Grandad - Halo was for noobs.

When I was a young lad in the 1980s, being a gamer meant predominately one thing - isolation. Countless hours on my own staring at a screen exploring dungeons in Ultima or traversing a galaxy-on-a-tape in Elite.

And I loved every minute of it! Problem is that this solo aura of gaming fostered a reputation of gamers as nerds. The labels of 'weird' and 'suspicious' were not far behind. Tags that still hang around today, as evident in media scare reports about gamers fostering all sorts of anti-social behaviors.

That said, today's gamer is a lot less likely to be considered a nerd. Thing have changed considerably. Gaming is more often than not a social event played over any amount of numerous gaming networks. Consoles have become a near ubiquitous home entertainment device, sitting comfortably in the center of the living room. And everybody seems to be playing various casual puzzler games on mobile devices. And I for one salute South Korea for recognising the 'mad skillz' of Starcraft players, elevating elite players to national celebrities. Football needs a rest...seriously.



Still video gaming, even with its financial juggernaut status does not have the mainstream acceptance of movies and TV. Accusing fingers still point at games, murmuring the words "corrupter of children" , "dangerous", "waste of time" etc. And every time a serial killer pops up, a hint at a behavioral link between his games collection is not too far off. Whilst ignoring his collection of TV crime forensic shows DVD's lurking in his basement. Cultural bias is a pick and choose game.

Why is this so? It could be a generational thing. My Generation X still labels game players as "nerds". They play games, but feel guilty about it. The current young generation have grown up with Sony's Playstation brand marketing games as cool. For them, gaming is a past-time on equal status with any other leisure activity.

And of course, Gaming is paying its dues as a new technology. Radio, TV and even print have all suffered the glare of suspicion when first introduced. TV would kill movies, VCR's would kill movies. Cinema would stop people going to the theater, Ok maybe that one has a point.

So a new generation of media operators, and gaming losing the 'new' label means a cultural green light? Probably not. The biggest problem gaming has, is also its greatest advantage. Technological advancements. Graphics and the way we interact with our games is advancing at a hyper-pace. Its no great jump to think we'll be at photo-realism in graphics within 10 years. We're already getting 'sorta' close with titles like Crysis. And then there are input technologies such as the Wii, Ps3's 'magic wand' and the 360's Natal.

Put all of those together and soon enough we'll be able to explore and interact with any photo-realistic environment we wish to, complete with incredible levels of immerson. Will gamers of today, those raised in the confines of hand controllers and stylized graphics, be suspicious when their kids are playing Call of Duty 25 aka the 'virtual reality' edition? I would put money on it.

Sheez even me Mr geeky Dad will reel in horror when my grand-kids jack into the Matrix...for..like...real :)