@ Richard
I seriously thought you were joking about the Connect Four but you are absolutely right in what you say about it and other games. A few years ago, I think it was on a New Year's Eve, I saw a mother fucking rock, paper, scissors tournament. These dudes were dead serious about it too, they had nicknames and wore costumes and shit. I forget what the winning purse was but it was in the Gs. Sorry I lol'd you and good luck with it, it's a good idea.

@yo
I remember seeing thread after thread in the Bungie forums about exactly what you/we are saying. There were guys on there breaking the system down and explaining the way it works. I think that was before they changed it though. As for what happened to you, I think that the system seen the teams you were playing as "inferior" to your team so you were "suppose" to beat them. I think you only rank up when you are winning or placing high against opponents that are suppose to be better than you, even if only slightly. But 12 games in a row sounds suspect. I could be way off on this too but what I got from my days visiting the Bungie forums was something along these lines. I also have a theory on when you play. I think weekends are a better time to rank up due to their being a larger pool of players. Could just be a coincidence as well but it seems to have been the case for me.

Oh and sorry for going off topic so much.

Well, I did post it in a light-hearted manner, but it is something being worked on.  I am into boardgame stuff, and would like to see boardgames get on TV and stay there.  To this end the International Abstract Games Organization (IAGO) is promoting abstract strategy games, and working so that games like Connect Four, Chess, Checkers, Go and so on, break through and get sufficient media coverage.  The series of events are currently under the IAGO World Tour banner.  IAGO World Tour Enterprises is a business that is set up for this.  IAGO is looking to be set up as a stand alone non-profit.

RPS actually happened to get on TV, and there is more than one organization that try to have it set up in league play.  I actually had correspondence with the head of the World RPS Society, which was the original league/organization behind it.

By the way, don't worry about LOLing.  I would rather it get a bunch of laugh out louds and people chat about it, then it be ignored.  I believe a bunch of WTF comments are needed.  Like, imagine the Connect Four World Championship is on TV and you are channel surfing.  You would go, WTF?!?!?!  and stop and watch for a few minutes, wondering what the heck.  Then the trick is to maintain the attention.

Anyhow, this is something I am working on.  I don't get into details much on here, because it isn't heavily videogame related, and it is still a work in progress.  But the ideas are there.  An objective is to get one abstract strategy game to get attention, but have it lead to a bunch, so we have what happened with chess in the 1970s with Fischer-Spassky be sustainable.

Ok, let me drop off here for now regarding this.  I could go on a LONG time, and this isn't the forum for it.  If the IAGO World Tour ever becomes a licensed videogame product, and ends up the shelves of Gamestop, then it would belong here.  I would like to see a Gran Turismo level product for Chess, Checkers, Go, Chinese Checkers, etc...