Editor's note: I've never understood why gamers look down at others for playing on easy. Can't we all just get along? Brett discovers the joys of gaming on easy. -Jason

I'm about to tell you something that may cause you to immediately stop reading this article.

It's something so shocking that you may never read an article of mine again. It's so heinous that you may actually fly to San Francisco and spawn-camp my apartment building just so you can nail me with a rotten tomato every time I walk out of the door.

OK, here it is: The last two Xbox 360 games that I played were on easy. And I had so much fun that I'm going to play more games that way, too.

Yep, after 20-plus years of gaming, I've become a noob. And it's frickin' liberating! No more thrown controllers. No more yips of frustration. No more pounding pillows, shutting off systems mid-fight, or pulling a game out of the tray and immediately walking it over to GameStop.

I'm a noob, a rookie, a novice, a pwnee. And you know what? I don't care. I'm having the time of my life.

It started with Splinter Cell: Double Agent. Hyped up on coverage of Splinter Cell: Conviction at E3, I dug Double Agent out of my pile of shame. After playing through the training missions, I felt that I had a solid handle on the game.

But then I started the campaign, and guards spotted me left and right. I stared at the screen in disbelief. How did that guy see me? Where the heck did he even come from? I totally snuck by him! No matter what I did, those guards had some sort of unholy sixth sense that allowed them to sniff out my movements. A familiar frustration began to boil up inside me.

I paused the game. Is this what I wanted from Splinter Cell? Sure, it was easy to take the guards out with a pistol once they noticed me, but I didn't want to play this game like a shooter. I wanted to be a kickass superspy.

Checking the options menu, I noticed that it lacked any way to change your level of difficulty on the fly, which meant that going easy would require me to replay the entire first mission (thanks, Ubisoft). I hesitated because I didn't really want to negate the hour or two that I had already put into the game.

But I then thought of the aggravation that would gnaw at me in later levels. I saw myself angrily turning off the game, sticking the disc back in its case, and never playing it again. Where's the fun in that? Did I want to play this game for a challenge, or did I merely want to have a good time?

So I did it. I restarted, selected easy, and never looked back. I'm positive that taking it easy increased my enjoyment of Splinter Cell. I could be cavalier in my movements and still take the bad dudes by surprise, just like James Bond or Jason Bourne. I could use all of the tricks and gadgets at Sam Fisher's disposal, but they weren't required. I could be less artful during difficult sections and still successfully sneak around. In short, I felt empowered.

And that's what I want from games these days. Maybe it's my aging fingers. Maybe it's the grown-up commitments that limit my playing time. But I really don't feel like playing a game that's going to repeatedly kick my ass. I want to breeze through, play at my own pace and with my own style, and have a rollicking good time.

But old habits are hard to break. When I booted up my next 360 game, Red Faction: Guerrilla, I selected normal without even thinking about it. Soon I was meekly playing hide-and-seek with what seemed to be infinitely respawning enemies. I'd poke my head out, fire a few rounds, and then hide and wait for my health to recover. Rinse and repeat, ad nauseam.

It was boring, annoying, and definitely not fun. So I switched to casual -- a word so much more apt than "easy" -- and now I'm running headlong into the action with my sledgehammer, smashing up bad guys, and tossing some remote charges on a nearby building and then setting them off as I smack around the remaining stragglers.

Playing on casual, I'm the biggest badass on Mars. I am the Red Planet's Michael Bay. Everything I touch turns to a heap of dust and a bit of scrap metal. And I wouldn't want it any other way.

So if your ready to punch a wall after dying 20 times in a row, here's my advice: head into the options menu and take it eeeeeeeeasy. There's no shame in it. And maybe, like me, you'll remember what drew you to games in the first place.

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