Getting Trolled in Videogames

I'd apologize for all this time without writing, but... Nevermind. Really, I had nothing to talk about. Besides, it's not like anybody would get mad at me because of it.

Anyway... Some time ago, with all this Skyrim fever, I took my old copy of "Morrowind", rolled a Breton battlemage and started playing. As I advanced a bit I heard a human scream. I looked up and saw a guy in a robe crashing against the floor and dying. Not the most unusual thing I've seen, but as I looted his corpse I found "Scrolls of Icarian Flight". I remembered. I wouldn't be trolled again.

Yes, friends... or for now, friend. I'm talking about "trolling" here. 4chan may have invented "trollface" and most of internet memes, but the act of trolling has existed for quite some time. Even videogames have it. The Scroll of the Icarian Flight was a troll item, put in the game by the programmers to screw you. The scroll itself appears harmless enough. Increases your Acrobatics (a skill that measures your jumping distances and the damage you suffer when falling) by 1,000 for 7 seconds. No typo there: It increased your acrobatics by One Friggin' THOUSAND. If you used the scroll and jumped you should certainly be able to head-butt Odin in His good eye. But after taking off comes landing. You'd die crashing against the floor, learning why the guy appeared from nowhere falling like a meteor. Sure, you can sell the scrolls, but you could fall into the trap just out of curiosity.

But at least, this is a "Curiosity killed the cat"-kind of trolling, the one that can be avoided. Let's go back in time and we'll find THIS:

For those who prefer not watching the video, it's a review of Noah Antwiler, a.k.a. The Spoony One, about "Diry Harry: The War Against Drugs" where you can find one of the best examples of videogame trolling in history.

No signs of it being dangerous or different from other doors in this or other buildings. You enter a room that looks like every single room you've entered so far. And when you do it, you're screwed. You're locked inside the room. Where there was supposed to be a door as all the previous times there was nothingness. Just a wall with "HA HA HA" written. As Spoony says, "Incompetence, I can handle", but this is real old school trolling. You're srewed, there's NO way out of that room only resetting the game. At least in Morrowind you could save your game before using the scroll, but here? You're so frigging screwed you'd want to punch someone in the face. And as I said, the room from the outside looks EXACTLY like every other one in the game so far.

Programmers want to troll us. Videogames cheat in RTS games, getting more resources and troops than you could get, attaacking you in the first 5 minutes of playing. The difficulty has always had a problem. It could be insulting easy or frustratingly hard. You can hardly find a balance. In FPS's they game KNOWS where you are everytime and that's an advantaje they can and will use against you. In racing games, the game will friggin' make up power ups so you can't end up in first place. And when I suffer most of those events, there's a word thundering in my head...

"Problem?"