Making a game for myself out of daily technical frustration
Like many people, I am required to use Microsoft Teams for conference calls by my job. Like many people, I find Microsoft Teams is rubbish and it gives me problems every single day. I have never joined a Teams meeting simply by clicking the link. I must always refresh stalled screens, sign back in, repeatedly tell it no don’t use the app, or some other technical hiccup. So I’ve made a game out of it. When I’m trying to join a Teams meeting, I open three tabs for it at once and race them to see which can get in first.
I wish I were exaggerating but no, Microsoft Teams breaks every day. Pages will stall while loading, requiring a refresh. At several different steps, it might sign me out or forget I’m logged in. In one such step, it might offer to let me join the call as a guest, but guests require approval to join and most other people are also guesting for the same reason so eventually someone must sign in to open the door. While I can’t use the Teams desktop app on my PC because of corporate security policies, the browser version will certainly still interrupt joining to suggest it—sometimes several times in a row. Refreshing a stalled page might also set me back to re-encounter error messages and nag screens I already passed. And so on. A random selection of these and more every workday. It’s the sort of little frustration which grows over years into screaming fury and I hope this game can save me.
I find three tabs is a good number for Tab Races. Any more and my attention is too divided for a fair race. And no, it’s not as simple as ‘first tab opened wins’ because Teams is so inconsistent and surprising with its errors and naggings. Some quick rules:
You could make this into a competitive multiplayer game with your colleagues. Line everyone up in Slack, Discord, or other non-Microsoft communications software and start joining when someone fires the 🔫 starting pistol. What a thrill to get in first then see the disappointment on everyone else’s faces!
You could alternatively add a spectator element by starting a conference call on Google Meet (quick, easy, just works) and pointing your webcams at your screens. It’s probably great fun to cheer and jeer when a bitter rival/cherished colleague who had pulled ahead suddenly gets thrown back into a login loop.
You could start a league too. Could even add gambling and prizes. Loser buys the first round of ice cream at EGX?
Anyway, I’ve got a Teams meeting in three hours so I should go start joining. Happy racing!
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Alice O'Connor
Associate Editor
Alice has been playing video games since SkiFree and writing about them since 2009, with nine years at RPS. She enjoys immersive sims, roguelikelikes, chunky revolvers, weird little spooky indies, mods, walking simulators, and finding joy in details. Alice lives, swims, and cycles in Scotland.
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