Those Moments in "The Zone"

[Jolly Co-operator]

I think we all have those times when we're playing a game, and then suddenly transcend humanity for a brief period of time to kick an excessive amount of ass. In other words, times when you were in "the zone". I'd like to hear about them.

I remember one particular time when I was playing Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. After dying so many times on one section (I can't remember which one it was, unfortunately, but I remember it was a rather large combat area, packed to the brim with enemies), I somehow achieved some sort of enlightenment. After that, nothing could touch me. I was dodging, blocking, and deflecting things perfectly, and I had the mobility of a caffeinated ninja. I don't think I ever stayed on the ground for more than 1 second at a time; this wasn't just random bunny hopping either, I jumped with purpose, damn it! I was doing so incredibly well that the game couldn't handle it and crashed just as I was about to finish the fight. Needless to say, I was pretty annoyed after my mind returned to the mortal plane, and I was once again susceptible to such petty human emotion.

 

[LaoJim]

Geometry Wars, with its slow build up to insane difficulty, is one of those games where you need to be in the zone. Also many fast arcade races (cf. Burnout Paradise) tend to do this to me as well.

 

[Zhukov]

Back in the days of Halo: Combat Evolved I could do truly terrible things when given one of those ghost hover-bikes.

I'd solo entire matches of CTF. Because the ghost is small, fast and manoeuvrable, there would usually be a way to drive it inside right up to the enemy flag. So I'd ram right in, running down down anyone in my path, hop off directly onto the flag, hop back on the ghost and speed right on back out. Usually I'd be in and out before the enemy team even knew I was in there and the ones I'd killed on the way in would be respawning just as I cleared the exit, often just in time for me to run them over again on my way out.

Repeat 3-5 times for instant match victory.

 

[Lilikins]

hmm, Ill usually tend to go into the 'zone' when I panic and freak out and just start button mashing and paying attention to every little detail I can. I do suppose my greatest achievement in the 'zone' was when I played WoW (quite a bit ago but ah well..). I was a priest healer and we were in the fight against Shannox (a raid boss) in 10 man, the fight started and the other healer got mugged in a split second, they battle ressed him and he got dc'd, I ended up solo healing that entire fight. So I basically did 2 healers jobs..alone. My guild never heard the end of it..and I did get 3 place in the world on the rankings on hp/s for that fight. Speaking of which I shall have to check if thats still there..which Im doubting but I shall check hehe. That would be for multiplayer.

Single player I guess would be...I beat the gaping dragon on Dark Souls on the first try with minimal hp after going in some panic induced state and running around in circles screaming. Beat him without getting hit a single time only to see him fall and me letting out an exhausted gasp.


Edit: After checking it up, Im still in the top 75 worldwide on that list haha, and its been about...2 and a half years later roughly, Im proud of myself 'gloating ends' now if youll excuse me I have to prance about my apartment and uncontrollably giggle to myself.

 

[DrBonBon]

That feeling of anger and pride when you're kicked from a battlefield server for being a suspected cheater. "Come on! Nobody is THAT good!" Well I can't help it. I was in "the zone". *Queue sunglasses and awesome power ballad*

 

[BleedingPride]

I get that stalking bloodthirst in games like Assassin's Creed, especially in multiplayer. And I dunno why, but I've been getting a little too in the zone with the new EA UFC game. Maybe it's cause I do Tae Kwon Do and really get the appeal. Who knows.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

I remember playing Hawken and getting a 13 killstreak once. My K/D/A ratio by the end was 16/3/18 I believe. Felt like an absolute beast that game!

 

[GabeZhul]

Back in high school, when I had the free time to do so, I was playing Need For Speed Carbon (I don't generally play games like that anymore because my reduced free-time forces me to consider the invested time/new experiences I get out of it ratio more heavily.)

Anyways, as I said, I was playing the game and got to the final race. Maybe I went in with the wrong car or a bad setup, but in the final canyon race I got my ass handed to me. Repeatedly. I generally did zone out pretty often when playing that game anyway, but I do remember re-playing that one race over and over again for something like three or four hours straight. By the end of it I barely had to look at the road and I was pulling over split-second-accurate gear-switches and handbrake-turns on autopilot. It was a weird experience...

 

[Jolly Co-operator]

Back in the days of Halo: Combat Evolved I could do truly terrible things when given one of those ghost hover-bikes.

I'd solo entire matches of CTF. Because the ghost is small, fast and manoeuvrable, there would usually be a way to drive it inside right up to the enemy flag. So I'd ram right in, running down down anyone in my path, hop off directly onto the flag, hop back on the ghost and speed right on back out. Usually I'd be in and out before the enemy team even knew I was in there and the ones I'd killed on the way in would be respawning just as I cleared the exit, often just in time for me to run them over again on my way out.

Repeat 3-5 times for instant match victory.

Mentioning CTF reminds me of another moment of glory, this time in Starhawk.

I'm much better at playing defensively in objective-based gametypes, so I did my usual thing, protecting the flag, keeping out enemy riffraff, etc. Apparently the other team had the same idea, because as we neared the end of the match, neither side had captured a single flag. It wasn't for lack of trying, it's just that nobody seemed competent enough to actually get a flag back to base.

With little time left, I decided I'd had enough. I actually took the time to plug in my headset just so I could say, "Goddammit, here's how you do it!" I hopped on a hoverbike, and took off. With some clever careening off of sloped walls and well-timed jumps, I got over all the obstacles built by the other team, as well as their guards, and I returned to base, untouched, with the flag. Thanks to my glorious leadership, we won the match 1 to nothing. If there was ever a time in my life for sunglasses and a mic-drop, that was it.

 

[Jolly Co-operator]

I remember one particular time when I was playing Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. After dying so many times on one section (I can't remember which one it was, unfortunately, but I remember it was a rather large combat area, packed to the brim with enemies),

Wasn't the first section of the Death Star by any chance was it? I remember that part kicking my arse several times over, no zoneage for me that time, just plenty of foul language and a big slurp of tea after each defeat.

Anyway for me it was the fight in Metal Gear Rising with Monsson I think (the guy whose limps are already in slices and he can separate them at will). I just remember his constant barrage of attacks and I failed to parry nearly all of them, then after several attempts he dashes towards me and attacks and I manage to parry every single one, there was no controller, screen or console, just me and the game it was awesome, every attack parried, I was so in the zone and so hyped that once I beat him I jumped up screaming "FUCK YOU MOTHERFUCKERRRRRRRR!" Awesome game.

Nah, I don't think it was the Death Star. I was on a planet with a rather dull rocky look, and I think there was quite a bit of wreckage around as well.

And congrats on the Monsoon fight, I found his limb-splitting and dodging to be quite annoying.

 

[Schtimpy]

This is a repost, but this is one of my favorite stories so here ya go.

Back when I first started with Ninja Gaiden (Xbox), I was playing the fourth level (Tairon) and I got my butt kicked in the stairwell leading up to the clock tower. I had a sliver of life left, and there were ninjas waiting for me at the top of the stairs. This is back when I couldn't take out ninjas at full life. I could of healed, but using items in that game always felt like giving up to me. So I went for it. When I got into the fight, time slowed. Like actually slowed, Bullet time and all that. Only time I ever experienced it. I can't remember anything that happened except the end of the fight.

There's a couple of moves, when an enemy is almost dead, that are instant kills and decapitate. I used a sweep move (X X Y Y) that cut off all three of their heads at the same time. One of the ninjas hucked a exploding shuriken a frame before I hit him and I got killed. I had a Talisman of Rebirth (fairy from OoT). My dude rose up in a pillar of blue light, and exploded at the top (exploding shuriken) while being animation invincible. All as the three headless ninjas "exploded" on the ground because corpses don't stay in Ninja Gaiden. I stared at the screen in awe for at least two minutes, then reloaded 'cause I used a talisman. Sigh.

I was going to put the game down, but this got me to finish Ninja Gaiden, and now I'm a Master Ninja on Black. Good times.

 

[Elfgore]

A while back I was playing Modern Warfare, on the one warehouse map I think. I waltzed into a room and dropped an enemy. Someone threw a flashbang in the room and blinded me, but luckily I turned away and didn't take the full brunt of the flash. In my half-flashed state, I ended up killing four enemies who ran into the room. I think I was using the G36C at the time. Man, did I feel like such a badass.

 

[Nouw]

Hotline Miami, except you're in the zone 99% of the time. Also, pulling off insanely long combos in the Arkham games.

Spoiler

 

[Redlin5_v1legacy]

So in World of Tanks last November one of my best friends (the gentleman who introduced me to the game in the first place) and myself decided to load up for a typical platoon battle. I was in my Tiger I and he was in his Tiger P. We were top tier in a tier 7 maximum game in the map Ruinberg.

We drove into the city as is expected of heavy tanks on that map.

Our team was terrible. Just useless. We were in very good tanks.

When the smoke had settled, I had killed 10/15[footnote]This may seem trivial but inside the game getting this many kills in one match is exceptionally difficult.[/footnote] possible enemy tanks and my ally had killed 2 himself. Our team managed to take 3 down with them as they collapsed uselessly on their own. Throughout it all I was calmly putting 88mm shells into tank after tank whilst simultaneously giving instructions over skype to my friend as we fought 2/3rds of an enemy team of equal tiered vehicles to a standstill. In the end it was us against 3 survivors and we saved the day by destroying them as they attempted to capture our base.

That was probably my best war story. Tonight I also was highly decorated. I managed to calmly work together with him again whilst in the zone to take down a T95 who was at 90% health and capping our base. Between the two of us we secured the win.

We work well together.

Spoiler: Evidence! :D

 

[JayRPG]

Playing on my favourite TF2 server recently and got a 46 killstreak, died once and then got a 38 killstreak. I ended up with something like 84 kills, 22 assists, 1 death, 12 dominations. It felt good.

Lots of times in WoW when our guild would just blast through new raid bosses (and then of course for some reason the next night we wipe 400 million times on a farm boss).

I got into the Zone playing Tales of Xillia once too, I was in like a 5-6 hour session of it and got a boss which I read was actually unbeatable, as in, you always died but it still progressed the story, I was so determined and ended up killing the unkillable boss, which actually turned out not to be unkillable, just hard, and you could die and the story still progressed.

 

[Catfood220]

Years ago I was playing Modern Warfare 2 multiplayer, team deathmatch on the rooftop level. I was never what I would call awesome at that game, but I could hold my own when people actually wanted to play the game rather than hide in a corner with a sniper rifle.

Anyway, I'm playing this match, I don't remember how I was doing but I wandered around a corner and saw 2 enemies coming towards me. For some reason I haven't reloaded my gun from my last fire fight. Most of the time I get killed in the middle of reloading I'm that obsessive about reloading. So I opened fire with half a clip which does nothing and automatically go into the reloading animation, I'm out of options so I run toward one of the other guys all the time them shooting at me, I don't know what I'm trying to do, I just expect to die. I reach one guy and instinctively melee him, he dies. His friend is still firing at me so I run at him and instinctively melee again and again he's dead. I stand there for a moment thinking to myself "how the fuck did I just do that?" then run around the corner and murder a couple of other guys before being murdered myself.

I was never that good again.

Well there was that time I accidently took out 2 guys with one airstrike and won the game. But that was more luck than anything resembling skill. But it was nice to get congrats from other players.

 

[Valkrex]

I had one of these back when my friends and I played a ton of Rock Band 3. I was our drummer, playing on Pro-Expert with the cymbals and everything, and I think I missed a total of maybe 20 out of thousands of notes notes in the 3 hours we played that day. And we played a TON of different stuff ranging from Boston and Bon-Jovi, to Iron Maiden, Metallica, Bullet for My Valentine, All That Remains and Megadeth. It was nuts, I got into a groove, absolutely NAILED every song, and got so into it I was even doing crazy tricks with the drumsticks. Hell I even dropped one at one point and pulled another from a small pile nearby (my brother actually does play the drums so we had a few lying around) and kept going without missing a beat.

The time I get in the zone, is usually in Spectacle Fighter games like Ninja Gaiden 2, Devil May Cry, God of War, and Metal Gear Rising. This actually happens to me a lot with this kind of game (and is required for higher difficulties) and I'll suddenly start racking up combos of over 100 hits without taking any damage. Now THAT is an AMAZING feeling in this kind of game. Getting completely in sync with the enemy, and having your combos flow unbroken as you get into a rhythm and destroy everything around you and suddenly notice you still have full health with a SSS rank combo going having used every weapon and move in your arsenal. ESPECIALLY during a boss-fight.

The one's I remember best from this kind of game were in Ninja Gaiden 2 and Metal Gear Rising. In Ninja Gaiden 2 there is a point in the later part of the game where you're fighting your way up an obscenely long staircase into a demonic temple to stop some weird ritual (I don't remember the story very well and it wasn't that great to be honest) and enemy ninjas and monsters are just piling onto you as you fight your way up. I must have taken out over 200 enemies in that 15 minute stretch without taking a hit. I think my combo was over 600 at that point I felt like a complete badass.

In Metal Gear Rising, the boss battle against Jet-Stream Sam. Holy hell is that an awesome boss battle, but I got in a groove and parried nearly every attack, and pulled off some crazy combos. Didn't get away un-damaged this time, but w/e it was still awesome.

Needless to say the Rock-Band thing hasn't happened since...

 

[someonehairy-ish]

I was in the zone on Dota2 last thursday. One game, I was a gyrocopter on a team vs. a faceless void. I saw the void about to time walk in and trap us all with Chronosphere, and I managed to drop my ulti onto our team just as he landed right in the middle of us, thus stunning him, letting us kill him off and win the game.

And then there was my necrophos game. Final killcount, 42/5 to us. My personal k/d, 6/0, with 20 assists, which is amazing on a fairly squishy support.