Confessions of a gamer

Solid Snake, do you know this name? Well maybe you´ve heard about it and seen videos about a character that goes by that name but who is Solid Snake? This is something that isn´t really clear to me when I first played Metal Gear Solid on the Playstation, I never played any of the Nintendo Metal Gear games so I was completely in the dark. But this didn´t stop me from playing the game, it was quite something in the late 90´s and I wasn´t really used to stealth games as my strategy was always go for the direct attack. I think Metal Gear Solid changed that a bit, think before you move and when you make a move be ready to make another one. Metal Gear Solid is difficult for new players? If you´re not used to stealth games then it might be a challenge, because running and gunning usually means that things won´t end well for you. Suddenly I had to take it easy and move slowly instead of rushing, this was very strange for me and it caused me to get killed in the game several times where I did...

Did I just say that? Well I actually typed it but yeah I did, something some guys (maybe even girls) think but no one says. But is it true? Should girls play games? Or are games wasted on girls? I´d say anyone with at least some brain activity would know the answer on these questions, but that doesn´t keep some people from giving an answer you might expect from a douchebag! Why shouldn´t girls play games? Some guys think that girls ruin the fun, that they suck so badly that it´s no challenge to play against them and then there are people that are just assholes about it. I don´t think gaming is a guy thing, hell I´d welcome more female gamers to bring something else in the mix. Some guys prefer to play against other guys but then I look at certain games and notice that most people don´t really communicate with eachother and when they do it´s usually a lot of insults that are thrown around, so does it really matter against whom you´re playing? Then the bullshit about girls being so...

Sometimes when I play games with friends the tension reaches a critical point where no one wants to lose and harsh words can be said in the heat of the moment, I mean nobody wants to lose and sometimes when the score is that close then it only takes one mistake to fuck it up! It´s great when afterwards everything is back to normal, but what if things aren´t back to normal? Is it possible to lose friends because of a game? To give you a short answer, yes! But that person is usually not a good friend, unless you´re being a terrible friend yourself then it would make a bit more sense. It´s not uncommon for friends to get angry at eachother because of a game, but it´s completely up to you how you deal with that! Sure you can be mad for a moment but that´s a moment and not worth keeping a grudge against your friend. Of course there are people that are scumbags, but you probably know that if he or she is your friend and to hold that against someone seems a bit weird. Because if you know s...

I think a lot of gamers are familiar with good and evil, you´ve probably played games like Fable or Fall Out 3 where morality plays a (big) part in the game and it will determine the outcome of certain missions. In Fable it goes so far that you actually see your character change into an angelic being or a demon, depending on the choices you made. It´s nice that you can choose, to be good or to be evil. I wish more games did that but sometimes it´s also nice to just follow a story that leads you into darkness or is sometimes a path of redemption. The information I´m getting about Metal Gear Sold 5 the Phantom Pain the more I realize that this is a story about a man that is falling into darkness, a path of revenge that leads him to the darker parts of the soul. I´m quite fascinated by that, because it looks like it´s going to be an interesting story that is quite unique in the world of games. Sure there are games where you can play as the good guy and do bad things, hell you can even b...

Have you ever wondered how your life would be if you never played games, if you never heard about video games and if they didn´t even exist? I think that would change things a lot for some people, especially if it´s your favourite hobby and if you spend a lot of time gaming. But if video games never existed then how would you miss them? I started playing video games when I was nine and got my first console when I was ten, which wasn´t really that early in my life but in that time not many people played video games anyway. I started to spend more time playing games then playing outside with friends, something that wasn´t the smartest thing to do because I lost contact with some of my friends. I stopped playing football (soccer for Americans) and I also spend way too much money on games instead of other toys. But if someone would ask me if I regret anything then I´d say that I don´t regret anything about that, because I love playing games and maybe my life wouldn´t be better without vi...

A lot of popular games have a pre-order option with often a pre-order bonus attached to that, this is a way to convince people to pre-order that game or else they´re going to miss out on a cool items or something special in the game itself. But is it really worth it? A pre-order bonus is nothing special? That depends, sometimes it is something unique and the only way people can get it is via pre-order. Of course there are ways of getting it, sometimes people sell codes that give you acces to a pre-order bonus, but that´s usually a bit more expensive then you´d like and then you really have to wonder if that´s worth it! Sometimes the pre-order bonus is for sale in the game store (online) and there are even items that become available to everyone after a certain amount of time. So a pre-order bonus isn´t always that special! But I´d be too harsh to say it´s all crap, because it´s not! For example playing as Catwoman in Batman Arkham City was a nice pre-order bonus, eventhough tha...

It´s a bold statement, especially when you look at certain games where multiplayer usually keeps a game alive much longer than the single player can. But if you would take away single player then you´re kind of forced to play only multiplayer and/or co-op and I don´t think everyone would be happy with that! Who plays single player? This is something I wonder sometimes when I look at profiles in a Halo or CoD lobby, because so many people don´t bother playing the campaign and go straight for multiplayer. Maybe that has something to do with someone playing on a secondary account or perhaps that person isn´t interested in the campaign. It does give me the impression that there are a lot of gamers that don´t care about the campaign and wouldn´t mind a game that is multiplayer/co-op only. But there are also several people that do play single player, some do it for the achievements/trophies but there are also people that actually enjoy playing the campaign. Somehow I do get the feeling tha...