Video Game Videos Are Reality TV For Gamers
Video Game Videos are often unprofessional short segments of either a PC gamers or Console gamers experiences. Usually the videos will have heavy metal, rap, or some random song to accompany the action as the player often PWNS! or dominates his/her opponents. This is mostly seen in games of PvP (Player versus Player) as people showcase their talents to the masses on the big screen. So what makes watching someone else play Halo, World of Warcraft, or the countless other video games out there fun and addicting? The same reason people watch Flava Flav, I Love New York, Rock of Love, A shot at love with Telia Tequila, Real World, etc,; the realism. These videos are raw, mostly uncensored, limited editing, and something we all can relate to as people and as fellow video game players. We might not know what it feels like to get seven head shots in a row and teabag everyone, but we can understand how awesome it must be in the moment.
Segments such as the popular King of Kong movie on G4TV showed the true rivalry of Billy Mitchell and Steve Wiebe as they faced off trying to best one each others score in the classic arcade game Donkey Kong. Other videos such as the Leeroy Jenkins! video depicted a character by the name of Leeroy Jenkins shouting his name before training his entire raid group in World of Warcraft. Many people that play mmo, mmorpg games can relate to someone messing up a raid or can empathize with the situation which turned the video into an iconic instant classic. Even situations over VOIP hosting such as Ventrilo or Teamspeak have turned the most ridiculous arguments into YouTube celebrity. Usually these headset to headset conversations include as many racial slurs, hate speech, and pornography to make even the most hardened criminal take notice. Video games bring out the worst and best of people; it makes for great TV! The competitive juices start flowing along with all the built-up frustration which makes for amazingly painful audio/video. A great example is the video Onyxia Wipe where the raid leader is being recorded over Ventrilo without his knowledge. A guild mate ends up getting into the whelps and all hell breaks loose; the infamous cry of THAT’S MINUS 50 DKP has brought many people to tears laughing while understanding just how sick of a moment it truly was. Situations of massive online games makes the situation even more critical as real life players associate deeply with their virtual characters and instances of sheer joy and utter disaster are a thin line away. It’s walking the proverbial virtual thin rope with thousand of other participants and viewers.
The glory. Nothing says I’m important like beating someone in a video game. People may try to reference the cliche phrase of “It’s just a game” but in reality the consequences hold more weight than the participants are willing to admit. Grown men and women don’t scream frantically over a well cooked turkey dinner, or parallel parking, but our animal urges are exposed at their core during virtual combat. Shooting someone in a video game makes you better than the other person, even if you sweep dirt for a living and the other person is a high paid lawyer. The game puts you both on equal footing and unleashes competition that rivals any big time “real” sport out there. The great thing is video games don’t leave you physically harmed like real life sports but still invoke all the male posturing, empty threats, swearing, and racial slurs we have all experienced over our headsets whether on a Console or PC. The narcissist in us all wants to be better at something than the next guy. When you capture that moment on video it immortalizes your superiority in a very real, raw, and growing media. Amateur game videos have been around since the birth of Pong, with a huge explosion in PC related video game movies thanks to programs such as Fraps and other screen recording technologies that allow you to play PC games with little to no effect on performance. As it becomes easier to record actions on your TV for console play, the barrier to self produce your own game videos will become null and void. Just as everyone know has a web cam to voice their mind, everyone that plays video games will be uploading their virtual battles, meltdowns, and feats of epic proportion, or just some random bum playing Tetris.