I am 40.
I am a father.
I am a son.
I am a nerd.
I am a gamer.
I am not a gamer.
Do I play COD or WoW or know what the difference is between
a Hunter and a Promethean Knight is? Can
I perform a 360 no scope? No. But so what?
You don’t get to give me a tag of gamer or not. That is not for you to decide. Now, I would never call myself a soldier
because I’ve never been in the armed forces or trained in the military. That is an entirely different thing. The
reason you don’t get to call me a gamer, or not a gamer, is because you aren’t
the governing body of video games. You
are not a part of some hierarchy of video game admins that decide who or what
defines me as a player of video games.
You are a gamer or you are not a gamer, by your own definition.
Let’s face it, video games have been around a lot longer
than some of you who consider yourself to be MLG. And, by using that term alone I sound like an
old man, I know. But I also know that
video games are older than I am, which makes whatever you think of my gaming
ability to be irrelevant. You have no
idea what being a gamer or not being a gamer is. You’ve never stood in an arcade, with your
quarter sitting on the rim of the bezel, waiting for your turn as some geek
stands there, their eyes darting back and forth as they move left, right, down,
and up to avoid pixelated enemies, knowing that there is no save point or
continue. One quarter. One shot.
Now, you may also wish to contend that the games of old,
back in the days of the arcade, were simplistic. All it took was memorization of some pattern
or repetitive moments to be good. Sure,
go ahead and keep believing that. I dare
you to even try to keep up with someone like Billy Mitchell.
Video games have come a long way. From text adventures to monochromatic 2D
sprites to isometric RPGs to millions of polygons per second rendering on the
screen, we’ve seen games that have told stories of searching an underground
kingdom to saving a princess in another castle to surviving the night in a
haunted pizza restaurant and sometimes, it’s not even a game by traditional
standards, but an unfolding tale of lost loves from car accidents or
cancer. We simulate everything from amusement parks to
prisons to farms. We blast aliens and
fruit. We build vehicles contraptions
and even other video games.
Playing one specific type of game does not make someone a “gamer”. It’s an understanding of many disciplines
and it doesn’t mean you have to be any good.
You don’t have to compete in tournaments or carry your own custom
controller and gear. You can sit in a café
and play across a network connection with someone next door or across the
world.
And when someone else says they are a gamer or not a
gamer. If someone plays video games they
can consider themselves whatever they want to be. They can be old, young, male, female,
Christian, Muslim, or Jewish. The fact
that they play, that they care, gives them the right to call themselves
whatever they want.
This idea that you have to be a male with a Gamerscore over 20,000
to be a “gamer” is ridiculous. Who
cares? I don’t have a Gamerscore. My daughter plays video games. She records videos. She’s under the age of 10. She can be a gamer if she so chooses to be called
one. This shaming and violently
attacking others for playing games is a ridiculous practice that needs to stop,
yesterday. Are there problems in the
world of gaming in way of gender exclusion and objectifying of a gender? You betcha.
I remember the Nude Raider mod
for Tomb Raider, Strip Poker on the Commodore 64. Come on, we need to grow up. We need to start acting like human
beings.
Gaming is an outlet for expression and creativity and we
should embrace anyone that wants to be a part of that. We should nurture the desire to figure out
what makes games work. We should engage
in a community that doesn’t hate someone because they don’t know how to play a
particular game, but helps them learn so they can enjoy the same thing we
do. When you tell someone that you play
video games or that you like video games what is their reaction? Do they roll their eyes or do they continue a
conversation, invested in your attachment to the activity? Maybe if they understood it like you do, had
your passion, they would be more open to accept that you like to play
video games and don’t brush it off as something juvenile or a waste of
time. With that in mind, why would ever
try to dissuade someone from joining your ranks as a person who appreciates and
partakes in the playing of video games?
We need more people in this club.
We need help from all walks of life.
We can’t make this idea exclusive to who we feel is deemed worthy to
wear the tag of Gamer or whatever is an appropriate title.
Father
Son
Nerd
Gamer
Not a gamer
Human Being
