Life Compared to Mobages

In the past decade, a lot has happened. I finished high school, went to university, and now I’m working. In a way, it’s pretty amazing, but it was a lot of hard work. I live life with a motto of “work hard, play hard”, and one of the things I love to play are mobile games, AKA mobages. I think I can compare life to playing mobages, sort of. Just hear me out.

So for me, I like to think about it this way. Life is analogous to any mobage you can think about, whether it be Love Live! School idol festival (LLSIF), iDOLM@STER Cinderella Girls Starlight Stage (deresute), you name it. So picture yourself playing a mobage, whichever one it might be. Now, think of high school as one event in a mobage. In an event, there’s usually some sort of goal. In the context of, say deresute, perhaps it’s trying to get as many event points as you can so that you achieve a certain rank. In the IRL context, for me, it was to study hard and get into university. And guess what, high school finished, and I got into SFU, analogous to a certain rank in a mobage event.

Now here’s where things get a little more interesting. High school ends, and so does this event. You compare with your friends that also played the same event, and see the tier rankings. Perhaps you’ve placed pretty well, or maybe not so well, but the event’s over.

Now it’s the intermission: a little bit of breathing space before the next event: the university days. And once the next event starts, everything resets. Your experience from the previous event helps you with this next one, but you basically start from scratch and have to make yourself known. University is the same. Sure, some people from the “previous” event will remember you (AKA your high school classmates), but you’re basically a nobody. You have to use the things you’ve learned from high school to help you out; however, this event is a new one for most people. We’re all noobs here: we’ve never experienced this type of event before, so we go in blind. Some of us take it for granted, and give up a quarter way through. It’s sort of like first year, where some people fade out. At this point, people sort of get the gist of the event, and continue to grind it out.

Once we reach the half way point, your typical mobage offers some sort of helpful thing to you. In the context of deresute, this might be a “spend double stamina, get double the event points”. Analogous to university, you’ve passed the “gatekeeper” courses. For me, those were most of my second year courses.

As we’re nearing the end of the event, it’s the last sprint to the finish. We have to grind it out to the end, but the event has taken a toll on us. We’re tired, and just want to finish.

And finally! The event’s over. How well did you do? Are you going to achieve the the rank you wanted? In our context, will you graduate with distinction? Did you make the cut? The wait is long while final scores and rankings are calculated. When they’re finally released, you feel a sense of relief: alas, it’s over.

And with that, we move on to the next one…and the next one…and the next one.

Life is like mobages…or is it the other way ’round?

~Lui

Injabie3
Injabie3

Just some guy on the Internet that writes code for fun and for a living, and also collects anime figures.

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