Observations from an older gamer.

Now I consider myself an older gamer. Not old, by any means, just older. I'm 36 FYI. I started my gaming on a Atari 2600, yelling things like Doodoohead at the crocodiles in Pitfall whenever they ate me, or a car squished me in Frogger. Through the years I've mostly played on consoles. Nintendo, Sega Genesis, Playstation 1 & 2, Xbox and 360. Wasn't until 2004 or 2004 I discovered Pc games and MMOs. Now throughout all this time, I've always been heavily into games. I was the kid at school who always had the new copy of Game Informer or whatever game magazine I was reading at the time. Even today, I always check online for gaming news, and I'm an active forum poster for any game I play.

All that being said, I'm not as in touch with some things that pop up in the online game community as I probably should be.

For instance, one thing that pops up on my server (Emerald) often, is the legendary "Ginyu Forces Rules" spam. I get why it is said, but I have no bleeping clue what it actually refers to. I've no clue what Ginyu Force actually is. I'm kinda assumming it is a Pokemon or Dragon Ball Z reference. But seeing as I know absolutely nothing about either Pokemon or Dragon Ball Z, I'm just guessing.

Another thing, what is it with running and jumping all the time? I get it if your out in the world, zigzagging and making sure some Infil can't pop you. But what's the point in spawn rooms or WG or wherever? Is everyone so pumped up on energy drinks they simply have to run and jump in front of me 500 times?

Also, I can't understand a good 1/3 of the chat anymore. I get some stuff, simple stuff like LOL or BRB. But so many people are using numbers as part of words now, I can't keep up with it for the life of me. Makes my eyes hurt just trying to read it. Hopefully as my son gets older (he's just over a yr old now) he can explain some of this stuff to me.

So wondering if anyone else notices differences between older and younger players. I'm not knocking on younger players (unless you're that squeaky 9 yr old on the mic trying to act like your Mr Toughguy) so lets try to be nice.

You think you're older? I'm almost 48. Get off my lawn. (Or I'll spray an entire magazine from my GD-23 at you point-blank and miss.)

I don't get most of it either, but honestly, gaming helps keep me young, I think. Or at least partially connected to the pop culture of twenty-somethings.

Are you kidding? These days the warpgate is almost as dangerous as the battlefield.

I can answer the Ginyu Forces Rules part for ya. That is the VS outfit GOKU and it is a dragonball Z referance.

and about same age as you and the shortening and adding letters is getting a bit overboard...
Next thing we know text on the net will be so shortened it will make the US Military look like they use full words XD

This should explain it a bit.

My god queue that was epic.

Lol Vertabrae.
I get where your coming from Im 44 and my son is in the Navy and my daughter just graduated HS.
So I have a little more insight.
I think of myself still young

When I see them jumping I think they are just youngsters being goofey, yeah it is quite annoying.



One of my first consoles although I stopped at Sega Genesis

I'm 25 and I also feel like I'm surrounded by kids all the time. Especially the "MLG pro faction" people that see themselves as "Ubergamers" take the game way to seriously and tend to give you sh\t in the chat when you show them otherwise.
What else is the crossfaction chat good for other than flaming?

I just ignore pop culture references I don't understand. If it was any good like in my day I would have heard about it.
Everything after Pokemon (including Pokemon) is crap anyway.

I'm 53. Neener Neener.

The using numbers as replacements for letters is a relatively new trend (my name does not reflect this, it is mostly random numbers). This type of language is called 1337 (or leet, pronounced like "beat") and mostly consists of replacing letters for numbers to show off your "skill" or "eliteness." Some of it is abbreviated (like "m8" for "mate") and other bits make no sense at all (which is probably what you are having issues with).

Just ignore it if you want to. Its generally useless banter so there is no need to try and understand it.

By your standards I'm an older gamer too; just about the same age.

I think the big difference here is that you grew up on consoles and I grew up on PCs. I totally understand the l33t 5p34k because I grew up on IRC... back in the 90's all the k-rad kids were talking that way (replacing letters with similarly shaped numbers).

I get why people are jumping around all the time and can see why it's a totally foreign concept to a console gamer. Back in the day FPS games were much more simple and the best means to avoid death was to avoid getting hit. You ran, jumped, strafed, circle strafed, ran backwards, rocket jumped over the pit in DM6, all as a means to A) avoid getting hit and B) stay ahead of your enemy. Even during idle times you do these things becuase you can practice these moves without the pressure of a threatening situation. You practice them so much that it becomes second nature, brain reaction followed by muscle memory carries you through stressful situations that would otherwise negatively impact your performance.

If you can't execute your moves precisely without the threat of being killed how on earth are you going to do it when someone is shooting at you, stuff is exploding around you, your screen is shaking, and your weapon is recoiling? Answer: you don't, you will totally suck, and you die... a lot.

I'm sure, as a console gamer, you understand repeating 'levels' ad nauseum to the point where you have them memorized. You can do them almost on auto pilot with your timing down perfectly. It's about the same concept. When playing HA... hitting your overshield when rounding a corner, ascending some stairs, or other predictable situations should be done without concious thought; it should simply happen immediately when your mind recognizes the situation. Same with many other 'moves' and reactions.

You should also be learning the bases and buildings like you did Super Mario 1-1. They re-use a lot of the same designs so its really not THAT hard for such a huge game. Once you know every typical building design perfectly you can start memorizing standard camping spots where scrubs hide. That's how that high BR dude comes through the door way, turns, and kills you before you know what happend... he didn't KNOW you were there... he ASSUMED you were and started firing as soon as he rounded the corner. What you don't see is the bazillion other times he assumed wrong and shot a wall =) Yo ucan also start guessing and assuming typical routes people take from one point to another. You'd be amazed how often you guess right.

*insert bad Grandpa clip*

I started my gaming at age of 3 on the NES... well NES after my 1st game "Legend of Zelda Link to the Past" from the SNES. I played it and completed it at age 3. I then started playing the original Zelda and Zelda 2. Afterwards, it was Final Fantasy 1 on NES and other "rare" games like "Destiny of an Emperor" which is based off of the 3 kingdoms lore with Liu Bei, Cao Cao, and Sun family, etc. Okay, that's about how "old" I am and I do have semi bad eye sight so you can imagine how horrible I am fighting VS at night on this game lol.

Just out of curiosity... I see you play Ceres TR. Is your experience with Ceres TR in some way related to your comment?

Weird Al still got it. Whenever i watch one of his videos i'm not surprised he's still somewhat relevant.

Edit: I bet English teachers across the country would love this video.

I've been around PC online gaming since original Everquest back in 1999, I recently turned 32. I understand most references in chat. Leet speak was invented long before my time to bypass built in chat filters, if you say a curse word it would get filtered but if you try to replace a few O's with zeros, or a few i's or L's with ones, or a few s's with fives you just might get around it. Kids are taking it way too far today without understanding what it's for. They keep typing in words that wouldn't get filtered in any case using numbers, thinking they sound cool or something. It's still understandable. I expect baby talk from babies, same deal here. It doesn't bother me, shouldn't bother you either.

The jumping thing is just newbies that don't realize planetside has no bunny hopping. It might have worked in Counterstrike, but planetside will punish you for it by making you move slower. Let them hop around while I shoot them, more kills for me, for you and anyone else with at least half a functioning brain.

"Ginyu force rules" are also kids that grew up on dragon ball z, that was after my time. They think it's funny, and maybe to their generation it is. In my time we had power rangers to fill the "stupid" and "repetitive" gap in entertainment for those that needed it. Also slightly before that Voltron, Transformers and GoBots, which you might relate to more. Remember how cool those people were in their day? As in not at all...quite the opposite. Well their generation is filled with other similar memes, equally as repetitive/niche/lame, as it should be. It's mostly Mattherson/Emerald VS, so it's kind of expected of them. Let them chant their thing while they lose base after base.

54

All the jumping around reminds me when I ventured into QIII Arena. I watched, died, left and never returned.

Older gamers may not be the future of gaming but they are absolutely integral to the backbone (you guys have more disposable income). Don't let anyone tell you guys otherwise.