Why "Hide and Go Seek" is Ultimately a Crappy Game
Those same kids who were playing that wrestling video game (discussed at large a couple of blog entries back) were also playing the perennial, cross generational kid-game: "Hide and Go Seek." Not at the same time, of course, but later that same day.We all played that game as kids, didn't we? One persons counts while the others "hide" and the counter—after reaching an agreed upon number—will "go seek" the hiders by trying to find them.
When I was a kid, I always thought "Hide and Go Seek" was a pretty lame game. Oh, I played it...but it was always like the recreational version of what Chinese food is to me: I eat it, but it's not my first choice.
It wasn't, though, until the other day that I stopped to reflect upon this and actually come to some conclusions as to why I thought it was a weak game.
For starters, some box-headed kids always wrecked the natural groove of the game by counting to 25 (or whatever the number was) at this breakneck speed. They couldn't even spew out the numbers articulately when they did this, and, like, 5 seconds after starting they'd yell, "Ready or not, here I come!" Which would cause fighting among the players when some no-bullshit hiders called them on their actions and insisted that they back off and be reasonable. Often they'd be forced to agree (can't look for people who are standing in front of you fighting) and, therefore, it really made the "ready or not, here I come" exclamation useless fluff that never stood up.
Secondly, most of us didn't play the game in some 6-floor mansion with 25 rooms on each floor. Usually the playing boundaries were rather small. For me and my sister and cousins, we usually did this kind of thing upstairs at my grandparent's house: two bedrooms, a bathroom, and the hallway. That means that there were, oh, about 6 hiding spots, which is sometimes even fewer than the amount of players partaking. "I found you! Ha ha!" the seeker would gloat as he pointed you out. No s**t, Sherlock Holmes! Without even looking you had to know that I was either under one of the beds, in the closet, behind the dresser, or in the crawl space under the eaves.
But let's suppose neither of the two scenarios I described above are true. Suppose you are the exception to lame "Hide and Go Seek" and you play not only with impressively mature and cooperative kids, but you also have a lot of potential places to hide. If that were true, "Hide and Go Seek" should be a tremendously cool game of strategy and excitement. But it will never be and here is why:
There is a huge flaw—a catch 22, if you will—in the game. Naturally the goal of any game is to be successful at it by employing your talent and skillful execution. The downfall of "Hide and Go Seek" is that if you happen to be very good at it, you pay the price: the better you are, the more boring and, even worse, ruefully lonely the game becomes. Yeah, you're the best. You find spots that no other kid seems to be able to find and you get creative with how to hide yourself and you exercise great self-control and discipline in your ability to remain as silent as can be. And how are you rewarded? You're rewarded by being stuck in a dark hiding place for a long time by yourself. If you're really good, your cronies will likely split before finding you and go find something good to watch on the television. All the while, you're sweating your ass off in some cramped quarter saying, "How much longer will it take for them to find me? This sucks!"
It's much more fun to be a lousy player in this sport. And that never works, except in drinking games—which, mind you, I think are the stupidest, most mullet-headed excuses for an activity the world has ever known.
Well...I didn't know all that stuff about "Hide and Go Seek" when I was 5- or 6-years-old. But whether I knew it or not, I think it's precisely why it was always more fun to play "Freeze Tag."
posted by Steve @ 10:29 PM
9 Comments:
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
I started posting a comment explaining that I've had identical experiences to your Hide-and-seek hijinks, but it became too long and good to be used as a comment, so I posted it on my blog. I credited and suggested your post as a pre-requisite.
And Toni, master editor, it's Red Light-Green Light, not Read Light... =P
Whatever. I just wanted to make sure you were paying attention.
(((Whatever. I just wanted to make sure you were paying attention.)))
I know. I just wanted to point it out so it could bother the hell out of you, knowing you can't change it... >=P
Try not to lose any sleep over it.
{{One of my favorite games to play as a kid combines both your hide-and-go-seek post and your red-green post - the game red light-green light. This was the one where one kid would stand with their back to the rest, a set distance away. They would yell "Green Light" and all the other kids would dash towards them, until they yelled "Red Light," at which point everyone would try to freeze, and the kid at the front would whirl around to try and catch them moving. The object was to try and get past the "Stop Light" kid without getting caught. That one took a lot of skill, as you had to be able to freeze at a moment's notice, in any position you happened to be in. And if you were the Stop Light, you had to be quick in the turn around to catch movement, while at the same time changing up your calls to keep everyone on their toes.
Great times.}}
:-p
Steve's gonna have your ass for that...
Then I will blame it on you. It is always your fault anyway. :D
Paul said:
[[[ started posting a comment explaining that I've had identical experiences to your Hide-and-seek hijinks, but it became too long and good to be used as a comment, so I posted it on my blog. ]]]
Can we do that? Since you did it, I am going to do it. I posted this thing about sour milk on DK's blog that I was thinking sounded more like my own blog entry. So, I'm going to pick it up and use it. You have set the trend.
Come to think of it, I also have a good comment or two on the Captain's Blog, which has basically gone under as fast as it went up. So maybe I'll borrow from that, too.
--
Toni was responsible for this piece of trouble:
[[[ Comment Deleted
This post has been removed by the author ]]]
And Paul remarked:
[[[ Steve's gonna have your ass for that... ]]]
Oh, he's right! I'm going to have to give you a hard time about that! I think you should have kept it. Not that I haven't fixed my own typos, but... that was on a main post, not a comment. This screws up the order. It makes it look like your comments were made after Paul's.
Oh, well...I will live...as long as you keep commenting, I can't be fussy about it, right? So...let's get to that comment:
---
Toni said:
[[[ One of my favorite games to play as a kid combines both your hide-and-go-seek post and your red-green post - the game red light-green light. This was the one where one kid would stand with their back to the rest, a set distance away. They would yell "Green Light" and all the other kids would dash towards them, until they yelled "Red Light," at which point everyone would try to freeze, and the kid at the front would whirl around to try and catch them moving. ]]]
Yeah, we played that, too. There was a variant, though, as the person who was "it" would specifically chant the phrase, "Red Light, Green Light, One, Two, Three." And they'd turn on 3. I'm not sure where the numbers came from, but they were there for us. If memory serves, we also had to tag the person, not pass them (although, you know, it's basically the same idea).
I thought Red Light-Green Light was far superior to HAGS. Hey! "Hags!" I like that. You know, newsgroups all across the web that their little abbreviations and acronyms, such as the very space-nerdish "TESB" for the second (fifth?) Star Wars movie. I think "Hide and Go Seek" should be "HAGS."
Kudos, too, for incorporating the previous post (the stop light one) with this one (HAGS). For that, I forgive you for the post deletion. :)
LOL, I was going to leave it there typo and all, but the heckling got to me. I caved to the pressure, and I am sorry. I will strive to do better in the future. (grin)
Does anyone else think the comments box needs a spellcheck like the post box? Or at least a feature that lets you edit your own comments...
As for red light-green light and "HAGS", those were both games I remember playing growing up. Belive it or not, that is one of the few memories I have of my time in Georgia, where we lived for a few years when I was young. I remember the house having a really steep driveway, and the "called" always stood further up, making the "runners" go uphill. I also remember flying down that driveway on my bike. And, I think, one year there was a dusting of frost, enough to coat everything in frozen water, and we took the trashcan lids and rode them down the driveway. I hit the one scrawny tree between me and route.
It is funny the things you remember. That one memory of red light-green light jarred those others loose, and those in turn have made me remember other things, like the huge area in the backyard with the wild blueberry tree, and the little fort with a swing we used to play on.
And this is getting a bit long, so I think I will take it over to my own blog. Darn you Paul, you started a trend!
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