The point of the LAN party was not to be playing games on your computer, the point was to be playing games with your friends, in person. No matter how good your connection, no matter how good your battlestation and headset, it will never compare to the sheer joy of hunching down over your computer while it’s set up on a coffee table, a mass of messily-coiled cables around your ankles, a janky mouse-balled mouse in your hand, as you have the ability to turn and call your best friends slurs and share cold pizza, secure in the knowledge that you’re going to go to sleep on a scratchy couch, wake up around noon tomorrow, and start the whole process all over again.
It’s not the tech, it’s the meatspace community that made it special.
Yea, I spend several hours once a week with my bestfriend a city over. We’d play together in person but mostly we do other stuff that we can’t do online when we hangout in person. That’s not to say that I don’t believe in a certain magic of a LAN party but it’s not like I can’t play 110hrs of Baldur’s Gate unless he’s in same the room.
People act like the only online games are Fortnite and CoD but it’s like, bud, it’s just that your friends are busy and find it hard to set aside time like that.
Oh also many PCs have glass sides and are risky to transport. Ain’t no way I’m risking my Fractal North unless I’m moving. MiniATX though I totally would, all the time.
man lan parties were awesome but I do not miss lugging my 19" crt anywhere. and the reason they existed is now moot - we can lanparty from our homes.
The point of the LAN party was not to be playing games on your computer, the point was to be playing games with your friends, in person. No matter how good your connection, no matter how good your battlestation and headset, it will never compare to the sheer joy of hunching down over your computer while it’s set up on a coffee table, a mass of messily-coiled cables around your ankles, a janky mouse-balled mouse in your hand, as you have the ability to turn and call your best friends slurs and share cold pizza, secure in the knowledge that you’re going to go to sleep on a scratchy couch, wake up around noon tomorrow, and start the whole process all over again.
It’s not the tech, it’s the meatspace community that made it special.
21" Trinitron + stairs = “I’m gonna die here aren’t I”
Yea, I spend several hours once a week with my bestfriend a city over. We’d play together in person but mostly we do other stuff that we can’t do online when we hangout in person. That’s not to say that I don’t believe in a certain magic of a LAN party but it’s not like I can’t play 110hrs of Baldur’s Gate unless he’s in same the room.
People act like the only online games are Fortnite and CoD but it’s like, bud, it’s just that your friends are busy and find it hard to set aside time like that.
Oh also many PCs have glass sides and are risky to transport. Ain’t no way I’m risking my Fractal North unless I’m moving. MiniATX though I totally would, all the time.