My Favorite Life Lessons From Video Games.

“Controlled” Photographed by Ernest Sandefer

I’ve been playing video games all of my life and not once have I shot up a school, super market, church or movie theater. There are plenty of others like myself out there, because video games do not make people violent. A fairly recent article published by U.S. News with further prove my point https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-11-08/no-evidence-violent-video-games-lead-to-real-violence-study

Favorite Lessons from Gaming.

1. Perseverance. If you’ve ever played a video game, any video game, you’d know the point of every game is to persevere. A life lesson one does not need to play video games to know and learn, but it most definitely is present. If you can beat that difficult boss, level or road block in a game, then you are capable of doing the same in life. Some of my most memorable “tough it out” moments in life involve me getting through an obstacle in a video game. I pity those who’ve only had to face hardships in virtual reality, but I still credit video games for the added lesson in never giving up after every loss or obstacle I encounter.
2. Compassion. Contrary to fake news political banter, video games have actually made me a more compassionate person, to strangers especially. That’s not to say before I picked up the sticks I wasn’t a compassionate person. I’ve always been a compassionate person. Life doesn’t always reward people for being compassionate, but video games do. Doing good deeds and having a heart simply for rewards is not the act of a compassionate individual, but it is nice to be acknowledged for your good nature from time to time. It’s human nature to seek acknowledgment for the things that we do. I don’t base my entire self-worth as a writer on the acknowledgement of others, but if I didn’t want to be acknowledged as a writer and for who I am, these pieces would never leave the notebook I scribe them in before putting them on screen for the world to see. Acknowledgment for being kind hearted in a video game isn’t always an in-game reward or a trophy. It can be a simple “thank you” from a character and even if I don’t get that, knowing I helped shaped the trajectory of someone’s (somethings) life is still a great feeling to me. I think it’s nuts when people try to argue video games have this negative effect on people when playing video games motivated me to get out into the real world and be just as compassionate to strangers as I am to A.I. in virtual reality.
3. Your Choices Matter. Has anybody else gone throughout life with the beliefe that their life was pre-destined to failure or stagnation? Like the place you work at, the people you’re around, the place(s) you are will never change, no matter how much you want them to? Well, baby, there’s always a choice. You do not have to play video games like Life is Strange, Detroit Becomes Human and Cyberpunk 2077 or games at all to know that you have the power to choose your destination in life, but I credit these games and gaming in general for reminding me of that and for creating mental clarity for me to be able to make important choices in my life. Gaming has had the same effect on me when it comes to how I view my decision making as it has on the being compassionate. If you feel like your decision don’t matter in life, play Life is Strange, Even if you’re not a gamer. It’s a story driven game with simple controls so you don’t have to worry too much about remembering how to play. Just pay attention to the story and the choices you make. You might liking your experience to release therapy. The goal is to get you to shift your mindset, to really be mindful of the decisions you’ve made the power you have to change your circumstances.

Lighthearted Lessons.

Not everything that I’ve learned from gaming are “deep” life lessons. Some of the stuff is just minuscule knowledge to me, compared to what I have above. Here are some of the “lighter” lessons I’ve learned playing video games.

• Exposure to different languages. I’m no expert in Spanish, France, German or Haitian Creole or any other language I’ve enteracted with, but it is nice to have a few words and phrases in the chamber from languages other than English.
• I’ve learned how to hold and use a firearm. The mechanics of a gun, too. Before you send a firing squad to my overpriced apartment, this is not an endorsement for giving everybody guns/weapons in general and this damn sure isn’t an argument proving video games make people violent. Don’t be the loser who thinks having a 91% success rate at hitting your target on a video game will translate to your gun toting ability in reality. You still need to go through proper firearm training to get your gun license. Life is not a video game. A gun WILL NOT solve all of your problems.
• Learned how to drive. Just like handling a gun in real life, driving a car in reality is much different and should be taking one-hundred times more serious. Don’t think you being able to shift lanes between cars without a scratch on Need For Speed means you can and should do that in real life. Don’t be that foolish. Get your license, follow the rules of the road and remember life is not a game. Following the rules of the road is not optional in real life like it is in most video games, which means you should ALWAYS follow the rules because you won’t get a do-over unless you’re affluent and white.
• Self Discovery. If you’ve ever wondered what your style was, how’d you look in certain outfits, create yourself in a game and create your look. I credit games like SIMS that allow people to create themselves in virtual reality and experiment with their look. In my experience, this can be a real confidence booster or simply just a fun pass time if you’re in your 30’s and still like to play “dress-up.”

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