Video Games have always been an integral part of my existence. I can still distinctly recall the feeling I got when I beat the first Legend of Zelda game like it was yesterday. Every single detail of that moment, and it was decades ago. I remember exactly where I was standing in my living room. I remember the way my house smelled like Yankee candles. I remember my hands trembling from the faux-adrenaline I felt. I also recall it feeling like an actual achievement. Like I had REALLY done something. In hindsight, feeling that much pride about a game may have hinted I was a major nerd more than anything else, yet I find myself playing and beating games to this day, and rarely getting that feeling anymore.
The games look great, and many play great, too, but it just feels more cold and less personal. Though technologically speaking, games have never looked, sounded, or played better, it all comes at a cost. It is the same feeling you get when you go from watching a movie like Goonies to watching a movie like the most recent Transformers. It feels dead inside in comparison. It may be shinier, it may be faster and louder, but it is vapid. It is empty. It has no soul. As big and impressive as it may seem, it all feels like shine and no substance. And it is for that reason that I feel like gaming, as whole, has lost some of its magic.
I’ve come to find out that more factored into that conclusion than just the games themselves. Seems I am not aging as gracefully as I would like to think, and gaming held me up a mirror and showed that to me, whether I was ready for it or not.