Gaming Cultures

Gaming has developed so much in the last 20+ ears and with that has also seen the development of video game fans from simple players to an entire culture that eats at every waking moment of a gamer’s life and has even divided itself into separate entities such as the FPS clans and the RPG/JRPG factions. It has become part of the world culture as Films and TV did in the past, it’s no longer an escape for the few it’s now a voice for the many and is a global phenomenon that influences the everyday lives of over a billion people. If I was to fall into any sort of group I would be half in the RPG and half in the Action adventure group’s I love games with great story but also like suspense and action (games such as Tomb Raider, Broken Sword, Half Life 2 and the Metal Gear franchise being my favorites). Unfortunately I’ve found that I can become quiet hesitant to join in social activities when I get into playing certain games (Not just W.O.W.) and also find that when I go on holiday I can become very easily frustrated with realising it because I’m away from my consoles… I may have an addiction which needs to be checked. Anyway aside from my problems it is such a big part of my life, I check gaming news sites such as Kotaku.com every day without fail to see what’s new in the gaming world and flicking to sites such as IGN.com to get more in-depth previews of specific games and if that’s not enough its over to GameTrailers.com to find a trailer of the game I’m looking forward to. The sites seemed to al be dedicated to games but not the games but in 2006 a site called Screwattack.com changed that where they created original content every day for gamers to watch and it’s a great example of how the culture has influenced to gaming community and the introduced the first online news cast the is dedicated solely to gaming news and telling fans what the need to know with any backlash or constraints from companies as they are separate entity that can tell the facts with bias and general act as the online voice or gamers around the world. The culture has not just be contained to video games, web comics that have direct ties to the news and satire of the video games business have become increasing popular in the gaming community with the biggest being Penny-Arcade.com who’s popularity has even spawn a real world convention called PAX has become one of the biggest events in the gaming convention calendar alongside the likes of E3 and GDC. The culture will only increase as time goes on with features such as XBOXLIVE allowing players to not only play together but talk to one another to and from this develop friendships, form clans and exchange news, ideas and comments from one side of the world to the other. I myself have formed some friendships with people I only know through my console and talk to via Windows messenger and to be honest I think anything that can allows people from every walk of life to join together and have fun and talk can never be a bad thing… unless it’s the guys who just go on Xbox live to swear and shout at kids for not being as good as they are… those guy and girls are just sad.