Today is my birthday. When you are a gaming blogger trying to do two posts a week, any opportunity for easy content needs to be capitalized on. I am going to use my birthday privilege to write an easy blog post talking about what I learned this year through the lens of video games.
I’m a big believer in the importance of everyone having at least one hobby that they are passionate about. These hobbies give us something extra to be excited about, they can foster connections, and we can draw life lessons from almost anything we do if we look hard enough. Video games are no exception here.
When I reflect on this past year of gaming, I learned a lot of important things that helped me enjoy video games more, but I could also extend almost all of these lessons to other elements of life in some way. With that, let’s get on with what might be the start of a yearly blog tradition for me!
An Open Mind Is a Powerful Thing
I’ve loved video games for pretty much my entire life. I’ve experienced almost every genre out there. But I’m certainly much more comfortable with certain genres over others. This year, I realized that, at times, that comfort can be a weakness. There are so many great video games out there these days that it can be easy to pigeon hole yourself into a few of your favorite genres and call it a day.
And look, there is nothing wrong with that. I have another life lesson related to this later on! But let me tell you, when you open your mind, and I mean truly open it, it is amazing how often you can enjoy things that you were sure that you wouldn’t. I resisted Baldur’s Gate 3 last year for a month, and it was probably almost a year ago today that I finally said screw it and bought the game. I loved everything I saw with the story, conversation, choices, and characters, but the CRPG combat just did not appeal to me in the slightest. Early on, things went about as I expected. I was into pretty much everything except the combat, but I got through it. Then, I got to the goblin camp. The goblin camp forced me to truly start playing with more mechanics of the combat, and I realized that I was having a lot of fun with it. I honestly think my own perception that I wasn’t going to enjoy the combat made me like it less early on in the game. When I truly opened my mind, everything changed.
I also had a similar revelation with Death Stranding. After playing 10 minutes of it a few years ago and deciding that there was no way I was going to be into it, I dove back in this year after seeing an overwhelming amount of praise on Twitter. There were some slight agitations with it early on, but I had seen so much hype that I truly wanted to feel the same way all of these other people did. Finally, I started to get it.
It’s rare to start a video game with zero preconceptions about it. Sometimes, I think having a lot of excitement for a game can help us get through some of the worst parts because we just know that we are going to enjoy it. And sometimes, we are pretty sure that a game isn’t for us, and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Entering a game with a truly open mind is a skill. And I feel like I’m starting to slowly learn how to do that.
Hopefully, the next time someone invites me to do something that I’ve never done before “in real life,” I can approach it with that same open-mindedness.
You Can Go Back, You Just Need To Take That First Step
One of my favorite things I’ve ever done was join a kickboxing gym. I went religiously for a year of my life. I got in great shape, and I was pretty dang good at it. Slowly, life got in the way. I started missing class more and more. I hated the feeling of coming back to class after a few weeks off. Getting a comment from the sensei saying something like “Where have you been, Westen?!?!”, and feeling just behind in general. It made me eventually just quit all together.
I’ve always had similar problems with video games. As I talk about a lot with this blog, I love to game hop. I usually have something like four video games in my rotation at any given point. This means that sometimes, if I’m really vibing with a few games, one might not get played for a few weeks.
Historically, when this has happened for me, that game often goes by the wayside and ends up never getting completed. Jumping into a game after an extended hiatus can be a pain in the ass. You have to kind of re-learn the story and the gameplay mechanics, but instead of being eased in like you were at the start of the game, you are in the absolute thick of it. It sucks. This year, I realized that, yes, that first step can suck, but so often, it’s worth it. I’d rather deal with that uncomfortable hour of not enjoying myself and then be right back in the thick of things over walking away from something I really like.
The greatest example of this for me was Rise of the Ronin earlier this year. While I absolutely loved the combat, I got into a rabbit hole of trying to clear out too much side content and ended up burning out on the game. In the past, this would be it for me, and I never would have picked it up again. But I went ahead and took the plunge after something like a month off with the game. It was a little shaky for 30 minutes, but then I was back in and had a great time with the game all over again. Once you take that first step, anything is possible. That goes for a lot of things in life.
Do What Makes You Happy In Your Free Time
When I first started this blog, I had a lot to think about in terms of what kind of posts I wanted to do. One of my first ideas was to spend some time playing Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown on all of its different difficulties and writing some in-depth thoughts on the differences. Whenever I start a game, I really like to look for articles on difficulty, as I want to try and see the best place to set it in advance. Usually, these articles suck and are super generic. I figured an article that was actually researched might be useful to people and do well on search engine results, too.
And then, as I started playing the game to work on it, I realized… this sucks. Replaying multiple sections across each difficulty was not fun in the slighest, and it wasn’t an entertaining thing for me to write either. I do think if I did it, it might have done well. But if I kept tailoring my content like that, this blog probably would have died fast. In the end, I’m a dad, and I work. I don’t have unlimited amounts of free time. Every peaceful moment is valuable. And I want to spend that time doing stuff that I actually enjoy. I currently play what I want to play, and I write about what I want to write about. I find both of these things fun. And there is no reason to do anything else. I’ve known this for a long time, but reminders are always good to have.
Community Enhances Everything
When my wife rediscovered her love of reading earlier this year, she suddenly realized she was missing something. She quickly made a Goodreads account and was desperate to have more friends on there. As much as she loved having this hobby again, it just didn’t feel the same without anyone to share some of these experiences with.
While I knew this lesson from sports, it was only this past year that I realized that it really did apply to everything else, too. Before starting this blog, it had probably been something like 12 years since I had been active in any real gaming community, back when I posted on GameFAQs message boards. I continued gaming after I stopped posting there, and it was still one of my favorite hobbies in the world, but for a long time, something was just missing. Somehow, I carried on with this hobby for over a decade, with almost no one to share my joy with (my wife very politely listens if I get excited, but that was about it).
It’s probably no surprise that I feel like I am now enjoying gaming more than ever since starting this blog. Part of that is that we have had a whole lot of bangers this year, but having people to share all these experiences with has been incredible. Having this avenue to share my thoughts in detail feels like I just took off a weighted vest that I wore for a decade straight. Yeah, that probably sounds overdramatic, but seriously, holding in the endless takes I have was almost physically painful. So take it from me, if you love anything, you should probably seek out some like-minded folks!
I’ll use this point to also give a special thank you to anyone reading this blog right now. The past two months, in particular, have seen a lot of growth here. Just having any audience whatsoever is an amazing feeling and has made this whole endeavor incredibly rewarding for me. As stated here, it has even made gaming itself better for me. I appreciate you! I have lots of cool content planned for the end of the year in particular, and I hope you will stick around for the ride!
Big Nerd Gaming 
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