Imagine you’ve just opened something. A game, a device, anything. Something you’ve wanted for a long time. You’ve seen Youtube videos about it, ads, and since then you knew you needed to get your hands on it. You have felt this feeling before, the sensation of you wanting something for such a long time and finally getting what you wanted. Well, that’s how it felt the first time I played Beat Saber.*
It was a bright, sunny day; I could tell from the rays of light coming through the windows of the living room. But that didn’t matter. What did, though, was that I recently just got Beat Saber on my VR headset, and I was about to play it in person for the first time. I got jumpy just thinking about it. I put on my VR headset and started loading up the game, prepared for the fun I would be having in the next few hours.
I gazed around the environment of Beat Saber. I was astonished about how good the graphics and music design were, even within the menu screen of Beat Saber. The sabers, the reflections, the burn marks… It truly felt like I was in a VR paradise.
I started up my first song, and let’s just say it got even better. I loved how each beat was being intensified by the SFX, or how I felt like an unstoppable being slicing through the red and blue boxes. I truly believed that I was going to be the next Bandoot** of Beat Saber. But I soon discovered that I was in over my head.
Never thought it was this hard, I thought while playing some more songs on Beat Saber. I was confident that Beat Saber would be an easy game; slicing squares with your hands to the beat didn’t sound so hard, but I was wrong.
No matter how hard I pushed myself physically, I could never get it. Wasn’t I supposed to be having fun?!? Sweat was slowly streaming down my neck. My hands ached as if I’d been writing for hours on end. My arms and shoulders felt as if they were going to fall off. But just as I was about to declare myself defeated, I realized something.
I was pushing myself physically, but not mentally. I might’ve swung as hard as I could at a block but never thought about how accurate I was or when the beats came in the song. As I realized this, I immediately started getting the hang of it. I used my wrist more to swing. I scored higher as I swung to the rhythm.
Then the game started becoming fun. Each time I passed a song I felt as if I had just won a gold medal. But then it got even better: custom songs and mods. Beat Saber had no more than 50 songs and one saber type, so the ability to add songs and mods amplified the rate I was being immersed into Beat Saber and greatly improved my experience.
I started enjoying Beat Saber again and was easily breezing through songs as if cutting through butter with a hot knife. There were more songs with higher difficulty, but for now, I felt accomplished.
As I took off my VR headset, I realized it was already getting dark outside. It felt like I just finished a good book. I thought back to how instead of going through the most direct route, I found a shortcut instead.
Playing Beat Saber for the first time was a great experience for me. Not only did I enjoy Beat Saber’s astonishing game design, but I learned something new: the most straightforward way of doing something may not necessarily be the best or most efficient way.
*Beat Saber is a Virtual Reality rhythm game that uses VR controllers as lightsabers to cut through colored blocks coming towards your direction to the rhythm or beat of a song.
**Bandoot is a Beat Saber Youtuber that is known as one of the best Beat Saber players of all time.
-Tyler W.
Hi Tyler, I really liked your writing about how you showed perseverance while trying to figure out Beat Saber. This reminded me of the numerous times that I almost gave up trying to play a game before finally figuring it out. And I also like how you included some similes like: “Cutting through butter with a hot knife.” And “Like I just finished a good book.” And you also included some powerful words like ‘Astonished’. And finally, this was a great piece of writing, I really enjoyed reading about you progressing through Beat Saber.
ReplyDeleteI like how you built up until you made it seem hard. I also, like how you said your first experience doesn ´ t make you perfect. I like how you gave credit to the people. what I like is the detail you use in the writing. What I like is that overtime you get better at beat saber. Also, what I like is that after you get good you start to enjoy the game which I can see
ReplyDeleteI think the message is to try to think outside the box. Tyler says, “Not only did I enjoy Beat Saber’s astonishing game design, but I learned something new: the most straightforward way of doing something may not necessarily be the most efficient way.” Although it was hard, he learned that he needed to think of another way to get better at the game. Once he began learning how to be more accurate and listening to the rhythm, he got better at the game. One of the things that I really liked about this story was the intro because it was very easy to relate to and base on my perspective and personal experience.
ReplyDeleteTyler Wang,
ReplyDeleteI have felt that feeling before, “You have felt this feeling before, the sensation of you wanting something for such a long time and finally getting it what you wanted.” I like how you were very descriptive in paragraph six, “Sweat was slowly streaming down my neck. My hand ached as if I had been writing for hours on end.”
I think the message is how no matter how hard you challenge yourself there is always a smarter method. A quote that I liked was,“I was pushing myself physically, but not mentally.I might’ve swung as hard as I could at a block but never thought about how accurate I was or when the beats came in the song.” And after you found that you started to figure out that you could time your swings to the beat then you started to get better and found the game fun again.I also liked how you described how it felt when you were done playing beat saber, referring to it as if you just finished a good book.
ReplyDeleteVery good independent writing piece Tyler. I know that persevering through a problem can be hard to do sometimes. Your use of sensory language was astonishing, “I felt like an unstoppable being slicing through the red and blue boxes.” You really kept me sucked in for the whole story.
ReplyDelete