Gaming Nitty Gritty in Asia
In the United States, most of the gamers tend to play by themselves (or with a couple of their friends), most often in their rooms or the family’s game room, not unless they are attending a convention of some sort. In the West, most serious gamers do not play with people they do not know, because quite frankly, it is weird to just start playing with someone whose name you are not even sure of.
But in Asia, it is a whole different story.
Most Asians cannot afford expensive gaming consoles such as Microsoft’s XBOX 360 (which ranges from $250 upwards) and Sony’s (somewhat declining in popularity) Playstation (prices around $400 hundred plus dollars). It is quite well known that Asia has a great number of third world countries in it (but let’s not get into the politics of things). However, it is not known to most people outside Asia that the young populace of this huge continent is addicted to gaming, both males AND females.
But unlike the slightly (if you would consider $200 more) expensive gaming of Westerners, the Asians have developed cheaper yet somewhat more obsessive ways of gaming. Statistics say that in every class (be it just high school or college), at least one student drops out of school because of their strong obsession to online and network games. It used to be shocking to hear a young boy (and even sometimes a girl) steal money from his parents by telling them that he needs to buy this and that for a school event or a special project, only for the poor parent to find out later that their child was only spending both his or her time and money on playing games outside their home.
Wii, Xbox and Playstation are of course popular in Asian countries as well (hello, Japan anyone?). But in countries such as The Philippines and Korea, people rather play with (you guessed it right) strangers, in (usually dingy) computer shops or internet cafes rather than in the comfortable (?) confinement of their homes.
Some are asking, “What the heck are computer shops?” as an image of a store full of second hand computers up for sale enters their head. Computer shops are small establishments that cater mostly to the gamers that want to play
network games with their buddies or even sometimes with complete strangers, as when it comes to DOTA, no one would let another group claim that they’re the best. Its very common for a group to cajole another group to fight them for a few rounds.
As mentioned earlier, these places can be dingy, and people who play in these establishments can easily elbow one another as the computer units are just placed next to each other. If you’re lucky a small separator would be placed for some sort of convenience, which of course fails if you happen to be claustrophobic. The chairs (usually slightly broken monoblocks) would always annoy you one way or another, with all the noise of it scraping the floors when someone stands up. If you are one of those unlucky folks, it might even hit your foot, so prepare for that too.
Internet cafes (Defined by Wikipedia as: An internet café or cybercafé is a place where one can use a computer with Internet access, most for a fee, usually per hour or minute; sometimes one can have unmetered access with a pass for a day or month, etc. It may serve as a regular café as well, with food and drinks being served) maybe somewhat popular in America and Europe but since most people there can afford buying their own computer units, people usually use computers that are up for rent only when they are travelling. The notion of playing in a small, very much confined (and sometimes even smelly) place is almost (if not already considered as) ridiculous. Although the more comfortable and furnished internet cafes are still present in Asian countries, the fact remains that seeing uniformed high school students playing LAN games in such establishments are not really considered normal.
Aside from the fear of being considered as a wimp when you play in a fluffed up internet shop is present, the biggest factor is that the normal daily allowance of these students is Php50 (or $1.50). When one would rent in an internet café, he or she should be prepared to shell out around Php45, whereas they would only have to pay computer shops Php20 per hour, and this rate is probably the highest reasonable price a computer shop can charge, that is, unless they are committing business suicide.
But one thing is for sure, from the comfortable environment of the internet café to the extremely popular computer shops, Asians, no matter how different their cultures are from Westerners, are not at all in shortage when it comes to gaming addiction.
No matter how small and cramped (and most probably hot and smelly) these computer shops are, as long as the prices are dirt cheap and you can bring snacks near the computers, every kind of student will flock there (of course, a slightly more powerful air conditioning unit is a major bonus). There are extreme cases (aside from the kids stealing from their parents and students dropping out) that instead of enrolling for a new semester in the campus, students who got influenced pretty badly would even move away from home in the pretense of enrolling in a school. These mislead youngsters would leave their parents behind in their farms and would go to the city, only to ask money from their old folks to sustain their gaming addiction.
Of course, these are extreme cases, but the alarming rate of 1 extreme gaming addict out of 40 students is something no sane person would laugh about. Most often than not, these people end up being computer shop keepers, not that there’s anything wrong with an honest (but exteremly low paying) job like that, but becoming a Civil Engineer would have been much better, don’t you think?
