Friday 2 September 2011

My Journey with Video Games

Video Games.. a term I have loved since I first hooked up my SEGA genesis, when I was 3 years old. But now its a term that only reminds me of frustration, boredom, lack of confidence and bad health. I will give a small history tour around the involvement of video games in my life as this is a big good bye for a part of me. My views on games here are solely mine and I do respect the medium, its just my personal feelings that I cannot control are expressed here... In no way are they forced upon you.

When I was 3 years old, from what my parents tell me and what little I remember, my dad had a SEGA genesis inside the cupboard as he disliked it and hid it there. Now I used to watch a lot of cartoons and was learning the colours of the rainbow and the basic maths shapes so when I snooped inside my dads cupboard and found the SEGA genesis, I was excited! The console had 1 cable shaped like a circle, one shaped like a rectangle which I inserted into the console testing my shape skills. Later the AV cables were a joy apparently as I connected the yellow and white from the cables to the television.

All was fun and games from there on, my life I played some Sonic the hedgehog, Comix Zone, Fatal Labyrinth, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Bonanaza Bro's... the list goes on. I always kept a balance on video games as I  was extremely sporty and did get more fresh air then video games. This did how ever turn, somewhere during my childhood when I had a Playstation 2.. I fell into depression and all I did was stay at home sucked into the digital pixels of the video games. This carried into my early teens as I did go through medical injuries and ended up staying at home with my Playstation 3 on for hours a day, continuing the horrendous schedule for years.


In my later gaming days I played everything, from rpg's like The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion to small artistic pieces like flower. People in the 'gaming community' did like me as I was apparently a 'Hardcore' gamer.. playing all types of artistic games whilst everyone else played the first person shooters like call of duty. My games were one of the best hobbies I had and on one end I could have seen myself sitting at home absorbed into God of War 3 then going out and partying with friends. This play of video games in the latter of my childhood and the early teenager years replaced my fun memories of video games with hate, frustration and loneliness.





During the beginning of 2011 I played a couple games, Bayonetta and Just cause 2 anyone? The games didn't hold my interest and every time I played them, I listened to a podcast or a new album to keep my interest happy as the sole play of video games always led to me being upset. A couple months past and every time I picked up a controller it led to me being depressed and thinking of the time I could have spent doing something productive. Even when I was given Marvel vs Capcom 3 as a present I could not enjoy it as it only further depressed me. I found myself happy everytime I had a day out, spending money on shopping and starbucks, going to the gym and feeling better about myself and just overall.. feeling more confident! Quickly, I gave my marvel vs capcom 3 to a friend a couple days before I left for holiday to my country and he sold it for me.



In my country, I had a nostalgic trip due to it being where I grew up.. There was one thing left for me to do the, after all the new games I had read about and waited for, for countless years... I had to say no, this was the time I just said 'no I am not buying, no more.. never again'. So while shopping in my country I saw the store I used to go to buy SEGA games, this store which marked my whole 'video gamer' journey was the root to my relationship with video games and so I had to say goodbye. I walked into the store and for the price of a subway meal I purchased .. A SEGA genesis. A nice little end to my gaming days by completing a full 13 year old cycle of games, by going back to the beginning. I will never look back at those days the same way again, now when I look at a game I can say 'Oh cool' but never again will I be able to passionately look at games and have a desire to play them. The most I can ever do is play apps on my iPhone for a couple minutes every now and then but for a gamer who spent hours a day playing and researching games... this journey ends. I have in a sense 'grown out' of games, even though always I told myself I would enjoy them till I'm too old to hold a controller without fainting. I have finished my journey with games, I'm not a small kid who wanted to even make games for a living anymore.. I just can't play them without depression. I guess I have moved on .. I have put the controller down and moved on, I've moved the curtains and looked at the sun again, I've put my blistered thumbs to rest, I've moved on to a new wondrous game..  called 'Life'.



1 comment:

  1. A very beautiful, personal, and stirring post Geeky Penguin.

    ReplyDelete