Too Old for Video Games?
Listen to me because I will tell you that never too old for video games. I been playing video games for 20+ years now. Gaming has been a huge part of my life. Video games got me out of trouble and become a new world unlike my own. This also helps me to escape reality and what going on in the outside like politics. I know the new Trump administration is shaking up the world with their policies. Not going to talk about politics in this blogpost, but I will talk about gaming in general. It doesn’t matter what age, genre, orientation or race you are. Video games are for everyone to join and talk about. Even anybody castrates you on gaming, then ignore them to the fullest.
Just a podcast episode went this female says that “I am adult and video games are for children”. I want to say that “it’s not for children and for everyone”. That’s negative sigma of people not enjoying and respecting folks who play video games. Another example, when a newscaster berated a kid for completing Tetris saying, “go outside and get some fresh air because that’s not an achievement”. First of all, it was very condensing to say to a kid. You are not his mother, and that caster should be ashamed of yourself. Let the boy enjoy his Tetris and keep your opinions to yourself.
Race and Gender in Gaming
Race and gender go play a factor in gaming community. I will tackle race first than gender. In gaming majority of gamers are white. Minority is Black, Latino, Asian and many more groups. Black gamers get bombarded by racist comments, but it doesn’t have all the time. Other minority get racial and hate comments in gaming. White doesn’t have to deal with racism but toxic behavior in online games. Toxicity happens in shooter games and many more. Whites take up the game industry like developers and get many jobs. Minority doesn’t see many people in the gaming industry because the system doesn’t work for us.
As a person of color, you have to work extra to be in gaming industry instead of being handed too. gender goes male take up 90% of the gaming industry. Females take 40-50% of the gaming industry, I might be wrong about this. If you are a female gamer, sometimes it doesn’t sit well with male gamers. Some male gamers are very misogyny toward female players. For example, telling them “this is a boy game or get back to the kitchen”. Those types of comment get under my skin and I am not a woman. These types of gamers need to delete the game and never play video games again. My advice is to play with someone you know or if you play with randos, mute voice chat. I did that went I play Valorant.
Continue
Valorant and other Riot Games like League of Legends is very toxic. You can’t control others behavior in online games. Best thing you can is to ignore them and have fun with the game. Don’t look at the chat nor response mean comments. Trust me, I played Marvel Rivals and found a lot of toxicity in that game. I won’t go into that but still a fun game. Some might have a bad day or just want to win. There are others who don’t play as a team or just love to take their frustrations on other people. That’s culture of being a gamer, went players talk trash and sometimes take it too far. If you want to be bully to others, then do it somewhere else.
Back to age of video gaming, it doesn’t matter how old you are. There is 60+ year olds playing video games because they didn’t grow up with it in their time. Did you know there is esports featuring older people? What about kids getting into esports? There are programs based on esports and education revolves around it. I am not going to talk about it here because it another blogpost. Video games have revolutionized entire world and there is no limit in playing them.
Closing
I just a proud colored gamer that shares the passion with others. There are content creators, artists, musicians and many more in gaming industry. Gaming is very creative and take you on a journey like Reading Rainbow. Also, video games are a form of innovation and evolving in many ways. You get together with your buddies to play Tekken 8. What about parties went games like Just Dance and Mario Party Jamboree? After coming home from work, school and others to pop in your favorite game. You can choose retro or modern games that you enjoy as well. Gaming has been turned into cinema as well
Play video games with your hearts contend and don’t listen to those haters. I understand people says that “video games are a waste of time”. That was back in the 80s and early 2000s, but nowadays, players can monetize their hobby. Which is a beautiful thing and I am happy to live or born in this generation. What are your thoughts on being too old for video games? Let me know in the comments below. Thank you for reading my blogpost and have a great day. I will see you on the next post.
