The Power of: Gaming
(Schmamer Corey has a hard time picking a favorite game! But that’s okay, the whole medium is pretty awesome. Let’s welcome Schmamer Corey as he talks about his throbbing lust for gaming!)
The topic at hand, the most formative game we’ve ever played, is giving me fits. Over the course of a week my brain has been wracked again and again, desperately searching for even one JUST ONE game that changed my life in some way. I couldn’t do it. The truth is that my life hasn’t been changed by a single game. But I am damn sure it that it was changed by gaming. For better or worse, gaming is a part of me and I label myself as a gamer. To be fair, I also label myself a comic book nerd and sexy beast of mythic proportions. And I may or may not suffer from narcissism and delusions of grandeur. Render unto Caesar, am I right? I digress.
One could say that my love/hate relationship with video games started on some past Christmas morning. My parents bestowed me with the greatest responsibility I would ever face: How to integrate video games into my life in a reasonable and restrained manner. Boy did I fuck that one up.
For about a decade my relationship with video games was fantastic. We loved each other. Sprite and Doritos were my sustenance and Mario my concubine.
This is my cue to sex the man
We were both getting something out of it; I was pleased visually and I helped Mario get his Princess. It was childhood. You remember that? When middle-class, white kids like me didn’t have a care in the whole damned world. I could play from sunrise to sunset and it didn’t matter so long as the good grades kept rolling in. Hallelujah and praise be to Nintendo!
College. That was an eye-opener and ass-kicker. For my part, I was a responsibility-fucker-upper. Who knew that a person actually needed to go to class to succeed? Not I. I played video games all through high school. I marched in band and worked after school. What I did not do was put one ounce of effort into school work. Didn’t need to. So I kept right on playing video games (and marching in band but that’s neither here nor there). With a PS2 and a modded X-Box, who needed class? I went to the wrong building for a final because my dumb ass was playing X-Men Legends instead of checking on where and when I was supposed to be.
I was entranced by a weather witch
I floundered around in community college for a couple years (pretend to be shocked) before I realized that I was playing video games far too often. Responsible adult I was not. At that point, I packed away the Wii, 360, and PS2. Lo and behold, I pulled my shit together long enough to be accepted to a real university again. I even graduated! Holy hell! Celebrate!
After college, in my infinite wisdom, I moved to be closer to a woman. And to get a job. But mostly to be closer to a woman. I know what you’re thinking. Responsibility was learned and my relationship with video games was wine and roses. How fucking wrong you are, sir or madam. That wine and those roses? Should have been using such things to keep that woman around. Hahahaha. NO! I fell right back into playing video games non-stop. An addiction. My job sucked and I had no friends close to me. She began to resent me for playing video games and I resented her for resenting me. Following? Good.
Oh, how I wish I could tell you that I’ve learned my lesson. This past weekend, I played Bioshock Infinite for around 27 hours. Let me be a cautionary tale to you all. Video games are good. I love them. I need to learn to love them in moderation. Perhaps put some effort in to, I don’t know, ANYTHING else. Maybe one day I’ll have a healthy relationship with video games (or a woman, or myself, or my mother, or beer…) but today is not that day. The first step on the road to recovery is admitting you have a problem.
My name is Corey and I’m a man-child who wants no part of responsibility.
On the positive side, you lovely people will be privy to my journey and all the delightfully nerdy things I do along the way. Bask in the glory of a flawed and human game junky.
