Gaming started very early for me. By very early, I’m talking around the ripe young age of four years old. I remember waking up on my fourth Christmas and having fewer presents to open than expected. Not that I was completely spoiled as a kid, I wasn’t. Far from it. My mum was a single parent, trying to do her best by working a full time day job and a part time job at night just to put food on the table. But, my Christmas days were usually filled with lots of little gifts sprinkled all over my room and/or our livingroom. My fourth Christmas was vastly different, however…
I remember having just two or three small sized presents and one big box (it looked huge to me at the time, I was four years old remember). I didn’t know what it could be and I was so desperate to find out! My mum told me to open the small gifts first though. I took the first present and tore into it to see a picture of Sonic. Yes, Sonic the Hedgehog! I was somewhat excited but didn’t really know what was going on at the same time. I studied the case for a while in absolute confusion. Was it a video cassette? Was it some sort of tape or a book? I genuinely had never seen anything like it before. I used to watch sonic on TV sometimes so I knew what I was looking at in terms of characters on the front cover but other than that, I was completely oblivious as to what was coming next.
I opened my second small gift to see a picture of guys posing in what looked like fighting stances. It was none other than the absolute classic, Streets of Rage. Again, me being just four years old and completely new to the world of gaming, I didn’t have a clue what I was looking at and genuinely became a bit upset and confused. My mum still tells me to this day that I initially hated what would become one of the few loves of my life; gaming. After a few tears and drama my mum got me to sit down with her and open my big main present. If you know your gaming and consoles you can probably guess what I was about to open. A Sega Mega Drive stared back at me through the torn up wrapping paper and of course, I was still very confused. I had no idea what this thing eas or what it did. That Christmas day was a complete write off if I’m honest. I was screaming because I didn’t have a clue what any of my gifts were or how they worked and my mum was going nuts, phoning anyone and everyone she could to try and figure put how to set the darn thing up! Yes, I am fully aware it was a box with a power cable, scart to TV and a controller or two but my mum was not tech savvy in the slightest. She tugged and fought with our CRT TV and the cables and in the end gave up to begin dinner for the rest of our family. I continued to cry until other people came to the door at which point I just hoped they had brought something good for me to play with. Nope. They all got me more of these damn cases with that same logo and name on as that big box thing that my mum couldn’t turn on or get to show up on the TV! Disappointed? Absolutely!
My uncle managed to calm me down and said “I have one of these. It’ll blow your mind. After dinner, I’ll set it up for you, Okay?” I nodded and wiped away the tears, enjoyed my Christmas roast but still felt utterly betrayed by such an awful gift. I’ll tell you what though, my uncle wasn’t lying. He set it up in around thirty seconds, slotted in that Sonic the Hedgehog cartridge and changed my life forever.
As I grew older and games became more ‘realistic’ through the likes of the the PS1, GameCube etc. the escape from real life and emersion in games became much easier. I was bullied for most of Primary School and a part of Secondary. I used football with my friends as an escape from school life a heck of a lot. That was until the bullies caught wind of where we played and would come down to the pitches to try and start fights and hurl abuse at me and my friends. The bullies that picked on me weren’t just verbal bullies though. They were good fighters and loved to show everyone what they could do. The most annoying part? These decent fighterz would never fight someone one on one. It’d always be a team effort and many times I was ganged up on. You see, I was well versed in mixed martial arts and Muay Thai as my mum enrolled me into classes the moment I came home with bruises and a black eye. But, no amount of training and practice in fighting styles based around rules can prepare you for being jumped by five to ten kids who are older and bigger than you and who can also fight!
This made school life particularly difficult for me and unless I could get each of the boys on their own, I never stood a chance at getting them off my back and to leave me alone for good. So, I found a different escape. One that prevented me from having to go out and instead my friends could come over and enjoy it with me too. I turned to gaming which had already been a big part of my life until then. But when I picked up a controller and got sucked into games such as Crash Bandicoot and the original Tomb Raider, all my real life troubles disappeared for a while. Instead, my biggest worry was why I couldn’t seem to beat this certain area or solve this puzzle to progress. As games became even more realistic in graphics and animation, I was sucked further and further into them. Gaming became my life outside of school and eventually work. I did what I could to fit in with others mind you. I’d socialise from time to time and go clubbing etc. The biggest problem with that though, is the fact I don’t really drink much at all and I hate (I mean extremely despise) most people when they are drunk. Again, I found myself in these environments where certain people were just out looking for fights. As people get older and more stupid on drink and even drugs, fights become much more dangerous. “Life or death” begins to make sense. I had knives pulled out on me, I was jumped walking home by myself after a night out, I saw guys spike girl’s drinks and wound up in fights after confronting them! All within the space of two to three years. My late teens were full of crazy nights out where we’d be out for a good time and it’d be ruined by someone leaving the club in the back of an ambulance and someone else leaving in the back of a police car.
By the time I was twenty-one years old, I decided that after my Birthday night out, I would no longer be going out every weekend with my friends. I wanted to go to College, study and learn and, most of all, play games.
Gaming pulled me away from those dark atmospheres and dangerous environments. Gaming prevented me from getting mixed up in bad crowds (none of the ‘cool’ kids gamed, they all did drugs and drank alcohol from a young age instead) and helped me avoid many potential fights. Times when I decided to stay in, my friends went out only to be attacked that night. One of my friends called me when I was mid-Halo 3 online Swat match to tell me they had been ‘glassed’ and had to go to hospital. ‘Glassing’ someone was a particularly cruel way of slashing someone (usually in the face) with broken glass from a pint glass or bottle. I believe it might also be a rather Scottish term…
I avoided that being me because I stayed home and played games online. But, I felt guilty. My friends went out without me and I wasn’t there to stand up for them or look out for them. So I used it to my advantage. I hadn’t been drinking, I was sober and clear minded. My friends knew the guy who ‘glassed’ my friend and he just so happened to stay down the road from me. So I picked out my darkest clothes and headed down to the park across from his house and waited. He eventually came running along the path towards his house. Sure enough, he was covered in blood and still carrying the glass he had used on my friend’s face. Drunk or even slightly tipsy me would have rand across and surprised him with a quick punch followed by a beating. But, sober me decided to scare him.
I shouted at him from behind the trees. He couldn’t see me, it was too dark. I was in the park across the road from his house which didn’t have any street lights in it. I was a ghost. The way the street ran, noises echoed. So, not only could he not see me, he couldn’t tell where my voice was coming from. I don’t remember the exact words that came from my mouth that night but I definitely scared him. I warned him that we were watching. We knew what he did to Mark and that we were coming for him if he ever did something like that to anyone again.
I honestly reckon I can thank gaming for those scare tactics. I don’t know what came over me or why I even did it, but it felt good. Even better than punching his face into a pulp. Knowing I had made this guy, who only glassed my mate because he “felt like it”, scared for his life, made me happy.
Gaming has done so much for me over the years but most of all, it helped me escape the harshness of the real world, even for just a few hours per day and, it prevented me from winding up in hospital or jail, too. If it wasn’t for gaming helping me escape, in more ways than one, who knows where I’d be today.
My opinion; Yes, gaming is healthy if done properly and under the right circumstances. And, yes, escape can be a damn good thing, it certainly was for me!
Let me know your reasons for gaming or even, not gaming, in the comments. Do you think escape from day-to-day life via gaming is a good or bad thing and why?
New Game + 