Massive Muliplayer World

Went to this fabulous Korean place in Ichibangai. The second-generation Korean owner was friendly and would chat with us as he cooked, but when he finished he kept running upstairs. Turns out he was playing a MMRPG. You could see it in his eyes- customers would come in, and he'd dish out some killer kalbi.. but his mind was turning in the world of dragons and hitpoints. I never got into multiplayer but I remember when a good RPG would devour my life for months. It would always be running in the back of my mind: when could I get back, explore that next area, see that next bit of story, hack up that next monster. I finally had to stop because anything with that kind of uncontrollable compulsion couldn't be good. I like to think that I fulfill my questing needs IRL now.. but still periodically that urge surfaces to have at something with a very big sword.

"Japanese players don't like grouping with foreigners." he confided in me. The first thing a Japanese group does is decide how long they can play. Apparently Westerners come and go as they please, at times ditching their team in a dire situation. Sometimes they'll go off and do puzzling and pointless things. Communication is taken care of with set phrases in the game, so Japanese players have taken to checking stats to try and tell the 'foreigners'. Westerners don't understand this and are even offended by it, he said. Good, clean continent-bridging hack-n-slash camaraderie turned into schoolyard 'nakama hazure'..

Oh, the Japanese Proficiency Test Level 2 is in two weeks. Ah, a real test to cram for, how I've missed this. It makes each frivolously spent moment twice as sweet. Let's not get carried away though, I still have my plans to play FFX2 in Japanese, and my console is calling..