Ryan goes back to school in just under 2 weeks, and I’ve been bugging him to play the Endless Setlist with me on Rock Band before he leaves.
If you’re unfamiliar with Rock Band’s multiplayer thing, the Endless Setlist is the last thing you unlock in the game when you’re playing as a band. It is exactly what it sounds like: a concert featuring all 58 songs that come with the game. It takes about six hours to play if you don’t take any extended breaks.
Today, Ryan and I tackled it on expert. He played guitar, and I played bass. It was awesome. We got five stars on pretty much everything for the first 20 or so songs, including three gold stars. I got the authentic strummer thing and 99% on about half of them.
We were seriously having a good time, striking the rock pose, putting our backs together while we jammed through epic songs, bonding through the power of rock.
Then, with five songs left to go, we got to Green Grass and High Tides.
For those of you unfamiliar with Rock Band, this is a fantastic southern rock song by the Outlaws. It’s also one of the hardest in the game, and the longest, weighing in at around 10 minutes. It’s a song that you don’t play as much as survive, and it does its best to really beat you down. If a song could kick you in the junk, this would be it. If this song were a poker game, it would be Razz.
So, after already playing for 5 hours, (and not exactly conserving our energy) we started to play this rock epic, knowing it would be the greatest challenge we’d faced yet.
Our first time through, we failed at 84%. It was entirely my fault for holding my guitar too high and deploying our emergency overdrive when we didn’t need it.
“Sorry about that,” I said as we lost 360,000 fans. “I blame my guitar.”
Ryan looked at me.
“Okay, I blame myself.”
Ryan laughed and said it was no big deal. He was confident we’d get it on the next try, and when we started the song, I could see why. He was in the zone, nailing 97% of the first solo. I wanted to holler about how awesome he was, but I felt like it would have been the same as talking to my pitcher in the middle of a no-hitter, so I stayed quiet and did my best not to screw things up.
I screwed things up, and we failed the song at 96%. We lost another 360,000 fans, almost wiping out the million we’d picked up when we did the Southern Rock Marathon last week. Compared to the nearly 5 and a half hours we’d spent playing, that 18 minutes wasn’t that long, but it sure felt demoralizing, especially because it was, again, entirely my fault we’d failed. See, there’s this bass phrase that’s repeated over and over and over, and if you’re just a tiny bit off (like I was) you’re screwed, and . . . well, you get the point.
I dropped my hands to my side and let the guitar hand around my neck. My arms were tired, my legs hurt, and my vision was getting blurry.
“I think I’ve identified the weak link in our band, and it’s me,” I said. “I’m really sorry.”
“It’s okay,” Ryan said, “but I think I want to take a break.”
“Good idea,” I said. “Let’s pause this, go out for something to eat, and come back later.”
Ryan walked into his room and turned on his shower. I unplugged my guitar so we didn’t have to worry about our dogs knocking it down and starting the game again while we were gone.
In my memory, the next few moments happen in slow motion:
- I pick up Ryan’s guitar, the wireless PS2 guitar from GHIII.
- I hold down the button to get the control screen.
- The dashboard comes up, and it gives me the option to cancel, turn off the controller, or turn off the system.
- I click the strum bar to select “turn off the controller.”
- I set the guitar on the ground — carefully — and reach up to click the green fret button.
- I hear the Xbox beep.
- I push the button.
- I realize that the beep was the strum bar clicking one more time when I set the guitar down, selecting “Shutdown the System.”
- The system shuts down, taking all of our progress with it.
- Time resumes to normal. For the next 120 seconds, I use every curse word I know, until my throat is raw. It takes everything I have not to grab the guitar and get all Pete Townshend on it.
Ryan came out of his room.
“What happened?” He said.
I told him.
What happened next was astonishing to me: Ryan didn’t freak out. He didn’t get upset. Instead, he told me, “Calm down, Wil. It’s just a game. We can do it again.”
I was still really upset. It was an accident, yes, but it was my fault. In my head, I kept replaying all the different ways I could have powered down his guitar that were more careful. I really felt like an asshole, because I screwed up twice and caused us to fail both times. I felt like an asshole, because I screwed up and lost all the progress we’d made. Mostly, though, I felt like an asshole because I really wanted to accomplish this feat with my son. I really wanted to have that memory.
What I got, though, was better than what I’d hoped for. I got to see Ryan exhibit one of the key values I’d raised him with: he kept everything in perspective, and found all the good things in the experience, like the gold stars we scored, the fun we had playing all the other songs, and the time we spent together. He reminded me that it’s not about winning, it’s about playing the game.
If you’ve read my blog for any amount of time, I’m sure you can appreciate how great it felt to hear my words and my values come out of my son’s mouth.
I don’t write about my boys very often these days. Their friends read my blog, and they sometimes read my blog. They’re not little kids any more and I feel like it’s not cool to talk about everything we do together with the Internet . . .
. . . but in this case, I’m making an exception.
I am always in awe of how cool my kid is. Thankfully, they do learn from our mistakes, when we stand back and let them.
Ouch! Sorry to hear about the gaming mishap, but I am pleased for you that your son showed such restraint. Like you said, it is about playing the game, and you guys sound like you had a great time together π
I have been wanting Rockband for the longest time, but I have a Wii and the Wii version is missing many features. It’s almost enough to make me buy an XBox π
Wil,
Hubby and I are still learning that lesson (I’m 35 and he’s 45) … we both have short tempers when things go rough like that. I think we’re both supposed to learn patience LOL.
I wish I could have kids in order to instill those values. Those values are so rare these days in the younger generation. Oh gawd, am old enough to say “younger generation”! Ruh Roh!
Anyways, so sorry about the game situation. At least it is something that can be started again and worked on during school vacations and such.
HUGS!
I really enjoyed your Mahalo Daily interview. After what you said there about not blogging about your kids so much these days, I’m really glad you still decided to make the exception and write this.
You are spot on when you said that you got much more than you had hoped for and it’s great that one of you could keep perspective. It seems you managed to create an even better memory than you had hoped for.
And there’s still time to try again another day!
Though it hurts now, later it will be something to laugh at. “Remember that time we played for 5 hours, almost finished the endless setlist and then I accidentally turned off the xbox??” or “That’s not as bad as that time I turned off the xbox…”
Still a great memory…
I’m still bugging my hubby about the “7th Guest” save game he erased not once but after almost finishing again, twice. Good times. π
Isn’t it great when they act more grown up than you do? The time that you spend with your Kids is golden even if it is messing up on Rock Band. π
I really enjoyed this entry. π
Careful, though…. on PostSecrets (do you know it?), I read a postcard that said, “I said my carpal tunnel surgery was because of work. But really, it was from Guitar Hero.”
On an unrelated note, I would have given a lot to see the Trek without Blueprints panel at ComicCon. Dayton, Dimore, Mack and you… that’s just scary!
This post brings tears to my eyes for a bunch of reasons. First, I have been reading you long enough to understand what this kind of moment means to you, and I’m grateful that you’re willing to share it with the rest of us. Your ability to make a connection with your kids (and write about it so honestly) is absolutely inspirational.
Secondly, I’m working through a similar issue myself, with my 18-year-old daughter who moved out of the house this past Tuesday. It’s still new and raw – and you as a parent probably know what I mean – and the idea that things can even temporarily return to what I like to pretend is “normal” comforts me.
Finally, though I’m not much of a “gamer” in any sense, I have recently begun connecting with my 16-year-old son over things related to Comic-Con. And the reason I attended that event in the first place was to see your panel!
So for all of these reasons, and probably many more, I want to thank you , Wil, for sharing your experiences with us, and for serving as an inspiration to me in so many ways.
I dont have kids. I have dogs and cats. I have not had kids for a lot of reasons, too many to go into right here.
But This is probably the first post I have ever read that made me want to have kids.
I’m not going to, I mean my reasons for not breeding are both personal and sacrificial in a way. But this post, I grokked it. Fully and deeply, how the point of having children, or adopting them, or accepting responsibility for them even if they are not your own, is that moment when one can feel the fact that the world will go on without out us, and be ok.
I’m a huge Rock Band fanatic and video game fanatic and I identify the effort to achieve something in a game and to get so far and slip it up and it be ok because hey, its both just a game, as well as the best thing ever, well.
That’s what it is all about.
Jesus thanks Wil for posting this.
S.
Wil, thank you for sharing this with us.
Although I’m not a parent myself, I assume that sometimes it’s hard to tell how well you’re really doing as a dad. This is one of those times where you get a chance to bask in the kind of gold stars that let you know that yes, you’ve done a good job by your sons.
Dang, that sux. But props to Ryan for keeping it real.
You have raised some incredible boys and seeing your teaching come through in their daily lives must be true joy. I’m sure it will be hard to send Ryan back to school in 2 weeks – the summers always seem so much shorter now that we’re adults.
I sympathise greatly, but my first thought on reading this entry is not ‘oh Wil you mucked up’ or ‘oh Wil that’s such a horrible thing to do by accident’.
It was ‘oh Harmonix how can you be so cruel as to implement a game mode that requires over five hours of continuous gameplay before any progress can be saved’.
Seriously, how many people will ever be able to finish that? How many people have a group of Rock Band players who will get together for that long and play continuously, with only pause-induced pizza breaks?
Haven’t they heard of the revolutionary concept of ‘saving the game’??
Wil,
I’ve been reading your blog for a long time. It’s some of my favorite reading. You’ve had some influence on my interests and on my own writing. (“Don’t be afraid to suck” is the best advice I’ve heard in a long time.)
I’ve never left you a comment before. Maybe I’m a bit shy, or I didn’t feel I had anything important to say.
But when I read this post and my eyes started leaking a bit, well heck, I had to introduce myself and tell you how much I enjoy your writing. This is a great story. Thanks for sharing it.
Milas
Oh man, do I know that feeling. The ringing eternal second where one’s stomach departs for points south, vision wrapped in a crystalline tunnel around the moment of Epic Fail, and just the word “no” hoving in tiny grey letters three inches behind the bridge of your nose.
Then the swearing.
It’s extremely cool that Ryan was so sane about it.
Kids are amazing, aren’t they? My nieces and nephews surprise me all the time.
“Green Grass and High Tides Forever” great epic song I greatly enjoy, yet deadly in the hands of gamers. π
I’ve been reading your blog for a while now, Wil, and your posts about Nolan and/or Ryan–and your relationship with them–are always some of my favorites. I don’t know exactly when it happened, but I’ve noticed that you refer to them as your stepsons less and just call them your sons more and more. That really resonates with me and touches my heart.
I’m a stepdad, too. I met my stepdaughter when she was 5. She’s 11 now and she’s been calling me “Daddy” for most of the time she’s known me. Her biological father is not in the picture (in fact, they’ve never met), and while we’re all open about the fact that she’s not biologically mine, there’s no question that I am her father. I’m so incredibly proud of her, and so lucky to have her as a daughter. Everytime I read about how close you are to your boys, what a great relationship you have with them, and everytime you call them your sons, not stepsons, I feel like I really know where you’re coming from and how you feel.
So, good for you for being such a great father to them! How lucky you are to have this time with them! And thank you for writing about it and sharing it with all of us.
wil
can you adopt me?
5 hours gaming with your son?
you are the best
Wow, Wil, that’s really a testament to your abilities as a parent π
I had to do the endless setlist twice on expert too. My friend accidentally forgot to sign in and didn’t get the achievement. Much to my wife’s chagrin we ended up doing the whole 5-hour set again a few days later.
My son is currently five and loves to kick my butt at all manner of Wii games. I can’t wait until he’s old enough to jam with me on the likes of Rock Band.
Ryan’s Words of Wisdom:
“It’s just a game. We can do it again.”
*applause*
I really enjoyed this entry because I do a reasonable amount of the running around, tearing my hair out and swearing and various inanimate objects (and a few animate ones too). The spectrophotometer software comes to mind – it doesn’t save data in a reasonable way and then doesn’t ask if you want to save before someone shuts it down. Perhaps I can shorten the time devoted to glaring at it and telling it exactly what I think of its mother.
(okay, that was perhaps a bit too geek even for this blog.)
The other reason for delurking is to wish you a happy birthday tomorrow. I can remember as a kid seeing your name in the “celebrities born today” thing in the newspaper on my birthday and not really knowing who you were other than as an actor. I’ve enjoyed this blog – and a book or two – for a few years now and I’m glad to share the same birthday with a hoopy frood who really knows where his towel is. So have a great birthday.
“I really wanted to have that memory.”
Those words are such a bittersweet reminder of how we, as parents, set ourselves up for disappointment. We plan something in our heads and have all these expectations for the memories we’ll take away. And then we introduce the wild variable of reality.
You are fortune. The memory you got sounds so much better than the one you thought you wanted.
Thanks for sharing.
Yeah, I have no one to attempt endless setlist with….but hey at leats you werne’t attempting it with rock band 2(harmonix has stated that it takes around 10 hours with no breaks). and hey at least you weren’t on drums.
This is a wonderful story and it’s helped me understand something about my own son’s gaming. He’s only seven, but he’s good and gets very emotionally involved with what he’s playing.
I’m going to share this post with him (minus the assholes which would just make him laugh hysterically).
Thanks, Wil.
you know you’ve been programming too much when an unclosed “(” in a blog post title makes you twitch.
We knew this already, but: Ryan totally rocks! (Uh, no pun intended.)
I’m with those who say that this will be a good joke between you two…eventually.
It’s amazing how easy it is to lose perspective when you get so involved in something, when you’re so close to something.
Congratulations Wil, you’ve raised a decent human being, which, as far as I’m concerned, is one of the greatest compliments you can bestow on a parent.
Dude, you’re so cool it’s just insane. I love these posts. Both of your boys are top notch, and it’s got everything to do with Anne and your raising them right.
This reminds me of back in the day when my sister was playing original Zelda. She made it all the way to the last level and somehow the NES turned off. She never touched that thing ever again. I’m glad to hear Ryan is mature enough not to freak out. WTG!
You know, the folks at IGN made this exact same mistake when they were first playing the game. Then, they had five people involved, and during a break before the last song a guy disconnects it. They paused for a few minutes in despair, ordered some pizzas, and started over right there. An all-nighter it was.
I know exactly what you mean about hearing your own words back from your child. My daughter is 7 and often spouts wisdom back at me! It always makes my day.
While I can imagine the heart-break involved in erasing five hours worth of progress, you should keep your depression in check. Think of it this way- how would you have felt if Ryan had done the same thing? I would imagine you would’ve reacted the EXACT same way that he did. I’m sure he feels the same way you do, that what’s really important is spending time with each other. I know, I know, you wanted that memory, but, as usually happens when we start out wanting a specific memory, God(or the Universe, or whatever karmic/supernatural/random force you believe in) says, “No, you get this memory instead. Trust me, it’s going to be much cool anyways.” Besides, you already know that what mattters who you spend your time with, not what you do with them.
Congratulations on an awesome memory to treasure with your son.
My stomach felt sick for you when I read the twitter. The two guys I know who did endless set list on expert had problems with GGaHT too. You really have to be strategic about when you use your star power. Getting a singer onboard the tour can help since it gives you that many more opportunities for saves. That is definately a ball-breaking song on guitar.
I suggest amending your story to “I did it on purpose so I could spend another five hours playing with my son.” Although if you adopt that stance, you are going to have to turn off the console every time you attempt in the future.
Welcome back from SDCC. Sorry about Rock Star, it happens.
SDCC plans for 2009 planned yet?
I finally get to go.
Wil, you aren’t the only one screaming in a corner with your pants down, feeling like you’re the only one in cyber space at a given moment. How do I know I’ve been in the corner too long? My first reaction was that was such a rookie Wesley mistake with rock band. I was hoping to read that you had found an uber-genious Wesly solution… reorganizing isolinear chips or nanobots or something.
Told ya I’ve been in the corner too long.
If you can’t get past “Green Grass” you will never make it through Iron Maiden’s “Run to the Hills.” It will suck the living soul out of you or at least leave you with the Twitchy Forearm of Doom. I did the Endless Set List on Expert with three friends last weekend, and that one was nearly the death of us. Nearly. We just squeaked through to glory. Sorry bout your accident. That truly sucks.
*tear*
I would have been freaking out like you Wil and I kind of think my nephew would have told me to calm down and that it was just a game too…
Wow, that’s a great story. I really wish I could keep my cool like that. It sounds like you and Anne have done a great job raising your sons. (And now I’m feeling really old at 27 because I just realized I’ve been reading Nolan and Ryan stories for years. But hey, you wouldn’t tell stories about them if they weren’t awesome, right? Right.)
And let me take a moment to congratulate you both on playing on expert. I can’t get out of medium. Granted I’ve played maybe a few hours total but still I just know my hand will never reach that orange button.
Anyway, nice story. It makes me smile. Rock on, guys. \m/
While I’m not putting down the game, the bonding, or anything similar, you are aware there is a new version of that for PC in which you would be using a real guitar and actually learning to play it….
That was such a beautiful story. I actually had to register to post just for this one.
It reminds me of the times my son has acted more ‘adult’ than me. He’s 16 now, but he’s given many several cool ‘adult’ moments over the years.
Once I was trying to put an entertainment center together. I can’t really lift anything heavy – and the pieces were very heavy – so he was trying to help.
I started getting really aggravated because I couldn’t get the sides to go on. I was cussing and freaking out.
My son told me to go to bed and finish it in the morning when I had fresh eyes.
Well, I actually decided to listen to him, and I had been up a long time.
Turns out it was great advice. As soon as I got up I figured out what the problem was and was able to slide the sides right on.
Wil,
That story was fantastic. Sadly I am not a parent. Because of some life choices I probably won’t get the chance. I have the pleasure of hanging out with a 13 year old that is the son of one of my closest friends. He is a terrific kid. The problem is that his mom and her brother are always yelling at him. He acts spoiled and mean around them. I don’t treat him that way. I treat him like he is an adult. If he violates that trust, then I explain to him that I will have to treat him like a kid. I never yell at him, I am honest with him. And because of that I see a wonderful, smart kid, who is very polite. I can only imagine how you felt when Ryan acted like an adult because you made a mistake. Its an awesome feeling. Oh and just for Wow factor the name of the boy that I look after is Ryan.
Thanks for letting me sure on your site. You really are a fantastic guy.
It seems you taught your kids “how to make people feel happy to know you.”
It sounds like your son has the kind of cool-headed perspective that most people don’t develop until adulthood, and that some people never develop at all.
You win at parenting. π
Heh. Thats a lesson I learned by example. A couple people I live with have OMFGENDOFWORLD reactions to all kinds of things that happen that dont go according to plan. Therefore, one of my personal philosophies is “Its not a big deal.”
Had your rockband thingy occured here? Oooh boy. I dont want to think about it.
I pretty much stopped playing guitar and bass in favor of vocals and drums as soon as we got Rock Band. Green Grass and High Tides was almost the end of me on just medium on the drums. It’s a shame really. In order to enjoy playing the song I have to quit at 56%, I believe? I wish they had a short version that unlocks after you beat it or something.
Great story, btw.
Ahh man, we’ve not gotten to the endless setlist yet but I’m dreading something like this happening. It’s a credit to your parenting that Ryan reacted in such a mature fashion.
If it makes you feel any better I knew a bloke who, for some unknown reason, played Final Fantasy on his PS1 without a memory card until his flatmate switched it off without checking….
PS2 Wil?! C’mon man.. use your 360!
Clearly you and your son are a whole lot better than my son and I, because we have a hard time beating that song on Normal. π
That’s really awesome. You’re a great dad and it shows!
When I was about ten, my mom and I used to play Super Mario Bros. together in a similar way. Only, there was just one way to put the game on “pause” for time to eat and sleep–actually put the game on pause. Turn off the TV. DO NOT TOUCH THE NES. We were so into it that we took it on vacation that summer. We were in world 6-2 and the closest we’d ever been to beating the game. She put it on pause to shower, so we could all go out for lunch. I don’t remember how, honestly, but I pushed the reset button while she was gone. When I told her she was furious. I am ashamed to actually admit it, but she even slapped me around. It was a pretty shitty vacation.
Wil, I wish you’d been my mom.