Madden

When I first started at Wash U, getting drunk and chasing freshmen girls around seemed like a much cooler use of my time than playing video games. I was thus a bit skeptical when Tyler and Brian told me Madden was crunk. However, after playing a few games, I was hooked, and that addiction has blossomed into a beautiful and ongoing video game romance I treasure to this day. Below I will try to give a summary of some of its highpoints.

At first Tyler and Brian were both vastly better than me, and I played a long string of back to back losses. Brian said something to the effect of "I've never seen anyone so excited about losing over and over" which I interpreted as a compliment. In time, I got decent enough to beat the CPU on All-Madden, and I started to play Tower's team in the Dauten franchise league. A while later, I developed the ability to beat it consistently, and I would have the opportunity to play Tyler or Brian in the playoffs (I had also developed the ability to make these games interesting). These were always challenging and emotional games.

I should start with my rivalry with Tyler, who was always the Superman to my Lex Luther. When I started playing, it had been my specific goal to learn to beat Tyler, and I ran into him in the playoffs far more often than Brian. Tyler would usually practice a small number of big yardage plays to a ridiculous pitch of perfection, and beating him always involved guessing how to counter a couple of known but overpowering and versatile deep passing plays. Tyler was also the running guru I originally studied under, and his running game was nothing to be sneered at. His prowess in beating the computer by a zillion points also meant his teams were very talented, and he was all in all a very challenging opponent. I think we went approximately 50/50 over the history of those games, although I was never sure how I was pulling off the wins I did.

I only played Brian in the playoffs a couple of times, and they were both close games that left me uncertain how to appraise him. Like Tyler, he was very good ar ridiculously stomping the computer and his teams were very talented. He would usually beat Tyler, which I thought very impressive, but then often lose to Tower (who I thought to be second-tier, no offense). He also used play-calling I thought would never work if I personally tried it, and his success with it mystified me. Nevertheless, Tyler often beat me and then lost the Super Bowl to Brian, making him the frequent Dauten (and later Trinity) champion.

Another Madden highlight was the Madden tournament Jon hosted in 06. Me and Tyler ended up in the championship, which I thought was pretty cool because we had previously honed our skills mostly playing one another. I ended up winning; I dug out my victor's t-shirt this past week, and it made me think we should have another tournament. Any of you reading this that are interested in making that happen, holler at me.

Me and Tyler also played "drinking Madden" once, which was a very spontaneous and informal (and fun) game. The rules were basically that if you scored or did something cool that made the other person look stupid, they had to drink. This turned out to be a lot of drinking, resulting in me and Tyler draining most of a 4 litre Carlo Rossi BAJOW. Tyler later puked straight red wine all over Jon's shirt, which was hilarious.

More to come...