Asteroids & Ineptitude

While this might shock some people, I will say it nonetheless: I cannot play arcade games.

I never played them growing up, I was too busy playing Monopoly, Barbies, and the piano to play online games. When I did play online games, they were sad, sophisticated games, like Tile Mah-Jong, where you had to find matching symbols in a sea of Asian tiles.

I played Asteroids recently, and it took me 15 minutes to figure out that not only could I turn 360 degrees and shoot asteroids, my little rocket could move around the screen. As well as I think I can adapt to various situations, I am no good at playing Arcade games. When I  played Sonic: the Hedgehog (I believe the colon is for emphasis), I killed Sonic. On the first level. Thrice. This poor little hedgehog was spinning around in circles on a plank and when we finally jumped to high ground,  Sonic died on metal spikes.

I am assured that playing these types of arcade games offer a variety of real-life skills, including problem solving, under pressure decision making, and figuring out how to get back to a spaceship after your jetpack flies you to the opposite side of the moon.

However, I am not learning much from these arcade games other than the fact that I am absolutely inept at playing them.