My Great Victory Over Me

I have just finished a game on paint. Most people don’t use paint for games, but I like to make my own. My games usually involve building cities and having them fight, though there are many rules as to how many buildings you can build per turn and who can attack what etc etc. It’s rather like Age of Empires, except that the graphics are somewhat inferior and I’m playing both sides.

In this particular game I decided that I would make some new rules. If you had 4 houses, you could build a port. If you had a port, you could build twice as much of anything as you could before. If you had 20 houses, you could build a factory. If you had a factory, you could build 4 times as much as you could before you had the factory. Each side had 3 ports and a factory, meaning that while you could usually build 1 ship per turn, you could now build 32! (1*2*2*2*4).

Unfortunately, this resulted in a rather cluttered map. I switched to defense and tried to wear myself out in battle, but unfortunately I could not beat me, as I could create things faster than I could destroy them! I then tried to target the ports and factories, but due to the rules of the game the attacking armies never got through the defenses. Switching strategies once more, I decided to make huge fleets and have them battle for dominance of the bitmap! Unfortunately, I couldn’t keep track of the attack power, range and mobility of 40 ships in my head.

Far off in a corner of the bitmap, in a small grass and mud hut, one of my loyal subjects was creating a weapon of terror! As the battles raged he slaved away, until finally it was completed. It’s power was unimaginable; it could wipe out vast fleets and huge forts with a single blow, leaving only a white smear in it’s wake. He showed the weapon to me, and I was delighted. Finally! I had a weapon with which to destroy me!

The attack was set for dawn, Tokyo time. Not knowing what time dawn is in Tokyo, and being to lazy to look it up, I ignored orders and launched an attack against myself that took me completely off guard! I destroyed my battling fleets and teeming cities! I destroyed my industrial complexes and grand fortifications. I was heartbroken, I’m sure, to see all my hard work smashed in one move! I then stood before myself, lord of all I surveyed. I begged myself for mercy, but I gave myself none! Then, much to my horror, I saw that my weapon of mass terror had not stopped its work! It swept on through my cities and fleets, until the entire map was white!

I fell to my knees, broken and terrified. I got up from where I had been begging mercy from myself, and I laughed in my face. I then punched myself. It hurt, but I’m not sure which me it hurt. Since my fist hit my head, and both fist and head were wounded, I believe I was hurt as well as myself.

And who won? Well, I believe I did. If I had not developed this device of terror, I certainly never would have, because of my technological superiority over myself. To be sure, if I had not thus destroyed myself, I’m sure I would have fought me for days… which would have been really boring in 16 bit color.