Donut Fridays: My Candy Crush Addiction and Dragging the Hubby Down with Me

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Oh no, am I really writing a blog about Video Games?! Yes, yes I am. I don’t actually like video games that much, and I’ve never gotten very addicted for too long to any game. Back in the “old” days, my parents did not get the ever-popular Atari, they bought Intellivision. And, I think we had 4 games total. The only ones I remember playing regularly were Donkey Kong and some space game. It was not uncommon for my mother to beat me at these games regularly as she had some crazy good hand-eye coordination that would frustrate both my dad and I.

Later, in High School, I got the popular Nintendo Game Boy, and my game of choice then was Tetris. I loved Tetris and spent hours playing it on long bus rides for band and drum corp trips. During my last year of Drum Corps, my “bus seat partner” was a guy who I think asked me to sit next to him, not for my witty personality, but for my Game Boy. He took it over that summer.

Since then, I dabbled in games here and there if friends had systems, but I never had much patience or love for them. But, if I did get involved in a game for awhile, I would grow bored of it after a bit. The same is true for all the apps on the Smart Phone. I’ll play games here and there, but I have never become that addicted and tend to go for games like Sudoku and Word Scramble, but then came Candy Crush….

I began playing Candy Crush about a year ago, and when I first started I thought to myself, “this is just like Bejeweled. Not sure what the attraction is…” But, then I kept playing, and I kept playing some more. During the last year, while still working, I also had a lot of business trips, and let me tell you, you can play A LOT of Candy Crush when you are alone in hotel rooms, and on airplanes… There is no doubt, I was addicted (and still am). As those who play Candy Crush know – there are ups and downs. You get stuck on some levels for a while and just have to stop playing for a few days. But, then eventually you pass it, and hey! Look at that! There’s a new level afterwards that seems easier - and perhaps you whiz through a few levels. And, then you get stuck again… You get rewarded with stars on each game depending upon the number of points you get, and each game gives you the chance to win High Score. Thanks to the connection via Facebook, you can see what levels your friends are on, and if they got previous high scores on the level you are currently playing. For the last year I have been following an entire family that I knew from High School through the Candy Crush board. One of the four of them was always in the top three, and it wasn’t uncommon to see all four of them sitting in the top 4 spots. A couple of other girls from High School, and old coworkers also graced the top spots as I came through behind them.

Throughout this entire time, and for at least a year prior, my husband has been a staunch Angry Birds player. He passed all the levels, and there were additional goals to complete. He would give me regular updates on his game playing, and before I started playing my own Candy Crush, I would secretly roll my eyes when he started getting Angry Bird geek on me. (Or, maybe it wasn’t so secret). But, then when I started playing Candy Crush, and it randomly posts on Facebook to tell people I’ve passed a level, my husband was at the ready to make some witty (smartass) comment about my Candy Crush exploits. What made this worse, was that no matter how high I get on the Crush gameboard, Facebook always seemed to post that I passed either Level 2 or Level 8. And my husband never failed to point that out. He’s a gem isn’t he?

Well… a few weeks ago, he finally beat all that he could at Angry Birds and posted about it. So I couldn’t resist jumping in to see what he was moving on to. And, sure enough, he has decided to take up Candy Crush. AND MY TIME HAS COME FOR REVENGE.

Mr. Mingle now geeks out on Candy Crush (and he is finding it very difficult). Suddenly, I’m getting nightly questions like “what’s this candy for? How do you get that Candy? Level 23 is hard… What happens when you get 5 in a row? 4? …” I even got a mid-day text about this (to be shared below).

While he’s just started, I think that I’m nearing the end. I have no idea how many levels there actually are, but I’m now on level 350, and I’ve noticed that three out of four of the family that I mentioned earlier all stopped on level 350. Why? Why?? Did you collectively decide you would give it up once you reached that magic number, or do you know something that I don’t about what’s beyond 350…. Do you go into Candy Crush Hell after that where the dentist comes to rip out all your cavities without Novocain? Please tell me, why did you stop??

And now, for the texts shared between a husband who gets obsessed with games, currently Candy Crush, and a wife at home who is happy to answer…

Mr. Mingle texts are in grey and my texts are in blue: