it isn't working.

l AM SCRIPTING12 votes

It's just a game.

-Yours truly, a diamond player.

Shiro Kiran2 votes

"Everyone know diamond is below Bronze" -dunko

Oksana8 votes

Look I play to just have fun. This season I played what? about 120 ranked games and won 75% of them. I have high MMR but i'm in gold 5 just because of the reason I don't rank. When I go play normal's, I'm not going to pretend its ranked and go full try hard. I'm not going to try my hardest and my best. For fucks sake I might even go Rengar/Vlad bot lane just for the hell of it. Because It is just a game and it is for fun. If your playing normal's your playing it to try new things, learn new champs, have fun with friends or just to play because you don't enjoy the ranked arena. Sometimes when I say, Its just a game, its not because I'm loosing or i'm doing bad in lane. Sometimes I say it because someone else is raging and taking it to far, or because I want to try something new and people think its stupid. Whats the point of having normal's and ranked if everyone is going to take normal's so seriously ? summoner 6

Bionic Avian5 votes

You have to remember, it is ONLY a game. Unless you're making a living off of it, it's nothing more. It's not your livelihood, it's not going to make or break relationships. It's a game. That's it.

Hopeslayer4 votes

its not just league that people say it, its just something bad players say as an excuse for doing poorly, like they are not trying to win a competitive game

Drakoniak5 votes

its not just league that people say it, its just something bad players say as an excuse for doing poorly, like they are not trying to win a competitive game

Bad players, Toxic players, Feeders, Trolls, afkers, ragequiters. Lets see what will happen season 5.

arkhammer2 votes

Lets see what will happen season 5.

Same thing that happened in Season 4?

Wullf4 votes

I know the feeling, but it is nothing wrong with this attitude unless it is in ranked.

Ye, I do not agree with this attitude but in normals, you cannot expect players to try their full best. That is kind of exhausting, Normals are to have fun, excercise and play without any obligations.

Still it is no less frustrating.

Rose crusader4 votes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzpndHtdl9A

TheRealBOBDOLE4 votes

I use this phrase. Heres the thing: It is a video game, which i play on MY free time, so I can enjoy MYSELF, doing MY hobby, for MY OWN recreation.

I owe you nothing when i join a game because I'm not there for you. I'm there for ME. I play for ME.

I work for someone else, i care for other people, i pay companies money for bills. i play games for ME.

This is important to understand, because people on league seem to be under the impression that when you join a game, you are agreeing to play in whatever way is expected of you by the rest of the team, and it simply isn't true.

There are some guidelines to follow, riot has made those clear. And contrary to common belief, NONE OF THEM say that I am required to play YOUR way.

arkhammer1 votes

I owe you nothing when i join a game because I'm not there for you. I'm there for ME. I play for ME.

Such a great response about a TEAM game. You utterly don't get the point of the game. It's not for YOU. It's for your TEAM. There's 4 other guys there with you. If you want to play a solo game, queue up a bot game and play all you want for YOU.

TheRealBOBDOLE1 votes

This is false. Professional players are there for the team. They are paid to play, and play a certain way.

Anyone who plays as recreation is not bound by the same limitations as a contracted player.

Your comments perfectly make my point. You feel that no one should be able to stray from YOUR version of the game that you have in your head.

If that was the case, there would never be any deviation in strategy, or meta, or game-play. Do you understand that if what your saying is true, there is literally ( and i'm using the term properly) no reason for balancing the game? If everyone always played the way you think they are "supposed" to, then there would never be an OP build, there would never have been an AP Yi, and stacking 2 bloodthirsters on Teemo in s2 wouldn't have ever been tried.

But i did try it. And it worked. And i'm not sorry for it. I'm sorry that there are so many narrow minded people such as yourselves, that you think a hobby such as video games should only be enjoyed YOUR way, and there is no room for deviation. You are the problem here, not the people trying to have fun.

arkhammer1 votes

I think it's funny that your first reaction is to resort to name-calling. I'm not the one who's "narrow minded." If you were originally talking about playing off-meta champs or unique builds, I'd be totally fine with that. "Playing for you," in that case, still means that your eye is on having the team achieve victory; your eye is still on helping out your team. That is the point I was making. Recognizing that it is a team game and that the goal ought to be to help out the team to win, regardless of how you achieve that.

If "playing for me," though, means that you can just be a total jackass in the game, solo play, ignore your team, objectives, pings, etc., then you're not playing by "my" rules. You're playing by the game's. The game IS about team play, regardless if you choose to play that way or not. It simply is. It's a game where 5 players play 5 other players, in TEAMS. "Playing for ME" implies that you are just playing for yourself, and that you want to do whatever you want to do, even if its to the detriment of your team.

That's not some biased, personal, "arkhammer" way of viewing the game. If you play selfishly as described above, you're not only letting you and your reputation down, you're letting down your team. You're wasting 4 other guys' time because you want to be a special snowflake. That's not "my" viewpoint. It's just common courtesy. People don't intentionally waste other peoples' time unless they're trying to be a jackass.

Again, if you want to be a selfish special snowflake and play a bot game all by yourself and you can be as selfish and toxic as you want. When you queue up with other people, though, the least you can do is respect their time and give it good effort.

TheRealBOBDOLE1 votes

It's not about being selfish, toxic, or a special snowflake. You're muddying the waters by throwing in negative terms that don't apply. Its simple logic:

If you went to the movies with your group of 4 friends and watched "The Hobbit"; then, when you were all done, you discussed what you liked about the movie, and your friend started telling you that because you liked Hobbits more than Dwarves , then YOU WATCHED IT WRONG, how would you feel about that friend? I'd tell them that is a stupid and illogical way of looking at how someone enjoys their own recreational entertainment, and that it isn't about how THEY want to watch it, but how i myself want to enjoy said entertainment.

The principle stands that when i play a game, watch a movie, listen to music, read a book, IT IS FOR ME. If the rules say not to do something, then we need to follow those rules. However, the thing being complained about here IS NOT AGAINST THE RULES. So it isn't fair to treat those people unfairly because you decided you don't like it.

If it was such a big deal, we wouldn't be allowed to deviate from the meta. We wouldn't be offered champion choice, or role, or anything. But we are, and there are going to be people (like me) that don't want to always play the same way everytime. And sometimes i'm gonna go ap Xin Zhao because i feel like it. It is normals, it IS just a game, and i have a right to play AP Xin Zhao until Riot says not to.

Teufel Monkey2 votes

Perhaps you should play with friends in custom games or single player games, there is no point in playing a game that is team oriented when you have little to no interest in the team. This here is a prime example of what I am talking about.

OJ1912 votes

I use this phrase. Heres the thing: It is a video game, which i play on MY free time, so I can enjoy MYSELF, doing MY hobby, for MY OWN recreation.

I owe you nothing when i join a game because I'm not there for you. I'm there for ME. I play for ME.

I work for someone else, i care for other people, i pay companies money for bills. i play games for ME.

This is important to understand, because people on league seem to be under the impression that when you join a game, you are agreeing to play in whatever way is expected of you by the rest of the team, and it simply isn't true.

There are some guidelines to follow, riot has made those clear. And contrary to common belief, NONE OF THEM say that I am required to play YOUR way.

Holy carp you're delusional.

What you just said is the equivalent of people saying in team based FPS' "I have fun teamkilling and it's part of the game so I teamkill because I can play however I want to have MY fun"

TheRealBOBDOLE1 votes

It is not the equivalent of that. What you and the other responders are saying is the equivalent of: "I have an opinion on how the game should be played, and no one elses opinion matters, and i only want it my way, ban everyone who disagrees".

LiftsLikeGaston3 votes

It isn't worse than your english, that's for sure.

a call beyond3 votes

chill out tryhard

TenSlashTen3 votes

"It's just a game," almost always pops up. Of course it's a game, i am playing it after all. But to everyone I've seen use this phrase, it means "here's my excuse for not putting in an earnest effort to not just win, but to help others enjoy their experience as well."

Because they're losers.

ThatWerido3 votes

I can understand the point you're making here, op. But honestly, there's no reason to get angry over a loss at any gamemode except for ranked. When I play normals, it's usually for fun or i'm practicing a new champion or role that I may or may not be good at.

Nkeyo3 votes

I've had people going 0/10/0 and saying "It's just a game", or "It's just normals", and their feeding either loses us the game, or drags it out and wastes everybody's time. What this post is getting at is that it's an excuse to write-off the fact that you're being a prick, and are really just playing to waste everyone's time. Want to try some troll build? Go play a custom, or bots, or put together a 5 man group if you have any friends, but don't go randomly ruin people's games and act like it doesn't matter because "it's just a game". We play and put time into this game in an effort to have fun, and if you're being a prick and ruining that, it's not about the game, it's about you wasting our time and fun just because you can. It's like a 20-minute car ride taking an hour because somebody is being stupid on the road, and having them lean out their window and say "It's just a car ride" when you want them to stop being stupid. The thing is, it's not about the car ride, it's about them wasting 40 minutes of your time so they can act like a special snowflake.

The worst part is people here are defending it. By all means, if you enjoy people wasting your time, ignore this thread and everything in it. If you laugh and have fun when somebody makes something twice as hard as it needs to be, then ignore this, but if it happens to bother you when somebody wastes your time, then have some empathy and be a decent human being you worthless sacks of shit. This isn't a single-player game, the other players aren't ghosts created for your amusement. /endrant

Konidias3 votes

The "it's just a game" people are just as bad as the people who do really badly and then try to turn it around like they are trolling.

Both are making sad excuses as to why they are doing poorly. Both are lying to themselves.

I've played quite a few online games and usually when my team is getting upset at a teammate, the teammate either uses the "it's just a game, lol" excuse, or they will go full troll and say "lol u mad?" as if their plan was to intentionally do bad so they could make you mad.

I mean, if you can't beat the enemy team, I guess you can have fun trolling your own team...

PL555 votes

"It's just a game" is not an excuse though. When someone uses that phrase, they are telling you to chill because you are probably overreacting.

AlbireoAzure2 votes

I use this phrase, ussualy i want to play normals because there should be no pressure, and if i'm playing a champ in pvp for the first time (it's very different than playing in bots) i won't make big plays, but that doesn't mean that i'm not trying or that my allies can rage at me. -Sorry for my english

stillserenity1 votes

i can understand just saying its a game in normals but ranked......im in ranked to to my best, not to play with afkers trollers and all that...but hey hurting someones chances to get to their max ability is fun for some pple...never fun going from silver 1 to silver 5....

Magma Lux Mid1 votes

No offense, but maybe you didn't belong there in the first place if you dropped that much. I mean, I dropped from S1 to S2, but climbed back up in 5 games (2 to get in series, 1 loss, then 2 wins to complete series).

stillserenity1 votes

half my games i have 2 pple afk off the start and 1 feeder....yeah its me thats bad....

The Curator1 votes

It's truly just a game though. The goal is to play, regardless of any self-indulgent fantasies you may have. Only in ranked is the goal to win, but outside of ranked, the goal is to play, that is all. Other people mean nothing, we play together because we must, but nobody is going to care about what you may find fun. The quicker you understand that your opinion means nothing to anyone else but yourself, the more fun you too will have in this game.

Teufel Monkey1 votes

I think a few misconceptions about what I am saying here are that I am talking about Ranked vs. Normal playstyle which i am not. Also I am not crucifying players that are trying out champions or that are not skilled with said champion, I am talking about those who blatantly disregard their teammates by either not participating in a teamfight, running headlong into the full enemy team knowingly, or others that flat out tell their team to basically bugger off because they would rather sink the entire team for their own reason.

Adetto1 votes

People pretty much use it to deflect blame. Odds are they feel targeted, and defensive.

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