131: A Day in the Life of the Social Loner

Cousin_IT

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Feb 6, 2008
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ive never been much of a social gamer, & tbh ive found that the rise of social focused multiplayer gaming formats has made me feel all the more self conscious about playing single player games in a situation where im not on my own. In attracting new gamers with social focused games, it makes said new game players view those of us who like single player games with confusion: "why would that person want to play on their own when they can play with others?"
 

Jakkar

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Mar 22, 2008
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Oi oi.. Shame?

I play what games I play, usually RPGs for long days devoted to a beautiful story (Baldur's Gate, Fallout, Planescape, The Witcher), action for quick gory excitement or japanese horror for a creepy night in with friends, and play them with pride. All but one of my partners has been a gamer girl to some extent, and when they didn't share my interests I generally introduced them to gaming, and found that they really did.

There's no more shame in enjoying interactive media than enjoying fiction on a page or on a cinema screen; less - if anything - for the ability to imprint your own choices, beliefs and expressions upon the path the experience takes surely qualifies it as more compatible, more significant, than simply sitting and observing a linear progression, still and complacent upon your cosy throne.

I am proud to be damn good at games yet to be a decent marksman, maintain a healthy body, a good, if exclusive social life... Games are no mark of shame; feel proud that you're one of the relative minority open-minded and perceptive enough to know what the future of media will be. Gaming is going to be very, very big =)
 

GenoThePeoplesChamp

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Apr 22, 2008
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I sympathize with your situation. When I was younger, I had to deal with people giving me strange looks at at my admissions to conversations about video games. Even the people that introduced me to console games began to isolate me. Thankfully, these days I am lucky to have a group of friends that enjoys video games just as much as I do. Its actually a bit strange because, when it comes to single player games, it can still be a bit of a social experience for me. This is because, for some reason, my friends enjoy watching me play games. For example, the other weekend, my friend had rented Condemned 2, and we all had been pretty pumped for this game since the first Condemned was so good. It was a saturday night, and I drove over there around ten o'clock. Once I got there we popped Condemned 2 into the Xbox 360 and I set to running and screaming my way through the game. All the while my friends just sat and watched, enjoying my reactions. Its strange but I guess I got lucky. Though, I do have to keep my time gaming and hanging with friends balanced with the time I spend with my girlfriend, but once again, I have been coaxing her into playing some games. Just casual ones like super smash bros and I let her run around in super mario galaxy, she has fun with that. I would just like to wish you luck, hopefully gaming will become less isolating as time passes.
 

stompy

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Jan 21, 2008
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... This hit close to home.

I'm sorry you feel you have to go through with this. You have a hobby, nay, a passion, and you wish to indulge in it. You're not gonna dump all responsibility; you're just gonna cool off playing some Halo or Metriod, like your girlfriend watches TV. This is nothing to feel ashamed about.

Hell, if I ever went down this path, I'd be grateful if someone slapped me out of it. If someone looked down on me because I play games, I ignore them; they're not worth my time. Everyone has different interests, and your interests don't hurt anybody, so why should you feel like a social outcast?

Please, Tomohiko Endo, do all gamers a favour: Don't be ashamed of being a gamer. Don't shun your gaming side, just because people look down on you for it (if its your girlfriend, then she's not worth it. I was always under the impression that in a relationship, you should never and try to change your partner). Open up, and enjoy. You only live life once, you might as well enjoy your stay.

- A procrastinator
 

ayoama

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Feb 7, 2008
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Novan Leon said:
It sounds like you need to experience single life in a place of your own. Once you do this for a year or two you'll begin to realize that you're really a good guy and grow more secure in yourself, since you're not always hiding your hobbies in a self-conscious shame that is undeserved. Attempting to live with someone or carry a serious relationship in the midst of insecurity (even if it's just concerning your hobbies) is a precarious path to take.

Try this for a week: Ignore the shame that you feel whenever you enjoy a favorite hobby (ie. video games) and force yourself to "act like a fool" and play games in front of others.

The only thing that can make playing video games a shameful act is if you're neglecting your responsibilities as an independent adult (ie. work, taking out the garbage, respecting others, etc).
IAWTC.
 

CoverYourHead

High Priest of C'Thulhu
Dec 7, 2008
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Thinking about this I just hope that someday gaming will be incredibly popular to the mainstream in my lifetime, and I will be so awesome I can brag to everyone I know. But games do have a weird social status today, casual gaming is embraced, "hardcore" gaming even in all of its glorious artistic games they are shunned. Makes me cry on the inside.
 

ErytheiaRed

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Oct 6, 2007
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Two things I've noticed about this story: First of all, you have surrounded yourself, and I hate to say it, possibly on purpose, with people who do not share your particular interest or passion. It feels very much like you have chosen these people to be in your life so that when you do get that moment, like first thing in the morning, you can drink deeply from the pleasure of enjoying a game completely alone...and not have to share. Indeed, hiding it sounds like a ritual. You don't want to share so that you can indulge in the pleasure of having something private to yourself in what sounds like a very public, very social world with very little alone time. Secondly, you do not wish to play games with others, and keep finding that the games people you know want to play are games that either require or heavily encourage and support multiplayer social gaming, which is an antithesis to escaping from the public group and having a quiet moment to yourself to indulge. But cutting yourself off from finding the right people, or even just person with whom you can share your interest and passion can be akin to amputating part of your soul.

This is not a world I know or inhabit. My first experience with games mixing socially was being with my friends in a room, filled with hardware, and everyone was playing their own game of choice, and only occasionally with one another, or occasionally swapping one kind of hardware for another. This college experience extended to the post college, enter the get-a real-job world for me, where I had a roommate from this social circle, and we would play a game, maybe an mmo, or maybe just a singleplayer game, and we would regularly play in different rooms of the house and if we were on computers we would often hook up our headsets and talk over skype or vent to achieve new heights in introversion and utter pathetic laziness. We didn't want to hang out in the same room because we already saw enough of one another living in the same house. But there is a pure and simple pleasure of playing a game in a room that someone else is playing a game. It is very similar to me, practically identical to being in the same room as someone else while both of you are reading books. It is a feeling of relaxation and absolute trust that you don't have to be anyone else but yourself with this person, they expect nothing of you except for you to do what you want at this moment, and you don't even have to talk about it or share with them. But you know that if the feeling arises, you can babble like some kind of maniac to them and they will listen and be able to respond and not make you feel totally isolated and crazy.

Look for those people. And stop amputating yourself. If you have to painfully teach someone who has potential to share your pleasure in video games, then do it. I certainly didn't start out very interested or knowledgeable or passionate about video games. It really was from blunt force social trauma with guys making me actually stop being a passive observer and become an active, very passionate player. And they did talk about games like they were high literature, all the time, sounding like madmen. But they made an effort with me. They actually let me try things even when I made just a noncommittal murmur of interest in the direction of something they were playing. Even if I sucked and had no controller sense. Even when I felt stupid and dumb for trying, they wouldn't take no for an answer. So don't give up on the people close to you, and let them into your world sometimes, no matter how terrifying it is for You--unless they really have no potential of ever being close to you or ever being remotely interested in your world. You gotta ask, why are you hanging around with them in the first place?
 

paiged

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May 23, 2008
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I don't believe I've ever felt the need to hide my gaming from anyone, that's really just a shame.

Although, ever since the release of the wii and all of the guitar hero & rock band installments, my friends have all decided to take on the hobby as one of their own. I remember earlier phone conversations where they'd "let me go" if I was busy playing Halo or Half-life, but now if I even mention I'm playing a video game, they invite themselves over for a few hours to play rock band.

Not that they were anything but indifferent when it came to gaming before, it's just that sudden interest almost irks me.

Or maybe it's just because now I feel obligated to share.
 

kir4

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May 1, 2008
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It seems like low self esteem. Pfft Im a gamer, and a really cool chap. If you don't like the fact that I play CoD4 or Little Big Planet, missy, fuck off, I can find one prettier than you who does.

/end asshole
 

Razorback0z

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Feb 10, 2009
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Yup thats me... except Im 43 and still wear an "i pwn noobs" T-shirt in public and the number plate on my bike (the one in my avatar) is 1337

Im a gamer, always have been always will be. I dont care what anyone thinks and yes I have chosen between partners and my gaming.

We all choose something to be passionate about in life. For some its music, for some its books, for some its sport. For me and many of us its gaming but more specifically for me escapism. Games are the highest form of escapism.

This website is the closest thing I have to a home and family if you count kindred spirits.

Footnote : Joseph Hyden the classical composer.... his wife would use his musicl manuscripts to light the fire in the morning and scrub pots. She regarded the time he spent writing music and not with her as a waste of time.

Its all value judgements. While I am not necessarily comparing a Level 85 Paladin in WoW with all matching raid gear as equal to a Hyden concerto, the time was spent willingly, the result was regarded by the creator as valuable. To others its a "waste of time".... value judgement... thats all....