Join the new world

_{You know.}


I've quit and rejoined this game so many times I've lost count.

The first couple of times, whenever I came back, people used it to make fun of me. And the first couple of times, I'll admit it, I got riled. Anybody calls you out on your BS and you're gonna feel the indignant sting of self-defense, your heckles raising.

But the thing is, I stopped caring after a while.

At first it was never admitting it hurt me. And then it was actively saying - sometimes pretending - that I wasn't hurt. Using humor to deflect. But by the half-a-dozenth time, it honestly didn't affect me. And nowadays, I embrace it.

Yes, I am that guy that you will probably see rejoin someday.

Yes, I will go away again soon thereafter.

Only...

The intervals are slowly reversing.

At first, I'd stay for months at a time, oftentimes uninterrupted. I'd throw myself into this game, get deep in that sweet sweet meta, and just grind. I had different priorities sometimes. My most successful stint by far was in early to mid 2015 when I was really trying to get CP. Consequently, I ended up influencing politics a bit on the way and gave some of the names that are still around the exposure and chance they needed. That felt pretty good.

And then, I won.


I'm leading with all of this to give context. I've been fairly loathe to rejoin this game again, and you should not consider this my first foray into doing so. This is a retrospective.

This is a warning.

That whole thing in Skyfall - the analogy of rats in a barrel that eat and fight one another until there's only two left - that's what people often want you to believe about life. And, more specifically, that was part of the implicit promise that this game would deliver.

But here's the thing: there can't be two rats left if none of the rats can ever die.

Does that make sense?

It didn't really fully formulate for me until I took a look at a couple of the articles and threads surrounding our current invasion wipe. And I realized that in going through them, the details, the specifics, the exact reason that this - this specific invasion - of the eUnited States was occurring were not only important, but completely irrelevant.

I've seen this thing so many times.

I saw it way back in 2008 with the original Canadian invasion.

I lived it for the first time I really joined this game in 2010 when we were throwing off a wipe and then hitting back at the Russians.

I fought in it in 2011 with World War V.

I glimpsed it briefly when we got wiped under occupation in 2013.

And there was that 2014 invasion of Canada.

And there was even American Empire back in 2015.

And today, two years after I really stopped giving any care about this game, it's happening again.

And it's so...

Utterly...

Boring.

Lemme switch metaphors.

There exists a difference between the steak you get at a Brazilian steakhouse and the burger you get at McDonald's.


You enter, and you sit at a table. Probably you're with ones you love or are friends with. Maybe it's a splurge, maybe it's a date night.

But you're there.

And there's the meats. Delicious, sumptuous. You flip a little card over, and they start coming to your plate.

There's a buffet of cold stuff.

The drinks are sweet and punchy.

You tell those at your table "Ooh get this, it's fantastic," or "Oh stay away from that one tonight, it's a little dry." But even with the criticism, it's still just fun.

You get plump.

Quickly.

You enjoy it. And you pay the check, and you saunter out, happy full and feeling like even though this wasn't the meal of your lifetime, even if it wasn't truly perfect or someone made an off comment, you had a great time.

Because you have to really try hard to have a bad time at the Brazilian steakhouse. Something else typically has to be wrong. But even when it is, the framework of that restaurant is such that the moment you enter through it, you're in for a good experience with pretty decent service and a bevy of delicious meats.

And then there's McDonald's.


When you get there, there's probably a line. A line of people who wound up at McDonald's. Maybe a few of them chose to come there, but let's be real.

You all wound up here somehow.

And you're looking at the menu, standing in line behind someone with an actively tantruming kid, or someone who is clearly doing meth in their spare time, and you ho and hum about your order. Or maybe you've got this down and you came in knowing.

Good for you.

It won't matter.

Cus there's about a 50% chance that the apathetic staff behind the counter - that delightful blend of acned high school underachievers and late-20s burnouts overseen by some older woman likely named either Darla or Colleen - will get your order wrong somehow. Even this global machine, this beast of burgers, will malfunction.

And you'll take your sack of fries and your sesame laden heart attack, along with your cup of over-iced fizzy garbage water, and you'll either sit down with the rest of the people who wound up here and observe just exactly how their day is going, or flee to your vehicle. Maybe you were already in your vehicle, behind a line of people who either can't be heard by the person taking their order through the monitor, don't know what they want somehow, or are high.

Regardless, you will leave eventually.

And no matter how much of a "treat" you might've convinced yourself this was, the fact of the matter is that there is no amount of salad, no amount of artisan burgers you can choose the buns for, no amount of kale and McRibs and and chicken fries and whatever the hell else they put out that will change the fact that this is a McDonald's.

It is trapped by its framework.

And so, I come back to eRepublik.


Cus there are a lot of you who think this game can be fixed with taxes. "If we just did the dang taxes right, we could be better and start winning."

Honey, they've been saying that the whole time.

And there's some of you that think that if we just choose the right alliance or party or country to lead and join, it'll all make sense.

And then, the wipe happens.

But there's also another truth, and that is that the wipe will also pass.

This invasion, this grand sausage party of assembled "nations" currently Air Striking and Natural Enemying our country will come to a close. It might be months, it might be days. Hell it might be hours or years, who knows.

But it'll end.

Because the rats don't die here.

And there are no stakes.

And it'll end, sure, but then it'll begin again.

Because this isn't a game you can win. All of your money spent on war chests and government programs, all of your threads pretending to be an actual congressperson or deciding military strategy, all of them will one day lead back to the exact same place that they once were.

The problem is that this game, the foundations upon which it was built, are inherently flawed.

Or to put it another way: McDonald's could start selling steak tomorrow, and it would still be McDonald's.

And it'll go on, and on, and on. However long you pay and play. However long they can keep pumping money out of you somehow. It'll go.

Right up until the day they make that post. "It's been a great run," they'll say. They'll talk of community while they get their final cut of the payout. They'll tell you how wonderful the experiment was as they pack up their desks.

And then servers will shut off.


I recommend Fogo de Chão, but right now I'm a little busy with this quarter pounder. Don't worry though; I'll only be sitting here for a moment longer.

I'll join you in a sec.