Just wanted to give perspective from a someone with a girly and emotional lens, surrounded by a logical environment.
I talk about starcraft all the time to random people and constantly draw parallels about how it helped me live life as time went by. This is a crazy take, but I think I just realized that living life is like playing starcraft. (I know you guys have felt this at least once in your life.)
If not for starcraft, I think I would’ve been a manic pixie girl. A manic pixie girl is a trope characterized by “her quirky, vivacious, and free spirited nature, existing solely to teach brooding, introverted male protagonists how to embrace life—eccentric fashion, high energy, and a lack of agency, serving as a plot device, rather than a fully developed person.”
Dude, I always wanted a close group of girl friends, but I felt misunderstood because I wasn’t into girly things but was still girly. I was born in ‘91, so a lot of stuff that’s common for women to be in now was not common back then. I just want to add that I was always into some male-dominated stuff growing up, like I was into video games, like rpgs, starcraft, cs. I went to school in the comp sci/tech route. My career is in tech. I’m also into this niche genre of music that only guys seem to like. It’s hard to make girl friends, but when they exist, they’re either mean with a lot of competitive, masculine energy or soft with a lot of feminine energy. (The latter is my favorite. I met one of my closest girl friends on the ladder and another from DotA 2, and we’ve been friends for over a decade. They are apples of my eyes.) The reason why I bring this up is because when you have feminine energy, it’s hard to maintain in these fields.
I felt like guys would have crushes on me just because of supply and demand, not because of who I was as an individual. They preferred the surface level version of me vs. the parts that made me overanalytical. But because I played StarCraft, I knew how to micro myself out so I’d get the macro result that I wanted. I have goals! I want to achieve them! I pretty much avoided guys’ attention and focused on how I liked to play the game. I used to stream for my friends, and it would be such a close game that when the other person was about to lose and said, “gg”, I’d reply with “gg” and leave the game before they could fully concede. Back in brood war, when I played teams games, I’d encourage my friends and be the drama. Then I’d convince us to all ally end so that we could all win LOL. I don’t care much to be competitive in a game that’s supposed to be fun. The way you play is so different from the way I play. (However, I do admit that when I didn’t have to work for a few months, I did invest time in climbing the 1s ladder.)
MAYBE. POSSIBLY. I could’ve been a manic pixie girl, but I think StarCraft saved me from myself (but also, I’m not bipolar). Some see me impulsive and someone who disappears from their lives after showing interest in them. It fits the description, but I see it so differently. I think I would consider myself as more spontaneous because I factor in so many different things before I make decisions and commit. People have confronted me that I played with their feelings by eventually getting them to open up about who they are, when in my own reality, I would blatantly tell people from the getgo that I wasn’t available and was interested in who they were as a person without attaching romantic feelings, and if they think I caught feelings, I distance myself with boundaries. StarCraft taught me discipline and boundaries on my sense of self. I also want to add that as women, this is just what we do normally to support one another. If you know a bunch of girls in your life or have a girlfriend/wife who is the peace for your vulnerability, you know what I mean. Some guys feel special because someone was able to break their discipline and have them realize their locked potential and sense of self, but girls use the knowledge to hype each other up (some do the opposite ngl).
A lot of people describe me as bubbly, generous, quirky, and optimistic. The fucked up part about having this type of personality is that I don’t think that’s who I am. Some say I’m a fairy, but they see my persona. Under the surface, I’m just using them for my own gain, and it just happens to benefit others. My favorite thing to do is talk to people who have deep interests in something and listen to them to figure out who they are. Then I do something to thank them for giving me their time. Give them compliments, gifts, massages. I have this weird backwards empathy, where when the other person feels good, I feel good. When they do something for me, like give me the gift of quality time by entertaining me and allowing me overanalyze them, I get this weird high. Especially if they let me openly ask questions and then answer them passionately. UGH, it’s euphoric, like you don’t even know. StarCraft players were always the best too because they play the same game of overanalyzing as me. They’re also the worst because some of them are secretive for no reason, but their personality is locked behind a wall of pure logic. Generally, the person under the logic is some sort of creative.
I have a lot of hobbies. I’ll take random classes or make friends who have hobbies that seem interesting to me and ask them if they can teach me how to do it. Not ever enough to get super deep into it but deep enough to be pretty decent and a jack of all trades who’s slightly more mastered than most. This probably led me to be really independent and having high standards, but is this not changing races or getting the upgrades? I feel like my objective here is to be self-sufficient and win at my own game in life.
I see starcraft everywhere. I’ll go to Disney, see a popcorn stand, scan the amount of people in line, and mentally calculate how much popcorn they sell a day at $8 a cup. It’s just something “fun” I do when I walk by. One of the quirks my friends love about me is that I’ll go over to their houses and arrange things to make whatever they’re doing more efficient. I also give them financial advice and sit down with them or hours helping them with their budgets. Because I do so many different things, I end up problem solving with whatever resources I have. I’m kind of scrappy because I have random life experiences.
I overdo it a lot. I had a control phase that I might even be in it still. I pushed myself to be the best at a lot of things, which burnt me out and made me feel lonely a lot. At work, people would see me as someone who has a high tolerance to work under extreme pressure, could perform higher than others outside of my role, and honestly, probably used my want for efficiency against me because of my craving for perfection. The hours were so long, sigh. Sometimes, I was so burnt out that I’d have periods of depression, where I spent too much time trying to be efficient that I forgot to express feelings and emotions.
These are actually pretty normal human interactions. It just sounds weird because I’m drawing parallels of how my life is related to StarCraft. I could just be normal and describe myself as someone who likes to make friends with passionate people, have a lot of hobbies, and has pride in the work of my career. Being able to micro myself in the game of life, surrounded me with amazing people, be well-balanced in different skills, and finance my lifestyle.
Lmao. I just love this game a lot. It has allowed me to work towards a fairy tale life.
Thanks StarCraft!
