Why I Feel Like A Fake Gamer

In the wake of the recent “fake geek girl” debate, I’ve realized something very troubling:

I call myself a gamer, but if I’m brutally honest with myself, I’m not sure I deserve that title.

I don’t play any PC games anymore, I don’t really play anything else besides Fallout or Halo, and I don’t study the craft of improving my gaming skills (which is why I’ve avoided applying for the Frag Dolls Cadette program for the past two years). So to call myself a full-fledged, serious gamer feels like a betrayal to those people who are far more heavily involved in games than I am.

The problem is that I used to do many of those things I just mentioned above. I used to be obsessed with all kinds of games, and so I’m not entirely lacking a backbone when it comes to this industry.

My first introduction to gaming was through Super Mario Kart for the SNES console. That little grey box that hooked up to the TV was a wonder to me, and I couldn’t get enough of buzzing around on tracks like Rainbow Road. I also grew up with Oregon Trail and Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego? for PC, and plenty of board and card games when I wasn’t feeling quite so digital.

Then came the Nintendo 64 with its glory days of GoldenEye and Starfox. A few years later at a friend’s birthday party I got my first taste of the brand-new Xbox and Halo: Combat Evolved, both of which I immediately wanted to steal from him, of course. I suffered through a few months of Xbox withdrawal, taking any chance I could to play on friends’ consoles until I had saved enough to buy my own (God bless high school jobs).

But here’s where I know my range of gaming interests slacked off. After the introduction of my own Xbox and a copy of Halo, I essentially didn’t play any other game. Even after I got a job at GameStop and had the ability to use my discount to purchase new Xbox games, I never did.

I’m not saying I regret my decision to become a Halo fanatic. To this day, I think it’s one of the greatest franchises of all time for plenty of valid reasons. But I definitely missed out on expanding my gaming skills during a time when the industry was gaining more ground at a rapid pace.

And now, over ten years later, I have next to nothing to show for myself despite my long history of gaming. I’ve dabbled in some PC games like EVE Online and more recently League of Legends, but I quit them all after about two months. I finally own more than just Halo games (the Fallout games have quickly become my second favorite go-to series), yet most of my achievements and bragging rights still only come from Halo and Xbox scenarios. My only redeeming value here is my collection of board and card games, which is still 100% legit with titles like Settlers of Catan, Munchkin, and Magic the Gathering.

Wait, scratch that - I haven’t played Magic in years, either.

So despite my huge interest in the gaming industry, such as the recent developments in eSports, I am hesitant to say “yes” whenever someone asks me if I’m a gamer. I try out new games when I get the chance, I read as much industry news as I have time for, and I like to learn about gaming tactics. But does that make me a gamer?

I’m not sure it does. I’m afraid I might just be a fake gamer after all.