Berserk
“Berserking is for scrubs!”
“You mugged my Lv 9 triple-elemental-rapier! I'm gonna kill ya, you fuckin' son of a biaaaaaaatch!!!”
Berserking (ICD-10 1337) is a mental illness that occurs as a co-morbidity of video game addiction. That means one has to be a video game addict in order to berserk. It's characterized mainly by an uncontrollable fury with varying degrees of severity. A berserking attack is triggered by the player's frustration with something that happens inside the game or by the patient being interrupted in the satisfaction of his vice.
Epidemology[edit]
Recent studies show that the berserk virus first started in Scandinavia and then spread to other countries via the TCP-IP protocol. Theories about the Nordic tendency towards berserking point to the long winter that makes Swedes, Finns, Danes and other blond people with big-breasted valkyrienesque women prone to excessive gaming and, even worse, O.S. voluntary programming (Linux is the only well-documented case of berserk occurring without game addiction).
Symptoms and classification[edit]
Anthropologist Civ Meier created the following classification for berserk in his book "My Son Is a Berserker. Kill Him or Not?". There are five degrees of berserking, which for some unknown reason berserking patients insist in calling levels.
| Severity Level | Symptoms | Example |
| Level 1 - Wimpy |
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| Level 2 - Retarded |
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| Level 3 - Annoying |
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| Level 4 - Worrisome |
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| Level 5 - Catastrophic |
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Military use[edit]
Academics widely recognize that Vikings were the first to use berserking as a military weapon. Those warriors used to fill their longboats with portable consoles with a little trick to start a general berserking state: Viking leaders charged the batteries just enough to endure to sea travel. As soon as they reached the coast, the consoles turned off simultaneously, often when the players where in the last chapter of the game. This was the main reason behind Viking victories during Middle Ages. In the 12th century, when home entertainment systems were invented, Scandinavians decided to convert to Christianity and stay in their houses.
At the end of WWI, the Treaty of Versailles issued a worldwide ban on chemical weapons and berserking. Later on the ban was respected, as neither the Axis nor the Allies wanted to deal with the massive human costs of the other side also using berserkers.
Berserking episodes in History[edit]
- In 328 BC, after being mocked for his poor performance in Black and White, Alexander The Great killed his friend Clitus using his controller chord.
- In 55 BC, getting furious after playing 32 hours of Civilization III in Sid level without any result, Julius Caesar decided to invade Galia and Britain to prove that it was easier to do it in real life than in the game. He was right.
- In 622 AD Muhammad gone berserk after being expelled from Meccan World of Warcraft clan for cheating. He founded his own clan in Medina server and started looting caravans of Meccan players. This way, he is credited as the inventor of real money concept.
- In 1799 AD Napoleon Bonaparte got furious at some Russian gold-farmers that nailed down his character with bots. He invaded half of Europe and killed almost all of his army just to find a pile of burned CDs.
- From 1933 upon Adolf Hitler put to work his revenge for not being accepted in Hanukkah clan of Counter Strike.