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Fatherhood and Videogames
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.. Or, "Reflections While Playing Fallout Over
the Holidays" ...
Having been (like many of my generation) something
of a slacker in my youth, I became a father rather
later in life than is customary. I view this as
taking a responsible approach to irresponsibility.
Given that for much of my early adulthood I could
barely support myself, it was probably just as
well I avoided the added burden of having to also
support someone else. That my precarious state of
financial affairs was due as much to choice as to
circumstance was, well, purely circumstantial.
Despite having avoided fatherhood for so long, I
nevertheless managed to develop some expectations
about what it would entail. Some of these proved
correct - sleep deprivation, loss of freedom, and
added stress, for example - and some very much did
not. One of those assumptions was that I would
have a receptive audience with whom to share the
cultural treasures of my youth. Substitute
"receptive" with "highly selective" and you'd have
a far more accurate assessment.
Winnie the Pooh? Archaic nonsense for babies.
Peanuts comics? Waste of time. Old Bugs Bunny
cartoons? OK, I guess, if Johhny Test wasn't on
Teletoon right then. All those great old
Christmas TV specials? Jim Carrey was a better
Grinch, and Rudolph ain't even on the radar. Star
Trek? Unsuitable for anyone except boring old
people, and who is that ridiculous looking space
elf? (not sure I ever got over that one). Star
Wars was probably the only piece of my cultural
luggage that he wanted on his voyage.
Fair enough, and I really ought to have expected
it. After all, how many times had my own father
tried and failed to interest me in Beau Geste? One
of the sacred duties of childhood is establishing
an identity for yourself distinct from that of
your parents. This is often said to happen in the
teenage years, but in my experience it starts to
happen a lot sooner. And in this my son was
remarkably successful.
What I could not have foreseen was how much it
would work the other way, which is to say the
extent to which I became a receptive audience for
my son's cultural touchstones. Although my son
has long put such things behind him, I can to this
day recite the lyrics to the theme song from
Spliced, and describe the life cycle of the
Bionicles. To take a couple of examples.
Probably his greatest cultural gift to me were the
videogames. Apart from a brief but intense
engagement with Myst and Riven in the 1990s, I'd
never done any gaming at all, and I'm quite
certain that had I not become a father I never
would have. But my son was drawn to videogames at
an early age, and spent many happy hours gaming
away on age-appropriate fare like Mario, Sonic,
Lego and when he got a bit older, Minecraft, which
was the hot new thing back then. Which meant, as
an engaged Dad, I spent a lot of time with them
too.
Some of those Minecraft modpacks were nuts. But it
wasn't until he'd progressed to Portal that I
really sat up and took notice. Games that were at
once ingenious, retro-futuristic, and hilarious? I
was hooked, and once I'd played through those I
needed more. Well Dad, you liked Portal? Here's a
game called The Stanley Parable you might enjoy.
Done with that? Well I know you think you don't
like first person shooters, but I think you might
like Bioshock. Or maybe an RPG, like Mass Effect?
.. and so it went. Sometimes I'd go my own way,
like the time I played Far: Lone Sails, following
which my advisor recommended I check out the OG of
such games, LIMBO. I liked them both.
And now I'm onto the very first Fallout game, that
my son thoughtfully gave to me for Christmas,
which will no doubt take me twice as long to
complete as it took him, as I fumble my way
through Shady Sands, Vault 15 and so on. To tell
the truth I find Fallout somewhat less engaging
than many of the other games I've played, but
still interesting as an historical artifact of an
earlier era of gaming. Nevertheless, I should be
proud - clearly, my son feels I'm ready for the
Classics now. He's taught me well.
