Young Writers Society

High score!

I type my name for the seventh time and it gets added to the leader board, which contains only my name. Yep, I’m coming in first, second, third, fourth, right up to seventh place. That’s how the old games work. Before wifi and multiplayer, when you played by yourself and the programmers still thought it would be worthwhile to have a leader board.

Play again?

I press enter, and the screen turns black as the primitive game reloads. This is how I spend my weekend mornings, between eating breakfast and doing whatever my room-mates have planned for the day. There’s something about playing Bomb Defence that appeals to me. Maybe it’s because I spent hours on it in my childhood, when games like this were cool. Maybe it’s because my extra-extrovert room-mates know to leave me alone when I’m playing. Whatever my reason is, I always play, and my goal is always to beat my high-score.

Wave one incoming…

A city made of pixels forms at the bottom of my screen, and just above it is my view finder. Any second now some rainbow squares will begin falling from the cyberspace heavens, and it’s my job to aim and fire. If I hit a bomb, it explodes into lots of smaller rainbow pixels and fireworks rain onto the city. If I miss, the intact bomb will hit and explode, destroying buildings and thousands of lives. Obviously, that’s not what I want.

I hit the arrow keys with no mercy, as if real human lives depended on my destroying these digital bombs. Those arrow keys have been replaced three times and I don’t plan on being gentle any time soon. Enter. Left, left, left, right. Enter. Right, right, right, right. Enter. Left. Enter.

Wave one complete.

The cheers of my grateful citizens sound from the speakers, but I don’t join in their celebrations; there’s more coming. The game has thirty waves, and I’ve only ever gotten as far as twenty-six. There is no time to relax, I have a city to defend.

. . .

Wave twenty incoming…

I position my fingers on the arrow keys, my other hand clenched over the enter key. Twenty is always twice as hard as the previous wave. This is where the programmers expect you to fail, but never me.

A green pixels enters my sight, followed by a blue. Left, left, left. Enter. Right, right. Enter. The screen is silent for a little while, my heart thumps up and down as I wait for the inevitable cluster of pixel TNT.

Greetings, player.

Huh? I press the exit button, thinking the tutorial has come up. Nothing happens. I’ve never seen this message before, I’m not even sure it’s part of the game. Enter. Enter. Enter. The screen is frozen on those yellow words, a red pixel hovering at the top of the screen.

You have been chosen as Elite Defender.

I raise my eyebrow as the greeting fades away and is replaced with a new message. Elite Defender, maybe this is a secret level that I’ve only just discovered. I’ve heard of games having secret levels, but I didn’t think Bomb Defence would, it’s so old.

Game resumes in 6:59:59. Good luck, Elite Defender.

The hell?

Game resumes in 6:59:53. Good luck, Elite Defender.

A countdown of seven hours? Why the heck would the programmers expect you to wait seven hours for the next level? That’s bad business, everyone would get bored and exit the game. It must be a bug, a virus even. So that’s what I do, I place my hand on the mouse and click on the X. Nothing happens.

Game resumes in 6:58:45. Good luck, Elite Defender.

I try turning my computer off, this is a virus for sure. Some idiot thought it would be fun to prey on the people who still play classic games. I bet once the countdown is over my PC will be there’s for the taking. I press the on button right in, my face turns red and I poke at it viciously. My computer stays on and the countdown continues.

Game resumes in 6:55:21. Good luck, Elite Defender.

I throw my chair backwards and stand up. My roommate looks at me curiously from the dining table, but doesn’t say anything. They wouldn’t dare speak to me while I’m playing, and definitely not when I’m ready to smash the monitor screen in. I lean behind the screen to the power point and switch it off.

Game resumes in 6:54:48. Good luck, Elite Defender.

Damn it, someone else can deal with this insane hacker. I pull the cord out of the socket and disassemble the computer. “Help me get this in the car,” I snap at my bewildered roommate.

. . .

Game resumes in 5:21:36. Good luck, Elite Defender.

“Oh man, this is so cool!” The tech guy stares at the screen, a ridiculous grin on this face. “Dude, do you know what this means?” He turns to me, eager for an answer, like there’s an explanation brewing inside him that’s going to burst out any second. I shake my head. “You’ve been chosen!”

“As Elite Defender, yeah, I know.”

“You’ve never heard of The Elitist Company? Man, it’s run by this really talented programmer. He gets paid by all these rich people, the sort who pay millions for good entertainment. I can’t believe you haven’t heard of this before!” He stands up and goes to a cupboard. “They’re real bombs man, real bombs. They won’t kill anyone, but they do a lot of damage to the city. Like in the game, yeah know? Oh man…”

He places a box in front of me, and I shrug. What’s this guy’s deal? I’ve got no bloody idea what he’s saying, and he seems to sense that.

“The game is real! If you let a bomb hit the city in the game, then a bomb will hit this city! This is the entertainment that people pay for, and you’re the performer! Heck man, this is gonna be so much fun. I’ve read about Elite Defenders, but I’ve never actually experienced this.”

He opens the box, inside is a keyboard, a proper gaming keyboard. I would’ve bought one ages ago if I could afford it.

“Use this when you play, it’s way more responsive than yours. Oh man, this is gonna be so cool!”

Game resumes in 4:53:18. Good luck, Elite Defender.

“Dude, the game is real.”

As the seconds tick down on the computer screen, my brain clicks and I finally understand what is happening. Crap. How the hell can this guy be so excited about bombs being dropped in our city? My fists clench, my veins bulge from my neck, why the heck did I get chosen for this?

I’m not going to play this game. “I’m calling the police.”

“Woah, woah.” The techie holds out his hands in a calming gesture, his face not as excited as before. “Cool it, man. Hardly anything real bad happens, jobs are even made in the cleaning up process. This thing is good, it provides jobs.” Is this guy for real? “But last time the police got involved… let’s just say the cop was a terrible gamer.”

My mobile phone is out, my fingers hitting the small numbers. Zero… zero… “Wait, what do you mean by that?”

He finishes hooking the new keyboard up to my computer, the countdown still going, and scratches his forehead. “The programmer got pissed when the police kept going after him. He hacked one of the PCs at the station, installed Bomb Defence and had a cop become Elite Defender. That guy was terrible at it; bombs dropped all over the city. Small bombs, but they haven’t bothered him since.”

“Right.” My finger hits zero one more time and I hover my thumb over the call button. “I think I’d remember that.”

“You will. They hushed it up real good, but whenever the media mentioned it, they said that some gang had detonated car bombs all over the place.”

I put the phone back in my pant pocket. I remember that.

Game resumes in 4:13:55. Good luck, Elite Defender.