Watch the 1999 San Antonio Spurs dorking about in StarCraft
Playing off
Have you ever heard a football or basketball or (snort) baseball fan talking in depth about their passion? The numbers they can memorise alone puts some EVE veterans to shame. Some of them probably take it even more seriously than some of the players. Meanwhile, what's a star ballchucker to do in their downtime, with the press circling and anything dangerous or unhealthy off limits? There's only so much you can do when confined to a hotel.
It's not really a surprise then to see footage of the NBA's San Antiono Spurs playing StarCraft in between games back in 1999. Sport and games: together at last.
The video was shared on Reddit on Friday. This was reportedly between games of the championship finals, which the Spurs won decisively - no doubt because of their incredible vespene mining prowess. Highlights include David Robinson trying to hide his agitation at Tim Duncan's terrible defences even while his resources pile up, and Malik Rose's shameless cackle when he's caught cheating by peeking at another screen.
It's oddly cute to see these superstar athletes not just playing but so relaxed and happy messing around together in a game that serves such casual hangout games as well as it serves the extremely competitive professional circuit. And this was twenty years ago! Games have been big for several generations now, but this is a fun reminder that however much money they make, whatever the industry does, there will always be people doing the most important thing games have always aided: being big dorks together.