Why Ghostpsalm

When I was 17, my friend Faris bought me a Playstation game called Medal of Honor. It is a WWII first-person shooter (FPS), and given my enjoyment of WWII history, I naturally fell in love with the game.

I didn’t play the game after entering into college and working full time, until 2003, when I built a new computer and bought the PC version of the game, called Medal of Honor:Spearhead. Transitioning into the world of online game play was a bit weird, talking to people on a headset that I’ve never met and learning to use a keyboard and mouse instead of a controller, was challenging. After many of nights playing until I couldn’t focus any more, I became quite good at Spearhead….so much that I needed a good gaming name, one that no one had and that would be remembered for years to come (I had a plan of dominance).

During my college years, I went to a Church where I met some Christian guys/gals who were into a different type of music that I’ve ever heard. I was introduced to Tooth & Nail record bands in 2002 and it changed my life. There is a band called Zao (though not really Christian anymore), that really spoke to me. The things I was feeling inside, my outlook on life and Christianity and so forth. There was a particular song called GhostPsalm, that really spoke to me about Death. I won’t go into the details, but the name seemed to fit quite nicely with my online gaming personality.

Anyways, enough with the background, now its time to let people know who I really am. I am GhostPsalm of the clan called Misfits, also of the clan called Men of God, also of the clan NoClan and also of the clan….I forget the name. Basically, I was in a lot of online gaming clans. To put it midly, ok not really, I became what some people call, a legend. When I joined a server to play on, people would either jump to my side or go to spectator view to watch me play. Only the slightly so daring players, went to the opposing side to try their hand at beating me and my kill/death ratio. Not many did.

There were of course some players like Marcus Aurelius, Death Become and Azathoth, who were the best players I’ve ever played against. Each person had their own gaming style and were the best with a rifle that I’ve ever seen in playing the game 3 years. I was a mixture of rifle and machine gun. It was simply awesome when two of us would meet on a server, say hello and then watch everyone quit and move to spectate to watch us battle it out.

Another fun aspect of GhostPsalm, was the strategic planning of matches that my clan participated in, in The Honor League. Each match consisted of playing on a map as both the Allies and as the Axis. Each match lasted about an hour and was just so much fun. I was the “general” in planning out strategy for each map and would call out to each player to see where our weak spots were during game play. But also, I was a “ghost” as some people would say, “GhostPsalm, you really are a ghost….you float around killing and no one ever sees you to kill you”. I did die, just not as often as everyone else. Though the championship trophy eluded me for most of my seasons that I played, I finally won the last year. On top of that, I won MVP for machine gun (smg as we call it) and finished 4 seasons in a row, in the top 10 players of the season (keep in mind there were more than 300 players each season from US, Canada, Europe). I even tied Marcus Aurelius for being the #1 player in my last year.

Boy, Rudy really is full of himself with this online gaming in Spearhead, you say. Truth be told, Spearhead was the one true thing I’ve ever been good at, and no one can take it from me. I have videos and plenty of screenshots of scores and what not, that I’ll cherish and share with my kids one day. I learned strategic planning and dedication to team mates, scheduling practice and match events, placing resources in the right areas of maps, learning how to build custom PCs, etc. Success is different for each person. Looking back, GhostPsalm really turned out to be a legend after all….and that is success to me.