What do you have games to thank for?

Hey there!

I work with swedish national radio and this Thursday I'm co-hosting a show where we will be talking about games. To be specific the subject is "What in your life do you have games to thank for?", and I thought I would ask the most game loving community I know! There has to be some really great stories about games bringing people together and mending lifes problems, right?

I know I've got a lot to be thankful to games for. For instance, to me, video games became a soft comfort and a bridge between me and my parents when I was younger and they were going through there separation. It may sound silly, but somehow video games were where me and my mother could find comfort in just hanging out and talking. And with my dad, it became the thing that he wanted to learn more about to connect with me. So yeah, I've got a lot to be thankful to games for.

But what about you? I would love to hear your stories!

When I was a kid, watching my dad play Metal Gear Solid after work everyday until he beat it is one of the only fond memories I have of him but it's a really great one. It has a lot to do with why it's my favourite game series of all time.

@pompouspizza: It's nice that you at least have a fond memory of him that's still strong, even though it's one of few!

can't think of a story but i have this:

i started playing games right around the time i started to learn english when i was kid. and after a while english became "intuitive" for me. i did not study for tests but still managed to get a high score (8.8 though, not 9.0).

@hkabaran: It was the exact same way for me! I think I've got games to thank for never having to study for an English test :)

It's not much of a story, but just about the only time my older sister and I got along when we were growing up was when we were playing games together. Especially Toejam & Earl. I honestly have little to no other fond memories of spending time with her.

On a practical level, video games have taught me to take a long term view of my finances. I think the same urge to save all my potions/doodads for the final boss in games has pushed me to make budgeting and saving money a priority. Seeing my bank account numbers go up each month sets off the same pleasure centers in my brain as leveling up.

Games really help me relax and forget about the problems of the day

Playing the Civilization series as a child gave me a real love of ancient wonders. As an adult it has inspired me to do a lot of travelling and see them in real life. Angkor Wat and the pyramids of Giza are my two favourites!

Helping me get through the quieter and more trying times in my life. Also the boring ones.

Mainly as shit to do when I'm bored, and for also making me too broke to buy weed.

Having an N64 with 4 controllers made me popular in my halls at uni. So particular thanks to Nintendo and Rare for that

Met my best friend in college when he was talking about Duck Hunt with his girlfriend. Once I learned that, yes, it's okay to be geeky in front of normal-ass people, I opened up a lot.

Without logic puzzle games, games with logic puzzles in them, and especially that PS1 version of the GameShark that let you search for your own cheat codes, I probably wouldn't have gone into my line of work. From a young age I was an avid problem solver and I have video games to thank for it.

I can definitely "thank" Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate for helping tank my grades last year.

In all seriousness, I think I can probably thank games for being the impetus behind becoming a better writer. I don't think I'd be as good at writing important papers if not for the blogs I wrote over the years about games.

Saving my life. No shit, really.

Back when I was a kid, I used to obsessively play this Paperboy arcade machine that was at the local Dairy Queen. It was the kind that had actual bike handles for a controller. Anyway, one of the stages of the game had these cars that would suddenly back out of their driveway, so you had to swing off the curb to avoid a crash.

So I'm like, maybe 7 or 8 and my family is taking a ride around the local lake. It had a bike path, but there were also private homes that abutted the lake park, so the path was interrupted by driveways. We're biking along with me a little in front of my parents when this car (a black Lincoln Continental, which is basically exactly the kind of car in the game), comes from behind these bushes as he pulls out of his driveway. Right in front of me. Now, non-video game me would have just plowed into him and gotten run over, but thankfully my Paperboy instincts kicked in and I hopped the curb into the street behind the rear bumper and then hopped right back onto the path on the other side.

It was just sort of automatic and I didn't think anything of it, but my parents were of course mortified. Seeing as how the driver was about 90 years old, they couldn't yell at him too much for backing out of his driveway like a madman without looking. So in the best parenting tradition, I got it taken out on me.

Games (adventure ones especially) definitely helped me learn english way better than school did. Obviously the latter did as well, but all those lessons were pretty much a breeze by the time they became a thing for me in school.

After my accident video games helped tremendously. Final Fantasy XIV gave me some social activity in a game I could play from bed with a controller, and during my rehab games helped a whole lot with mitigating nerve damage and keeping my hands flexible.

My family and I were refugees for 2.5 years. When we lived in a UN-administered zone, our parents got my sister and I a Sega Megadrive (II MODEL), and a bootleg set of games that included many Nintendo classics.

Those games really helped me to escape and have something to look forward to during those hard times. It's why I still love video games, even if now I don't have much time to play them.

I attribute learning how to type to playing WoW (starting in like 3rd grade, a decade ago, which was probably too early). Starting in elementary school I tested out of every typing class/test I had because I had a lot of practice typing as my brother and I were in a guild. I was probably too young to be playing but I have no regrets!

Video games help me cope with depression. While it's not as bad now thanks to medication and life style changes there's still moments where my mind wanders into a dark place and being able to just sit down and play something on my PC or 3DS until the wave passes is a godsend for me.