Negative Perceptions of Video Gaming by Outsiders


It’s frustrating to run into people who associate video games with laziness and social or personal irresponsibility.

More than a couple of times I’ve talked to people (mainly older adults) who meet me and compliment me as an “articulate young man with high aspirations” talk to me about my current life and get all excited and enthusiastic when I tell them that I’m an English major in college and working on a novel.

These people are sometimes surprised when they find out I play video games, and sometimes become outright, disappointed, or even frustrated when I go on to explain that I’m interested in getting into the gaming industry myself and view it as a powerful storytelling medium. I’ve even had a guidance counselor tell me that doing so would be “a waste of my intelligence”, and said so thinking that she was somehow motivating me.

These encounters become even more irksome once they start becoming “impressed” and begin bombarding me with comments about how they are surprised that despite being a gamer, I have a social life, go outside, am physically fit, eat (fairly) well, am in college, get good grades, and am not an antisocial maniac planning a school shooting.

And then they are those under the impression that gaming is a purely “kids only” activity and as a result feel repulsed by titles like “that horrible ‘Halo’ game” and that the developers are sick minded for putting so much violence in “a children’s game".

They are sometimes totally surprised to hear that the majority of video gamers are adults and that an increasing number of them are parents, or even grandparents, and may dismissively respond that these are people who “need to grow up” or “are losers who live with their parents and don’t bathe” and refuse to accept otherwise.

I often find that the people who think these things haven’t even come near a game system since their son’s long forgotten “Nintendo” back in the 80’s, but at the same time are surprised to hear that the Super Mario series is more than 20 years old.

And the thing is, in my experience at least, these people really aren’t out to offend or attack anyone, but just have this seriously uninformed, outdated image of what video games and the people who play them are like.

I think rise of web based casual gaming sites like Pogo and the success of Nintendo’s Wii and DS systems dispel this attitude to an extent,, along with coverage on the History Channel's show "Modern Marvels" and the Science Channel's recently aired series "Rise of the Video Game." Still, when I read all these industry insiders getting all excited about how more “new gamers” outside of the traditional 10 to 30 age range are picking up the controller than ever before, and then to go out into the real world and still get responses like what I have discussed above, its disappointing.

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