This is a bit more of a personal post than most, but I
wanted everyone to know.
Last night, for the first time in a long time, I cried. Not
a lot mind you just most eyes and several tears that I wiped away from my
check. It was the strangest sensation but I was crying but I was in no possible
way sad. Happy tears do happen that I know. I also know how exceedingly rare
they can be. So last night by the light of monitor glowing in the dark I cried.
Earlier that evening I found myself strangely enough with
nothing to do on the internet. It happens occasionally. I keep a folder in my
bookmarks reserved for possible colleges that I either want to go to or that I
should look further into. The mouse wandered its way other to the folder
without much of my knowledge. Suddenly I found myself staring at the Princeton Review’s
list of the top ten best schools for Game Design in the country. The schools
and their placements had changed since the last time I checked. Yet, there was
a distinct familiarity between myself and the schools listed. Most I have not
yet done research on, but as I looked the more I felt like I belonged.
Without letting my cynical side show through and invade this
post, most Game Design schools are the same. They offer slightly different specializations
and differing levels of prestige (and debt) with their degrees. The core of
what it takes to learn to make videogames never changes though. Every school
boasts that they offer a program that will allow you to show your creativity, build
worlds and make an impact.
It is a lot of marketing.
It is also a lot of truth.
Videogames offer the newest experiences that humanity has.
Be your classification a game, an experience or an interactive story,
videogames are the cutting edge of how we as people interact with art. Games build
worlds full of rich history and lore, universes just brimming with life. The
end limit is only that of our imagination. For every player who lets themselves
be taken to every designer who poured in a late night so that their ideas could
be realized, videogames are their way of life. The genesis of creativity never
dies within the human mind. The tools that express ourselves are ever changing
and now the closest we have ever come to letting others live our ideas with us
is with videogames.
The best damn way that I can think of to share ideas and to
tell stories is through a videogame format. No other medium allows for such
interconnectivity to the material. The player is an integral part of the experience.
It is as much about what the player brings to the table as what the game
offers. I have been saddened by games. They have made me angry. In some of my
darkest moments they have helped me back up into the light. Videogames are
hope.
This world is really a mean place. There is no more
adventure, nothing left to be discovered. Eventually the childlike wonder of it
all fades way too. Videogames offer more than that. Imagination is set free and
the mind regains its sense of wonder. There is still adventure; there are still
things to discover. New worlds full of life are right there. They are waiting
of us and so we go out and seize them.
The human condition is more than just what we do with our
time here. More than sleeping and eating and going through the motions of life.
It is about believing. About ideas and stories and the infinite possibilities. I know that I am starting to repeat myself and
I wish I truly knew a better way to say this. Videogames matter to me. They are
the dreams that I can one day make my own.
And that is why I have a folder full of colleges with Game
Design majors. I want to make videogames. I want to share my ideas with the
world. I want to dream. I want to climb from the highest mountain top and scream
that this is what I believe. And there are a million reasons I started this
blog, but when it comes down to it I started this blog because videogames
matter to me.
By the light of my monitor and through the watery film of my
tears I looked at the Game Design schools. A sense of belonging began to swell
inside me. A sense of place and of purpose. The final culmination of an idea
that had been building for years. When it finally burst forth into the forefront
of my mind, I cried. Tears of joy. Videogames are what I want to do with the
rest of my life. They are my goal, my aspiration and my dream. My life will be
dedicated to videogames. My life will be dedicated to imagination, to stories,
to ideas and most importantly to hope.
Thank you for reading this. I just wanted to share.
“Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is
limited. Imagination encircles the world.” –Albert Einstein
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