i don't get it, this applies to every single game. you can't beat aimbots in fps, you can even rig any game bot to play perfectly.
that's why you play against HUMANS.
that's why you play against HUMANS.
But it did not used to apply for every single game. In fact in Go it was famously true just a few years ago that the best humans were waay waay better than even the best computers.
At uni I hung out with Go players and they had all kind of theories why Go is particularly hard for computers. Some of them well quite well reasoned, and some were just a bunch of magical thinking. What was not in doubt is that even at that admitedly medium level the players were better than the computers they had access to.
Just a few years ago it went from “we are competing to be the best Go players period” to “we are competing to be the best human Go players”. That is a change in mindset, and it seems at least for that one particular player they couldn’t make the change.
Imagine that you grew up in a world where aimbots are just worse than mediocre players, always. And you build up your personal motivations with this fact. And then suddenly the aimbots get better than even the best players. Some systems of motivation will crumble when this happens. Some will manage to adapt. This is just how it is.
Imagine if you grow up where there are no monkeys, mountain goats or helicopter rides to the top. You never heard of them, they are not a thing in your world. And you put in hard work to become a very very good rock climber. You kinda fancy yourself an apex climber. Maybe your mate George is a bit faster than you sometimes, but sometimes you are faster than him. Sometimes Sarah beaths the both of you, but sometimes you beat her times. You are kinda up there with the bests as far as you know. And then suddenly someone brings a monkey to your rock climbing gym and the monkey smokes all of you. It climbs walls much better than you ever could. Now you have to adapt. Will you change your viewpoint and start seeing yourself as “best among humans” and keep competing like that? Or will you see yourself as “clearly outcompeted so badly I might even give up”? Some people will go one way, some the other way. And then the new generation will grow up with the knowledge of monkeys, and they all naturally will be only the first kind of people, who understand that they can’t be the best only best among their class.
Go players had their “the first monkey shows up in the climbing gym” moment during our lifetime. That is why you see some of the players react like that. That is a very different world from rock climbing where everyone already knows about monkeys, and mountain goats and helicopter rides since forever. Every person currently climbing rocks started climbing with the existence of monkeys, mountain goats and helicopters already incorporated into their thinking way before they climbed their first wall.
At the highest level of play, exploration of the game space eclipses point capture.
Points don't matter because it's play, so your emotional attachment to the outcome is a measure of maturity.
Play with infinite boundaries is pointless, so they let us explore freely without having emotional stake in arbitrary accumulation.
To play with an asymmetrical opponent should be some parts learning with sparse competition to test your knowledge of finite play space.