I’m fully aware that most of the world views the time gamers are drawn into a game as wasted time, like time spent by an opium addict semi-passed out on a cot in an opium den. People, in embarrassment, hide the fact that their family members are taken by this gaming addiction, knowing that these family members contribute nothing to society, make little to no money, and only spending time eating chips and losing social skills. Most gamers I’ve met online never admit to their colleagues that they game in this way (Candy Crush is acceptable, but playing an online game like World of Warcraft or League of Legends is ever so slightly shameful).

This conception has gradually been shifting though. Enough so that I can pull off telling all and sundry that I game with little to no shame, even with a bit of pride. I’m still not the norm in this situation, but hopefully in writing this blog, people outside of the gaming community can see another side of this world that they couldn’t see before. To know that someone who does yoga and has a Sex and the City lifestyle can also be an intense gamer, that these elements are not incompatible, nor even strange to find all in one person.

First of all, though, a disclaimer. I have an in depth understanding of the online gaming world in WoW, but I have barely touched other games. As such, I cannot speak for how other online gamers live. Overall though, my understanding is that it is not so different: people form groups and play matches either with each other, or with elements in the game. Since it’s a team sport, I find it hard to imagine that there is any game where forming a steady team is not the pinnacle of satisfying gaming, even though I’m sure most games have the ability to form random teams that change each time you enter a match. As it is a team sport, what is often unrecognized is that social skills and management skills are a large part of what creates success. Building a team in a game that is competitive is, in this way, no different from building a sports team in the world that is competitive.

But back to why a person like me, who appears to most to be outgoing, popular, intelligent, successful, would find pride in being a WoW gamer. I say ‘appears to most’ not because deep down I have a dark side that I know is nothing like that… but because I’m loathe to make subjective assessments of myself, and anyway the point at hand has to do with others’ understanding of proud gamers who are not stereotypical. And this goes far beyond being proud because I’m a ‘gamer girl’, and that has a certain cachet nowadays. The points I’m proud of in my gaming lifestyle have to do with how this game requires intelligence to perform well at. It requires dedication and hard work. It requires the aforementioned social and management skills. In fact, to do well at an online game like WoW, you do need to be a rather well-rounded individual (besides physically, you actually can just eat chips all day and still be a great gamer, though a shorter lifespan means a shorter gaming lifespan as well). I have managed my time in game like a challenging career: I study and research game mechanics like an academic, practice getting good performance like a sports player, work with others and distribute duties like a product manager, and manage people and deal with their problems like a speaker in congress.

Through my experiences here, I have gained a lot of respect for the difficulties of the jobs of the academic, the sports player, the product manager, the speaker in congress, and more. I also have a lot of respect for any gamer who has played at or above the level I have played at. There are of course some gamers, who play at a high level, who excel only at one of the areas I’ve mentioned. But many who are leaders of their teams, like I was, need all of those abilities. The challenges we face in game seem to me to be no less than the challenges an entrepreneur faces in life, with the main advantage being that there is no financial pressure, but the main disadvantage being that we need to sustain things with no financial incentive to offer.

I hope that in writing this blog, anyone who doesn’t get the gaming world can have a new glimmer of understanding. Anyone who struggles with a family member lost in a game can perhaps enter their world a bit, and see that there are both benefits and costs, that this world is much more complex and interesting than the den of an drugged-out opium user. Maybe some people can more fully understand the benefits of the game, and can make more informed decisions about if they want to experience this world themselves, or whether they will allow their friends and family to be part of it.