My yellow blanket bordered my body like a cape with a hood,
while I criss-cross-apple-sauced my legs and hunkered over to watch my sister swing
Aladdin to catch the digitalized apple on the screen. As a kid in the nineties, Super Nintendo was
a huge marker in childhood activities.
Though, even then, I merely watched my sister and parents play, keeping
close so I could shout out all the memorized codes I recalled so they didn’t
have to flip through their booklet.
I knew
what video games were the way I understood what kosher meat meant; it was a
name, but it didn’t really pertain to me. My stories were made for the stage of
dolls I assembled on the floor while my sister beat Mario in under an hour. She
conquered through a multitude of two dimensional games for the Super-Nintendo,
and played a few on the N-64, but as her interest waned in the gaming form, so
did my connection to it. I spent most of the new millennium oblivious to almost
any and all forms of video-art (except for the Sims, I love those pants-peeing
little bastards). Until I met the gamer who would turn out to be my lover and
heart.
When we
met, he said he was a gamer working for a gaming charity. I immediately thought
of the only games I knew from the past fifteen years of sprinkled headlines
that seeped through the media and acquaintances. Halo was revered by kids from
high school. Call of Duty, as one of the reasons a close couple friends of mine
almost hit splits-vill. And lastly, Grand Theft Auto from being called a
gateway to the center of the hell candy bar in my extremely Christian teenage
years. I had no idea what surface I had just scratched.
The
first time I went to his house he showed me what video games really are in this
new century. I sat against the black of the desk chair and began to watch him
play as nostalgia of childhood danced in my head. However, this wasn’t the
paper and tiny bit world of Aladdin. The man on the screen breathed, walked,
and talked like an actor in an action movie. He flew from roof-top to roof-top
to save the working children and win over the area. I could not believe what I
saw in a game. Everything worked and entertained like Pixar’s more talented
cousin. I had the preconceived notion that games were just a recreation like
playing Clue or Monopoly. I was wrong and very wrong.
This is more than just a nighttime activity,
or a visual entertainment. This is what pumps into the thumping ventricle that
feeds life into their being. This is the heart of a gamer; their very soul. Each
game plays a differentiated depth of story, enveloping a person into the world
much like a well-written book does to a reader. However, alongside the engaging
story, a player interacts with the oncoming obstacles, using a combination of
syncing, speed, and strategy to defeat, collect, and ultimately win the game.
Society
places a stigma on gamers (and admittedly I did too) that the person is a lazy,
inanimate, and thoughtless creature who prowls the graphic world instead of
actively seeking human socialization. Media boasts articles that link video
games to poor performance, ADHD, violence, and a gambit of other demonizing
speculations to spin games and gamers into a negative connotation. Though, with proper investigation, the witch
hunt has ceased save for the few outbursts, The stereotype stuck: Video games
and gamers are bad for society.
Before my own
gamer, I’d hear the horrors relayed by my gal pals of what it was like to be in
a relationship with a person who played.
She would always go to the whining tune of, “He loves video games more than
me!” Who was I to say otherwise at that point? Maybe he did. Maybe she was an
over-dramatic attention seeking insecure female who spent twelve hours
shopping. Yet, I could not judge.
However, my own
jury is in. (I will save the mush for another article) I can clearly say that
the idea of a man hunched over with a liter of soda and cheese-puff dusted
hands to be a myth. Any and all cheese-snacking is mere coincidence. People get
invested in things they love, why can’t gamers?
As for the lazy
and thoughtless aspect, that is another lie. The groups of gamers I have
encountered through watching the Streams, or live gameplay that you can view,
have been hard working individuals who raise money for charity, like Gamergiving.
All of the individuals have jobs or attend school outside of running the charity.
They take time off of their own to use
Stream as an entertaining platform to reach others to fund. This group of
talented and often comedic players seeks to bring a community together for the
benefit of those less fortunate or in need of special assistance.
If the cliché is
you can’t judge a book by it’s cover, then you cannot judge a gamer by them
playing a game. The heart of a gamer is not a tampered menace; it is just in a
higher resolution than most. My love of stuffed crust oozing cheese pizza never
gave back to humanity, but the love of a gamer can. And if you want to learn
more, I’ll post the link at the bottom:
GamerGiving
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