Loneliness

Without getting maudlin I’m just a bit lonely at the time of writing. Work is in a windowless room and solo, friends are insanely busy and my lovely girlfriend is away on holiday at the moment. Whilst solitude reasonably suits me loneliness is very different, even in my solitude people are on hand if I so desire but when my usual support network is absent it’s easy to get glum. Like a person playing sad songs after the end of a relationship to help soothe the soul I found myself drawn to examples of loneliness…the most notable being in gaming.

I adore the Fallout series, it’s high praise when even after 12 years you can call it unique and an experience without parallel. An expansive game yet compact and a highly personal experience it’s not necessarily a AAA series but it’s one of those game series that changes how you view the medium and like any good book it can change your outlook on life too. Fallout 3 has received incredible high praise since it’s release and whilst I enjoyed it immensely that indefinable element that pushes a game from simply a great game into something more seemed absent. It was still funny, highly playable and one of the games of the year but I saw it as nothing deeper. That was until I felt lonely.

I utilise the protestant work ethic when playing games like Fallout. I do little exploring, it’s point to point gaming as I level up and get tasks done. It perhaps forces me to lose that element of exploration that makes some games great but games like Fallout 3 force you to put your own personality onto the game and the constant work aspect is my indelible mark. However with nothing to do I did something distinctly out of character, I went for a walk in Capital Wasteland. The radio quickly aggravated me so I turned it off, thinking the usual ambient sounds of Oblivion would tickle my speakers. An eerie wind blowing was all I heard, no other sound. Unsettling, but the occasional blip of incidental music helped kept me going. I then came across Arlington Cemetery, the resting place for heroes of past wars. Surprisingly no enemies for me to deal with, a peaceful reminder of what horrors preceded the end of civilisation. Upon leaving night fell and I found myself in a quiet corner of the map, no Enclave or mutated scorpions. Just me…and my camera which had caught sight of something. The stars and a crescent moon sitting in a clear sky. Feeling insignificant when looking at the majesty of space is normal, but for some reason it really hit home in Fallout. Nothing on Earth but the unimaginable horror of nuclear war and yet we are still nothing, still a tiny blip in a vast expanse. It also brought home to me that Fallout is set in Earth, which can be forgotten. The moon looking down evoked real emotion, real insignificance and real loneliness. Bethesda had always made Fallout 3 as emotive and personal as the rest of the series, I guess I just hadn’t had the emotion to engage with it on that level.

After that I decided work was the best cure and Broken Steel was downloaded along with a list of bobblehead locations drawn up. Keeping busy and all that. Beyond that Point Lookout, The Pitt and Mothership Zeta I guess, hopefully by then I’ll have my little support network up and running because I’m not sure if I can afford loneliness. Life was easier when all you did was play a song when you were sad, you only needed the radio for that.