A tribute to Video Games

My father is a gamer, he put my brother and me on a computer very early. At two years old I was already on Adibou, and I was most likely a pro Tetris player by the time I was four. I captured over 150 Pokémon at least six times before I was eight. I spent many hours on various MMORPGs during my teenage years. I’ve crushed many heads on FPS to keep my sanity while getting my master’s degree.

Gaming has been my main hobby since childhood. I want to write this post to remember the games I’ve played, the enjoyable moments, the friends I’ve made (make it more cheesy and it’ll turn into a Raclette), and to acknowledge the titles that have shaped my life.

“This is our story! Now let’s see this thing through together!” - Final Fantasy X

I’m a PC MaStER rAcE player, not because I believe PC > Console, but because it was what I had access to for a while. I eventually got a DS and a Wii. Emulators were available, so I used them to play older games (Thanks dad!).

In my early years, I mostly played alone or with my younger brother, who hated losing. I mean, I hate(d) losing too but let’s be honest, I was the best. We’d go to war on Age of Mythology, continuously spamming “Wololo” at each other, compete on Rayman Raving Rabbids, screaming “Bwaaah” while our parents watched, helpless at the chaos, and tried to outperform each other in Mario Kart DS and Smash Bros.

“Bonjour mon ami!” - Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

In middle and high school, I discovered MMORPGs. I made many friends there, and even met two partners through different games at different times. Dofus was my first MMO. I once organized an event that crashed the servers because too many players joined the same map.

In highschool I remember being told by my english teacher that I would never achieve anything in life and would certainly never be able to speak english. Oh well. I don’t mean to brag when I say gaming has brought me a list of skills which helped me navigate life more easily:

• My english level mainly comes from playing online games on non French servers.
• Taking down a raid requires planning, communication, and coordination.
• Patience and perseverance are key when you’re on game such as Dark Souls.
• Portal makes your brain cells work overtime, that’s puzzle solving for you.
• Curiosity tends to make you go towards that ”?” lost in the map and you get rewarded for that (unless you’re playing Ubisoft games).
• Having to debug an error message caused by a terrible anti-cheat system that leads you in the bios of your computer tends to give you the key to end up building your own machine a few years later.

After high school, convinced by my parents that I needed a prestigious degree to earn good money, I enrolled in an international business school. I did not fit in, neither did I want to fit in. At the time, I was playing Final Fantasy XIV. My guild master was studying computer science and offered to show me around his school. I switched to that path the following year.

Once in computer science school, a friend introduced me to Overwatch, which I still play occasionally. This game can be truely fun when played with a group, either because you’re try harding to win or because you’re just chit chatting while poucing the other team. I’ve made multiple lifelong friends with that game in the background. I love playing Ana, grandma healer sniper with some control skills. One evening I used the group finder and posted something like “Come play with grandma”. I teamed up with an American dude who played Zarya, the buffed as heck tank of the Motherland, after a night full of victory we kept playing together for a while, we’ve been pen pals ever since and still chat almost daily.

I’ve been told multiple times that it’s not possible to create real, deep connections with people online. I believe and know it’s possible, I’ve had the best random phylosophical talks with friends at night on Mumble and Discord. Some people I met have had an impact on my life, just like I’ve had an impact on theirs, hell I’ve even saved lives.

“I choose you!” - Pokémon

When asked what my favorite games are, I definitely have a strong first and second, however the third place is a tie between several games.

My favorite is The Witcher 3. After finishing the whole series and reading the books, I realized that a story-driven RPG with moral complexity, strong music, and satisfying gameplay is what I enjoy the most. Now add a cool ass main character, an open world and put that into a Dark Fantasy universe and I’ll sign up. My heart was broken when I originally finished the game and had the worst ending possible, so I reloaded a save 40 hours earlier to get a different ending. I have over 200 hours in the game, including the DLC and completion attempts.

The second place was taken recently by Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. All the boxes are ticked once again: story, music, gameplay, I only saw the sunlight again after completing the game. It’s great in all aspects cited above, but add to that the fact that they’re a small french team and even if I’m not very much of a patriot I was somehow proud of them. I’ve had the chance to go to their first concert in Paris and it was a remarkable experience, you could see the joy they had in sharing their work.

For third place, the contenders are Baldur’s Gate 3, Ori and the Blind Forest, Hades, Overwatch, and Final Fantasy XIV. They are all strong in different ways, but I would choose Final Fantasy XIV due to the amount of days and nights I invested in it. If I played it again now, I might not rate it as highly, since many expansions have changed the game significantly.

“I used to be an adventurer like you…” - Skyrim

And I wish I can keep on adventuring like that! Even though I have found new hobbies and go touch grass more regularly, I still play vdeo games and I intend to continue. We’re in an amazing timeline for that hobby, they have become more accessible, they’re seen less as a danger to society (by television, find the bug), more and more people are creating video games and even more people are playing them. I am thankful for the teams who developed these titles, for the hours of entertainment, the memories, and the friends I’ve made. They have been a great escape from reality for a long while, now they complement my reality nicely, the cake is no longer a lie.

“Reconstructing test chamber data.” - Portal 2

Do you know what I like aside from video games? Data. Data’s fun, I grouped the games by genre to create the chart below. I’ll keep denying if someone says I have a type though.

Game count (I have forgoten plenty that’s for sure): 123