THIS GAMING LIFE: TRAVELS IN THREE CITIES, AN OVERVIEW (book review)

It is a Friday morning and I have just finished Jim Rossignol’s “This Gaming Life: Travels in Three Cities”. I was inspired by the book mainly because it showed me that computer gaming is not just a pastime for killing time, but it is also a social and intellectual pursuit that attracts many people from around the world.

We always say that we shouldn’t spend too much time playing games because they are addictive and that they cause health, social, and emotional problems. However, in my own personal experience, gaming is a form of socialization; just like hanging out in a bar or at the cinema, games offer a place to make friends, have fun, and mold one’s world all at the same time. This is precisely the reason why I was really amazed by Rossignol’s book: It showed that games aren’t a bane to society, but rather another field of art where people get to express themselves and probably change their lives for the better.

In this piece, I would like to write about three things: First, I would like to talk about the author’s life as it is stated in the book. Second, I would like to touch upon the contents of the book itself. Finally, I would like to give my thoughts and my verdict on the book itself.

Throughout the book, the author himself tells his own life story in very clear terms. He was a journalist who wrote for a renowned financial magazine in the UK…until his bosses decided to give him the boot. He did not say exactly why he was kicked out, but in the months leading to the lay-off, he was increasingly involved in the creation and management of a semi-professional gaming team of a game called Quake. After his job was taken away from him, he fully immersed himself into his “second job” and did a lot of things in order for his team to thrive.

He was lucky that his friends at the time recommended him to take a job with what will become “Rock, Paper, Shotgun”, which is one of the most recognizable online gaming magazines today in the world. At first, he wasn’t accepted into the job; however, when one day, the company asked him to write an article “that would help the magazine’s readers play better”, he inquired whether they could help him avoid “wondering at the classified ads” and “the dreadful trip to London”. To his surprise, the company answered “yes”, and to this very day, he is working as a writer and editor at “Rock, Paper, Shotgun”.

This is the life of the author thus far, as it is narrated in the book. Now, I’d like to go to the three main themes that are presented in the book, namely “London”, “Seoul”, and “Reykjavik”. As I have explained above, he lives in the UK, and he spent a good part of his life in London. In this chapter, he mostly tells about his Quake experience, and how it took him out of a “very boring life”; he also tells the valuable insights that he have attained over the years as a manager of a semi-professional gaming team. He also openly says that “video games have changed my life”, and that “thanks to gaming, I have met a lot of different people”. There is a certain important point that he mentions in this chapter: He says that “Gaming seems to be neither wholly positive nor wholly negative: it’s value (or lack thereof) is indistinct and undefined.”

Then, he visits Seoul to see the gaming scene there, and he notices that South Korea is light-years ahead in embracing the so-called “gaming culture”: There are tournaments where one can potentially earn hundreds of thousands of dollars; there are gaming channels that operate 24/7, and most of all, the gamers themselves are treated as if they are superstars! He also sees the cutting-edge, competitive nature of gaming in Korea, and proceeds on to say that it may not be the future of gaming. As it stands, he has been proven every bit wrong, as computer games slowly start to take the place of sports: Take for instance the Intel Extreme Masters which was held in Katowice, Poland; a stadium has been filled to the brim with people!

Then in the last chapter, he talks mostly about Reykjavik and EVE Online, which is a massively multiplayer-oriented role-playing game (MMORPG) that is notoriously famous all over the world. He talks about how certain players have changed the face of the game, and how the players themselves have forced developers to make the game in the image that they want; he also discusses how flexible its developers were, and how certain people who seem to be ordinary in the real world can hold powers akin to that of a leader of a superpower inside the game.

At the end of the book, he gives a list of several games, along with short descriptions for some of them, and he advised everyone who is interested in gaming to “read a lot” and to experience the games for themselves.

Finally, I would like to say my verdict on the book: Even though it was written back in 2010, the concepts and the facts that are stated in the book are still valid even today. I do not agree exactly with his notion that gaming will be as a social phenomenon; however, we can clearly see the truth of this notion in many of the Facebook games that we play, where we need our “friends” if we want to advance through the game. I am of the notion that one day, games will be recognized by the general society and will not be seen as the “Other” that endangers their way of living.

As I’ve mentioned at the beginning of this text, I am really amazed by this book, and I would strongly recommend everyone to read this book, whether one is a gamer or not. Believe me, people will understand more about the seemingly enigmatic world of gaming once they have read this book!

I hope that you’ll enjoy reading this one!

…

PS: Looking back, I think that Jim will be happy to see his dream come true

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