The Society of Gaming

Adult gamers are all the same, right? Ask any non-gamer, and they’ll tell you. We’re all a bunch of slackers who never grew up. A bunch of overgrown kids who spend their money on games, when there are REAL ways we could be spending our money, like on mini-vans with doors that open by themselves. Of course, gamers don't work very hard to change the perception of non-gamers. We could generally care less about the opinion of someone who thinks Halo, “is about some angel or something.” Still, any community tends to define itself in some way, so perhaps it’s time the gaming community does the same. Gamers are a diverse group, but most fall into one of six categories. Those are: Hard Core, Devoted, Pretend Hard Core, Casual, Clueless and Worthless. Hard Core gamers are, at once, both the easiest and the hardest to define. Especially because there are so many gamers who will be crushed to learn that they really aren’t one. We’ll start with some demographic information. As heartless as this sounds, your average Hard Core gamer is not married. Now, I’m not talking about that rare, lucky gamer who met, dated and married another gamer. That group is too small to warrant classification. No, for most Hard Core gamers, marriage is one of many things that must be sacrificed in pursuit of their true life’s passion.

Hard Core gamers know games and gaming the way doctors know the bones of the body, artists know the color palette, and busty blondes know how to avoid traffic tickets. In other words, Hard Core gamers know it all. When they send a correction to a gaming magazine, the magazine prints it. When you tell them you tried to make an Asteroids-type game in the seventh grade, they tell you it must have been the ninth grade, because Asteroids wasn’t out when you were in the seventh grade, and they’re RIGHT. They may not be the absolute best player on every game, but, if you pick five games randomly, they’ll kick your ass in all five. True Hard Core gamers aren’t all that common, but you probably know at least a few. They are generally happy people who have their lives figured out, and are proud of their gaming knowledge and prowess.

While Hard Core gamers have the pulse of the entire industry, Devoted gamers have a singular obsession – The One Game, whichever it may be. I have never been a Hard Core Gamer, but I have definitely been a Devoted one. Most gamers have been, at one time or another. When you spend months, and sometimes years on the same game, generally forsaking all others, you’re Devoted. I’m a Devoted Halo II player right now. Some of you may be too. I occasionally play something else, but I always go back to the Master Chief.

Being a Devoted gamer is mostly a good gig, especially if you find a group of other gamers who are devoted to your game too. In that situation, you have people who understand your constant game references, laugh at your game-related jokes, and don’t think it’s weird at all when you start a sentence with, “I was thinking of a new strategy in the shower this morning.” A Devoted gamer may be able to give a Hard Core gamer a tough time in their One Game, but they lack the Hard Core depth.

There is a smaller subset of the Devoted gamer group. A darker subset. The Addict. Addicts place the One Game above, not just other games, but also above most other elements of life itself. For Addicts, daily decisions are pretty easy. Go to a ballgame or Play The Game? Play The Game. Invest time in a life-enriching relationship, or Play The Game? Play The Game. Take a shower or play The Game? You get the idea. This subset is most often found among devotees of MMORPG’s, but you can find them for just about any game. Many times, non-Addicts will call themselves Addicts because they play a particular game a lot. However, most of them play it because they like it, not because they need it. The Addict needs it.

Next on our tour of the gaming society is the Pretend Hard Core gamer, or PHC gamer. PHC gamers do know a thing or two about gaming, but they like to appear as though they know far more than they really do. Although they can fool casual gamers, they’re in trouble when they run into true Hard Core gamers. The PHC gamer is all about appearance. They like being thought of as someone who has an incredible depth of knowledge, but they aren’t willing to invest the time to actually acquire that depth. PHC gamers are usually pretty good people, except for the occasional arrogant ones who REALLY try to make you think they know everything about everything.

That brings us to Casual gamers. This group needs very little definition – you know what a Casual gamer is. They like to game, but it’s generally one of many hobbies, and is no more important than any of the other ones. Casual gamers tend to play only those games that get good reviews and sell a lot of copies. They’re not interested in experimenting with Genre-molding new concepts in gaming – they just want to have fun for an hour or so. Due to this lack of dedication to gaming, you won’t see many Casual gamers on games that require large time investments, such as MMORPGs. On the other hand, if you’re in a game, and there’s a player who isn’t all that good, but sure is laughing and having a good time with it, they’re probably a Casual gamer. I was a Casual gamer for the first few years of my marriage, back when we were in that Newlywed “let’s do just everything together” phase. Now that we’re older and have realized it’s OK for us to have our own lives within our marriage, I spend much more time gaming, and, as I mentioned earlier, have become a Devoted Halo II player.

That brings us to a brief stop on the Clueless gamer. This is another type you probably don’t need defined. Some Clueless gamers buy a lot of games, but they’re not very good at any of them, and they give up on them before they can become good. These are the gamers who do things that puzzle you, make a lot of mistakes and get pretty frustrated by that, but also aren’t willing to listen to any suggestions or invest any time to improve. Their general attitude is that if they have to work at a game to be any good at it, then it must nt be a very well-designed game. They may be big fans of games like Solitaire.

Finally, we get to the Worthless gamer. These are the gamers who, for a wide-range of reasons, make gaming worse for everyone else. They go by many names: Cheaters, Hackers, De-levelers, Screamers, Punks, Jackasses and our own favorite, Timmies. Entire gaming communities, such as our very own 2old2play, emerged as a reaction to the Worthless gamer. Worthless gamers are a cancer on the gaming world, and millions of dollars and thousands of hours are spent every year by companies to thwart them, gamers to report them, and message board posters to vilify them. They are the one topic the other five gamer types can all agree on, because they are universally despised.

Well, that about wraps it up. Have you figured out which gamer type you are? Do you wish you were some other type? Don’t worry, we all secretly wish we were Hard Core gamers, but it just isn’t in the cards for most of us. Thankfully, the gaming world is so diverse that, no matter what games you like, and what type of gamer you are, there’s a place for you. If you haven’t found that place yet, then you’ve taken a good first step by visiting us here at 2old2play.com. We hope you’ll be back, but if not, we hope even more that you find the gaming fun you’re looking for with a group of friends you enjoy spending time with. And remember, ultimately, it’s just a game (Yes it is, Addicts. Accept it).



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