ego.istic.org

Last weekend I was at a lan party. If you already know what that is, skip to the next paragraph. A lan party is a party where the participants bring computers and connect them together to form a network. This can be very fast because of the proximity of the computers. While the usual party things like talking, eating, and drinking are going on, the computers allow multiplayer gaming to happen as well. This is more fun than playing games over the internet, both because the network is faster, and because you can talk to the people you're playing with (where for “talk to” read “co-ordinate attacks with” or “taunt” depending on how teams are arranged).

People who didn't skip the last paragraph probably also don't know about the strategy game, Supreme Commander. In that game, one of the most powerful units is called the Monkeylord. It's described in the game as a “spiderbot”, but as you can see in this screenshot (look for the big units squirting red death) they have only six leg, making the name somewhat inaccurate.

At the lan we played a few games of Supreme Commander. In one of them, I was just getting into the rhythm and flow of the game when I espied from the corner of my eye the insectile form of a Monkeylord appearing just on the edge of my screen. As it was still early, I wasn't expecting such powerful units so soon, and I certainly wasn't ready to repel one yet, so I nearly jumped out of my seat. With new focus, I quickly finished giving the orders I was preparing and then glanced across the screen to the invader to assess its point of closest approach and likely arrival time. When I looked at it, I was relieved to discover that it was in fact a spider crawling down the outside of my monitor.

It was a good minute before I could stop laughing and return to the game.