94%

Today, I lost three and a half hours of my life. To one single level of this:

Naa na na nana-na na na, na na na na-na naaaaaaaaaaaa

Specifically, the sprinkler level.

For anyone who has seen me trying to play games, you’ll know how painful it is to watch me fall off the same bridge ten times in a row, or grenade myself to death because it’s easier to respawn than work out how to turn around. But this? This I can DO. Despite my appalling aim and inability to remember the maps, I’ve made it to 100% on every other level at least a year ago, beating that smug king and that stupid robo-king and all their stupid friends.

The goal: Fill up the Katamari with water, roll around the desert and make all the grass and sunflowers appear in five minutes or less. It’s very very pretty until you’ve played the same five minute over and over. And over. And OVER. Then the novelty wears off and you start getting blinding rage at things like cartoon zebras and rainbow stripey palm trees.

I now have a new theory about why they make so many games that involve war and fighting: it’s not because people like killing, it’s to make them feel more justified and less guilty when they get this angry at having to do the same level repeatedly. For example if it was grenades that I wanted to avoid rolling over rather than cute little Snowmen-that-turn-into-Palm-Trees then I’d be okay with hating them when I hit them. If it was Nazi’s that I resented (so much that I wanted to punch them right through the screen) because they’re in my way, rather than a cartoon Kangaroo, I’d feel like a better person.

I would like to apologize to EVERYONE for drawing this

See how much I hate them? I don’t even enjoy playing any more. Every time that stupid king-face pops up WHILE I’M TRYING TO PLAY to tell me I can probably walk on that STUPID PALM TREE I want to punch him. Every single time I run out of water it shows me where the water-hole is. I KNOW where it is! I’ve been doing this every five minutes for the last THREE HOURS. Stop making me pause in my frantic rolling!

I lean backwards as though it’s going to help me see more of the screen because even now I keep getting lost because the view is so narrow. I still tend to get stuck in the corners facing the wall and I can only jump successfully 1 out of every 3 times I try. I still don’t know what I’m doing wrong with that one actually. But I’ve improved. I made it all the way from 2% (my record before today was 20%) to 94% in just three and a half hours.

I’ve been screaming two thing at the TV screen and Steve. Poor Steve.‘Why won’t you let me jump’ and ‘Why the fuck won’t you let me fucking jump you piece of arse.’

I made a strategy. Then I made a DIAGRAM of my strategy.

You can tell my hand are not back to their normal shape yet

If I didn’t get 300ml of water sprinkled in the first route, I quit and restarted. If I got less than 700ml by the end of the first two minutes, I quit and restarted. If I hit a lion, I restarted.

Then I had to stop and go outside. Partly because my hands were frozen in gaming claws and partly because Steve insisted that we went to the gym.

I spent an hour and a half running about and stuff and I feel better now.

More normal.

Naa-naa na na na na na naa naa, na na na na-na-naaa Naa-naa na na na na na naa naa, na na na na-na-na Naa-naa na na na na na naa naa, na na na na-na-naaa Naa-naa na na na na na naa naa, na na na na-na-naaa.