I'm Not a Real Gamer.
Oct. 18th, 2010 07:09 amI'm not a real gamer.
I played on a Commodore 64 and programmed simple little programmes for it to run in BASIC. I played on pirated games my brother exchanged for musical gear, old names that even my most hardcore gamer friends don't know. Scarabus. Dan Dare. Impossible Mission. Elite (the first version). Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Rocky Horror Picture Show. Little Computer People. The Young Ones. Berk. Pirates (Sid Meyer's first version). The Newsroom. GEOS, one of the forerunners to today's Windows. I used paint programmes before they could really do much but make big pixelated smudges on the screen. I giggled at terrible strip poker games that featured porn stars of the 80s. But, I'm not a real gamer.
I moved onto the Amiga 500, and played Captain Blood, every game I could find by the Bitmap Brothers (Gods, Speedball and Speedball 2, Magic Pockets), Lemmings, I dabbled in Deluxe Paint and every version of that I could get my hands on, racing games and adventure games, remakes of the beloved titles I'd played on the Commodore 64.
In high school I remember playing on my friend's brand new Gameboy, with a green and black LCD calculator-like screen. It was big and chunky and I fucking loved it. I'd have given anything to have one.
I then graduated to the Mac LC630, where I spent most of my time writing, learning how to tell stories. But I figured out the very first version of Warcraft before my brother and nephew took over and played it to excess. I spent hours scouring the free DVDs Mum got with her Macworld magazines and playing with the demos on there (cause I didn't have the money to buy games then, nor the internet connection to pirate, nor the brother with contacts). There were demos I'd play over and over and over again, just because I loved them. There was a wonderful demo of an educational programme about Egypt. It was a game of Senet with Ramesses II, who would taunt you if you lost. I loved that, I still haven't been able to fill the hole in my heart for that game!
And when my Mum bought a PC, I played games on there too. Simulation games, mostly, but I spent hours making content for the first Sims game, stuffing around with the first versions of Catz/Petz, enjoying casual gaming and social gaming on various websites. I got wholly obsessed with The Sims 2, becoming a part of the community and creating celebrated content.
I'm now spending hours and hours playing The Sims 3, mainly because it helps me ignore the pain from my endometriosis. I play the Wii when I can, enjoying the mostly genderless games on the console. I have a Nintendo DSi XL, and I'd get the Nintendo 3DS, but I don't have cash to throw around on something I probably won't use that often (I use the DSi mostly for the paint programmes on it). I really do want one. BADLY.
But I'm not a real gamer. Not a *real* one, because I'm a girl, and I play *girl* games. Even though I tried to play the "real" games, but got frustrated by the controls due to my troublesome dyscalculia (I can't remember complicated rules easily, nor keep a track of my left and my right, and that includes which controls are which between which hands. I felt liberated by the Wii, because I didn't have those navigation problems. Just lean and throw my arms about - wonderful!)
Even though I've been playing computer games of some sort since the mid-80s, which means I've been fooling around with computers longer than some of today's gamers have been alive.
Even though I'd happily spend good money on a game I enjoyed.
I'm not a real gamer because the games I enjoy don't involve killing, gore, war, first-person-shooting, competitive play, levelling up, subscriptions, or those things that mean it's a real game. Not that I have anything against fighting in games. I used to love playing Double Dragon as a kid. Oh, and I loved playing Marathon on the Mac, that was a FPS, but it was on a space ship and there were puzzles involved. That made it fun.
Mainly, I'm not a real gamer because I'm a girl and I love playing Simulation Games. Which is funny, really, because my whole life has done a pretty good impersonation of that of a hardcore nerd very much in love with her computer games.
I played on a Commodore 64 and programmed simple little programmes for it to run in BASIC. I played on pirated games my brother exchanged for musical gear, old names that even my most hardcore gamer friends don't know. Scarabus. Dan Dare. Impossible Mission. Elite (the first version). Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Rocky Horror Picture Show. Little Computer People. The Young Ones. Berk. Pirates (Sid Meyer's first version). The Newsroom. GEOS, one of the forerunners to today's Windows. I used paint programmes before they could really do much but make big pixelated smudges on the screen. I giggled at terrible strip poker games that featured porn stars of the 80s. But, I'm not a real gamer.
I moved onto the Amiga 500, and played Captain Blood, every game I could find by the Bitmap Brothers (Gods, Speedball and Speedball 2, Magic Pockets), Lemmings, I dabbled in Deluxe Paint and every version of that I could get my hands on, racing games and adventure games, remakes of the beloved titles I'd played on the Commodore 64.
In high school I remember playing on my friend's brand new Gameboy, with a green and black LCD calculator-like screen. It was big and chunky and I fucking loved it. I'd have given anything to have one.
I then graduated to the Mac LC630, where I spent most of my time writing, learning how to tell stories. But I figured out the very first version of Warcraft before my brother and nephew took over and played it to excess. I spent hours scouring the free DVDs Mum got with her Macworld magazines and playing with the demos on there (cause I didn't have the money to buy games then, nor the internet connection to pirate, nor the brother with contacts). There were demos I'd play over and over and over again, just because I loved them. There was a wonderful demo of an educational programme about Egypt. It was a game of Senet with Ramesses II, who would taunt you if you lost. I loved that, I still haven't been able to fill the hole in my heart for that game!
And when my Mum bought a PC, I played games on there too. Simulation games, mostly, but I spent hours making content for the first Sims game, stuffing around with the first versions of Catz/Petz, enjoying casual gaming and social gaming on various websites. I got wholly obsessed with The Sims 2, becoming a part of the community and creating celebrated content.
I'm now spending hours and hours playing The Sims 3, mainly because it helps me ignore the pain from my endometriosis. I play the Wii when I can, enjoying the mostly genderless games on the console. I have a Nintendo DSi XL, and I'd get the Nintendo 3DS, but I don't have cash to throw around on something I probably won't use that often (I use the DSi mostly for the paint programmes on it). I really do want one. BADLY.
But I'm not a real gamer. Not a *real* one, because I'm a girl, and I play *girl* games. Even though I tried to play the "real" games, but got frustrated by the controls due to my troublesome dyscalculia (I can't remember complicated rules easily, nor keep a track of my left and my right, and that includes which controls are which between which hands. I felt liberated by the Wii, because I didn't have those navigation problems. Just lean and throw my arms about - wonderful!)
Even though I've been playing computer games of some sort since the mid-80s, which means I've been fooling around with computers longer than some of today's gamers have been alive.
Even though I'd happily spend good money on a game I enjoyed.
I'm not a real gamer because the games I enjoy don't involve killing, gore, war, first-person-shooting, competitive play, levelling up, subscriptions, or those things that mean it's a real game. Not that I have anything against fighting in games. I used to love playing Double Dragon as a kid. Oh, and I loved playing Marathon on the Mac, that was a FPS, but it was on a space ship and there were puzzles involved. That made it fun.
Mainly, I'm not a real gamer because I'm a girl and I love playing Simulation Games. Which is funny, really, because my whole life has done a pretty good impersonation of that of a hardcore nerd very much in love with her computer games.