I am going to tell you a story, Auntie Pike. I think I may have even told you this story before, but I'm going to do it again just for you, but I want you to know that this is probably one of the most traumatic gaming experiences I've ever had and I am reopening old and greivous wounds for you here. I was actually just thinking about this the other day, too. ugh. I will warn you all in advance that the only way I can truly do justice to my stupidity and the price I paid for it will require me to be entirely tl;dr. Anyway, here goes.

Back when I was attending university, my best friend Aaron used to live only a few houses down the road from me, and I would head down to his on a regular basis. We hung out a whole lot, watched a bunch of movies, ate a lot of food and played a lot of games. Sometimes on the PS3, sometimes pass and play on his PC and sometimes I'd take my laptop down and we'd LAN it up. One of our favourite games to play was Age of Mythologies: The Titans. For those of you who have never played the game, it's pretty much a typical Age of RTS game, only with mythical units and powers based on ancient gods. Seeing as there was a maximum of three factions allowed in a game and we thought it would be unfair with two of us against one AI opponent, we always played with the max difficulty level. The style of game we used to play was usually a 50/50 split between a legitmate game and one filled with us spamming cheats and generally being dicks to everything. This particular round, however, was a legitmate run.

Some run it was shaping up to be, too. For me at least, anyway. I'd be quite comfortable in saying that it was probably my best ever planned game of AoM. I had put an incredible amount of effort and time into building a mighty civilization in anticipation of unleashing all hell on the AI controlled norsemen. My civ was running at optimum capacity, I had built the ideal amount of the most important buildings, the economy was booming and I had quietly amassed a strong, if not huge military. I had also surrounded my entire home base with the strongest wall possible. I had progressed all the way through to the titan age god powers, the strongest level available. We were pretty much getting into endgame of the operation, as I had my citizens in the process of building of building my Titan gate, which would have enabled me to summon my Titan Cerberus. Titan units were far and away the most powerful in the game, capable of reducing an opposing faction to rubble singlehandedly if played right. My gate was nearing completion, and with a vast stockpile of resources my plan was to summon Cerberus, quickly push out a number of the strongest units available and then rain destruction upon the Norsemen.

As I previously mentioned, this was probably the best run on AoM I'd ever had, and I was excited. Geniunely, truly, rub-my-hands-together-in-maniacal-glee excited for what was to come. And quite pleased with myself for pulling it off. I should mention up this point as well that I'd had little to no contact with the Norse forces. Whether they'd had their attention focused on skirmishes with my boy Az or had just been content to leave me alone, I shall never know. What I do know, and what I will never forget, is what happened next. A chain of events that shattered my little world, my night of gaming and scarred me forever in a way that no game had before and none has done since. As I told you, I had surrounded my civilization with the strongest possible walls as a first line of defence. We were untouchable. Or so I thought. You see, there was a small river that ran across the world and through my home base. I had built the wall on either side of it, however unbeknownst to me due to the camera angle of the game, I had actually built my wall on one side of the river just one grid square short. Enough space for one unit to pass through. It was enough.

Right on the brink of being in the position to begin my offensive, I noticed something strange. Vikings. Storming towards my walls. Like I said up to this point I'd had virtually no contact with them whatsoever so I was not expecting to suddenly see a mass of hairy, beardy bastards steaming towards my glorious land and thus found myself quite confused. This confusion quickly turned to terror as the filthy scandinavian hordes began seemingly running straight through my wall in single file and charging into my beloved home. And then it happened. Just as I noticed the fatal flaw in my wall that was all the opening these vile warriors needed, the Norse god decided this would be a good time for him to use his ultimate power: Ragnarok. Thereby turning every single Norse civilian into a raging viking hero, infused with the power of the gods. No word of a lie, I actually screamed in horror as I watched every filthy norse scumbag in my land, and the ones following them in undergo a severe case of Thor-induced roid rage and proceed to absolutely decimate every last one of my beloved people. There was nothing I could do about it, it was far too late. I could only sit and watch the hordes and hordes of brutish vikings massacre everything I had worked so hard for. All because of one lousy hidden grid of unwalled land.

And that is not even the worst of it. No. For throughout this entire ordeal, Az, my brother, my great friend and partner in crime for many years sat near to me, not giggling, not even just laughing, but HOWLING with laughter at my misfortune. It only served to compound the indignity of the situation and rub salt in the most severe wound my gaming soul has ever taken. I can hear it ringing in my ears as I type this to you. It still cuts to the core.

So there you have it. I hope this has helped you somehow, Auntie Pike. For if some small good were to come out of this episode, it may-

I'm kidding no one. Nothing is ever going to make this better. smurfing norse bastards