...I actually win six-in-a-row in House Rules. It didn't come without some serious adversity: I scored my 20th point in the sixth-consecutive current House Rules match on a safety, and the game didn't award me the win. It didn't even give me the win after a kneel down, which ordinarily works in similar circumstances. I was forced to run out the clock with just under two minutes left and my opponent needing only a touchdown to win. I punted out of bounds, and ended up picking off his final heave of the game.
I don't know why my experience with this game is so different from everyone else's. Even when everything breaks right, and I bust through a run of easier opponents and a couple of mid-level F-word spammers (I'm the only one using this phrase, so I hereby claim the trademark on "F-word Spammer"), I have to deal with crazy, goofy stuff. But in the end I got my free 99 OVR Redzone Royale. And yet, that's not what this post is about.
(As a final side-note, F-word isn't nearly as bad when you have Surge Mylanta at MLB. I got him on the Auction House for just over four million today, so I haven't nearly paid him off even after winning a one-million coin item. Even so, he got me a clutch pick in game six that was probably the difference between a win and a loss.)
I am feeling a lot of conflicting emotions right now. But let me get to the point: I know my persistent gripes about this game are grating on some people, and while I feel like the ones most irritated by this are the very ones that contribute heavily to the negative play experience semi-casuals and mid-level grinders face every day on these servers, I'm pretty certain there are some decent guys that I've called out as cheaters without really knowing anything about you. I hate the way I've been addressed by a handful of guys I'll not name here, but there was a shred of value in some of their retorts, while several others shared some really helpful information. I remember all of you for how you've dealt with me, and I appreciate most the guys who tried to reason with me.
I'll go into MUT 26 knowing there are a ton of If-You-Can't-Beat-'Em-Join-'Em types here, and I hate that self-serving approach to the core, but I'll try harder to be civil toward you. If I slip up in this regard down the road because I have a bad run of games because Electronic Arts struggles to program a fair and fun game that rewards tactics over lineup and cheat-play spamming, just know that when I truly have my wits about me, I really am a decent guy. I had a lot of low moments this year playing this game, and I question whether this game threatens to make me a worse person just by the way it kindles what I've known for years to be an unhealthy ultra-competitive streak.
I learned a ton this year, and as I prepare to walk away from my 99 OVR team to go through this days-of-hours-long grind once again with MUT 26, I find that my biggest goal with regard to MUT has to change: I need to learn not to care when I lose, regardless of the reason why. I wouldn't mind your help learning to do this.