5 Reasons It's Still Not Cool to Admit You're a Gamer

[Cat Rage Room]

Interesting article. Whether you agree with all of it, some of it, or none of it, it's definitely something to think about (and hopefully discuss here) about the gamer culture and demographic.

http://www.cracked.com/article_18571_5-reasons-its-still-not-cool-to-admit-youre-gamer_p1.html

 

[Tennyo]

I think that article is spot on for the most part. Especially reason #1. I love gaming, but I really do hate the vast majority of gamers that I meet.

I really wish he would have spoken a bit more from the female point of view, but he did make a good case as to why women don't like most gamer men even when the women themselves are gamers. I mean crap. Such as, most people on WoW assume that everyone is a man, even when you have a female toon. When I reveal that I actually am a girl, just, holy crap.

I'm a gamer girl and I would actually prefer a non-gamer guy. Isn't that sad?

Not that this applies to all men who game, but still. There are enough of the bad ones out there to ruin it for everyone.

But going back to reason #1, and adding in reason #2 my main reason for feeling the way I do in my above comments. Oh yes because I care about frame rates. Oh yes if it isn't 100% exact my game is ruined. Ho. Ly. Crap. No.

And the pirating, and the whinyness. The pirating could go for any dude who does anything involving technology. I once had a guy in one of my classes heckle me for actually paying for Photoshop. I got an education discount but still, I guess I'm the lower human being for actually giving people money for their efforts. Riiiiiight.

And all these guys wonder why girls don't want them. HA.

And thus concludes my rant for today.

 

[Dee]

In any walk of life, there will exist stereotypes; things that others assume are true about a certain group of people without really discovering the truth for ones self. I don't fit into any of those 5 reasons listed in the article, so I really have nothing to worry about. I am a proud female gamer and I will shout it from the rooftops if I have to. However, if strangers looked at me, they probably wouldn't have guessed that I do game more than the average female.

In any case, I tend not to care about what assumptions other people make. They don't matter to me simply because what people see about me first will contradict everything stereotypical about being a gamer and liking video games. If someone wants to believe those stereotypes, more power to them.

I'd like to second what Tenn has said about leaving out female gamers as our population continues to rise. Although it is still somewhat of a novel idea to meet a female gamer, it's becoming more and more accepted.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

In any walk of life, there will exist stereotypes; things that others assume are true about a certain group of people without really discovering the truth for ones self. I don't fit into any of those 5 reasons listed in the article, so I really have nothing to worry about. I am a proud female gamer and I will shout it from the rooftops if I have to. However, if strangers looked at me, they probably wouldn't have guessed that I do game more than the average female.

In any case, I tend not to care about what assumptions other people make. They don't matter to me simply because what people see about me first will contradict everything stereotypical about being a gamer and liking video games. If someone wants to believe those stereotypes, more power to them.

I'd like to second what Tenn has said about leaving out female gamers as our population continues to rise. Although it is still somewhat of a novel idea to meet a female gamer, it's becoming more and more accepted.

Everyone

I think the article was less of 'HERE YOU SHOULD BE EMBARRASSED OVER THIS HOBBY' and more of 'Hey it's these people/things that drag down the reputation for this hobby for everyone'.

I think the title is rather facetious. If all you get from this article is "HEY I'M NOT ASHAMED TO BE A GAMER THIS ARTICLE IS BUNK", then well, you missed the entire point.

 

[Tennyo]

Well that is exactly it. I'm sure those stereo types don't even apply to a lot of gamers, but for the ones that it does I'd say they need a wake-up call.

 

[Alessa Gillespie]

Eh. A lot of number three issues are much less of an issue in games like Mass Effect or Persona 3 because those games deal very much with building interpersonal relationships and solving some side quests non-violently. Yes, you can basically boil it down to 'man beats robots' or 'man beats Shadows', but when you play the game it seems like a much smaller part than these phrases would make it seem.

On number four, there are a few gamers who are nothing but graphics whores who demand perfection, but who here watched Mako's thread about FFXIII being a piece of linear shit because it allowed no real exploration and had no towns? Certainly, there are gamers who will whine and whinge about the graphics not being SUPAH PERFECK but just as many people will complain about a game being a piece of shit to play. If it's amazing to play, a hell of a lot of people will play it; if it's just shiny boring shit to play, people may buy it, but plenty will sell it back.

I can't really comment on one or two since they don't exactly apply to me. Though I've seen everything about Bayonetta from 'SHE'S OVERLY SEXUALIZED TO SUIT GAMERS' to 'SHE'S OVERLY SEXUALIZED BUT IT'S CLEAR SHE WOULD NEVER BE PLEASED WITH YOU', and I do know that on the other hand, some characters are created solely for a female player to enjoy (some women play Draogn Age just because they really adore Alistair and I think Persona 3 Portable, where you can play as a girl and date the men of P3 was made entirely for this). It's just not nearly as much as there are for guys.

 

[Dee]

Really, I think it all goes hand in hand. Saying we're not ashamed to be a gamer is merely disagreeing with all of those stereotypes listed in the article; it's just another way of bypassing the obvious and stating the end result (opinion). However, I do agree that these stereotypes exist. What you do with them is what's most important.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I wouldn't even say they're stereotypes. A lot of it are real, legitimate issues with the industry and its fans.

 

[Dee]

The way he worded himself when listing off those 'legitimate issues' basically states that they are indeed stereotypes. For example:

#5, in which he plainly states and even uses the word stereotype:

"We Can't Shake the "Lonely, Anti-Social Virgin" Stereotype"

#4 also states a the assumption of a person/people:

"The industry thinks we're all 17-year-old douchebags"

Although the rest of them are worded differently, they still state assumptions towards a certain group of people. That's not to say they aren't legitimate issues. They are. They're still stereotypes coming from an outside source, however.

 

[Cat Rage Room]

Wait, what do you mean by outside source? The writer himself is a gamer as well, and has been for a while.

 

[Max Payne]

FUCK YOU I'M A GAMER

 

[Lord Noctis]

Luckily these stereotypes don't apply to me. Its kind of a shame that there are so many people they do apply to though. Its even sadder that alot of media actively portrays gaming in general as being that way.

 

[Dee]

Wait, what do you mean by outside source? The writer himself is a gamer as well, and has been for a while.

What I mean by an outside source is where these 'stereotypes' are coming from in the first place. Like I mentioned before, the industry and another example used in the article was women as the gender he focused on was how these stereotypes affected male gamers.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

I know, right? It's just like what I went through with Twilight - I was so ashamed to be a reader of books.

 

[Hisako]

OMG DEY GOT IT TOTALLY WRONG BECUZ SAKURA IS ACTUALLY A SCHOOLGIRL AND IT AINT FETISH ;-;



Eh, the article is everything obvious we all should know about the populace out there. I think most of us in the forums aren't the bottom-feeders of society the article makes us out to be, and I fear this is kinda like the PSA to the people that have heard it all before.

The ones that need to hear this sort of thing are the people filling out the stereotypes themselves.

 

[Winter]

God, I thought this article was fantastic.

I don't understand why some of you are saying "oh I don't care what other people think" etc, etc. It's not about that. It's about the fact that no matter what kind of fans we are, we are NOT the fans the industry caters to. The industry has shown repeatedly that it caters to, well, 13 year old boys.

Even Square Enix has said point blank that they don't make games for people of all ages, and that they expect us to grow out of Final Fantasy games.

Yeah, I know we're mature, well rounded people. But we are, quite frankly, in the minority.

Also the piracy issue kills me. I'm not a moralfag, I pirate music and even movies once in a while. But gamers seem to be too fucking stupid to realize they are single handedly killing the industry they love. Even music fans aren't this fucking stupid. The video game industry works differently than any other, and gamers just don't get this. No, I don't like paying $50 for games either. But there are easier and cheaper ways to play games other than HURR HURR I DOWNLOAD IT FOR FREE, SUCK MY DICK UBISOFT

So yeah, these are stereotypes. They're also RIDICULOUSLY accurate, in this case. The industry needs a change of pace, and even companies like SE, who want to be original and ~groundbreaking~ manage to make games that fall into these categories (see: obsession with gadgets and pretty. Yeah, I liked FFXIII, but we all know the focus on graphics was a little obscene)

I love video games, and I think there are lots of times when the industry does it right. But for the most part I am consistently embarrassed by the decisions of industry heads and appalled by the way video game fans behave.

 

[Hisako]

Which is why I said we're not the ones who need to be reading this article. It needs to be all the 13 year old boys out there who need a slap in the face and the writers of games who cater for them.

 

[LicoriceAllsorts]

You are right in many ways. But how can this problem be solved? I discuss these issues with my gamer sons, who are not (among other things) allowed to benefit from the hard work of others without paying for it. But I'm at a loss to understand why we don't get more intelligent and grown-up (as opposed to 'adult') games. The market is clearly there. Time for a new studio with a fresh vision, maybe?

 

[Cat Rage Room]

I personally thought Bayonetta was a pretty bad offender when it came to pandering to gamers sexuality.

I actually first played it not too long ago. While the gameplay is stellar, the oversexualized presentation of the main character was, well...insulting and almost embarrassing. Like, people actually want to see this shit?

 

[Max Payne]

I remember Kamiya saying Bayonetta was sort of like a fun, complete non serious parody of females in video games or some shit. Yeah I love the combat in the game, but tbh the retarded softcore porn crap doesn't bother me nearly as much as the terrible character design, art direction, and proportions of the lead character.

GIANT LIMBS TINY HEAD LONG TORSO IS LONG

 

[Strangelove]

I tend to skip the cutscenes if there's anyone else around.

And never use a torture attack on a Joy.

I still enjoy it as a game, but if they had just toned down the whole hypersexualised aspect of it, it would have improved it in my eyes. She's at least not some helpless damsel who drops her panties for the first guy who saves her life, but I can't think of many alternative reasons beyond fap material to explain why the camera is always focusing on her arse.

Also if she stood up straight. what's wrong with her back.

 

[Max Payne]

Also if she stood up straight. what's wrong with her back.

CONSTANT ARCH MUST POKE TITS OUT

 

[Hisako]

But I'm at a loss to understand why we don't get more intelligent and grown-up (as opposed to 'adult') games. The market is clearly there. Time for a new studio with a fresh vision, maybe?

I nominate the Fallout series as an example of a proper, Mature series of games, where the focus is less on the blood and titties and more on the fundamentally stupid nature of humanity.
Of course, no-one's ever going to ever read into it past the post-apocalyptia, unfortunately.

I would think, yes, there needs to be a bigger market in the "games that make you think past the mechanics", and gamers would definitely benefit from a new developer group focused on food for thought. But it boils down to the problem that a lot of gamers game in certain games for the purpose of not having to think very deeply, and it's particular genres that we'd have to change to solve anything, which the industry would suffer from. You can call Metal Gear Solid a dumb series, but in the end it looks like an Orwellian masterpiece compared to some of the brainless reflex-shooters out there.

No industry based on money would make compromises that would reduce money coming in. Thinking about it further, the gaming populace is a basket case.

 

[Max Payne]

I'm sorry, but there are quite a bit of intelligent games that aren't throughaway entertainment.

The reason why there isn't more, isn't because while there might be a market for that type of game, it is nowhere near as profitable as that of the games like Call of Duty which will sell assloads. It's all about money, and no one wants to take that kind of risk anymore.

And metal gear went from moderately thought provoking/deep/complex plot to outright stupidity.

 

[Dashell]

Video Game Storytelling is Still at the Level of B Movies

Other than that I do agree with a lot of this article and especially to those who said they hate half the gamers they meet XD I can relate to that

But no worries, I still love you guys