Generation X, How it Feels, and Gaming

My mind started wandering about my generation after watching an interesting interview with the author Jeff Gordinier, who I’ve never heard of (hat tip to LifeCourse). Since I like to wonder about generational differences, it fascinated me.  Give it a watch, it’s just under ten minutes.

While I don’t agree with all his observations, there are some points that resonate with me. I have to confess that I have the same feelings about the Beatles that he does.

As sheltered and Christian an upbringing as I had, even I grew up hearing endless tirades from Beatles-worshippers about how incredible they were. Take it from me: When you didn’t live through it, it gets old. While I’m pretty ambivalent about them, I certainly recognize their genius. It’s not about that.

It’s about the mythos, about how they’re Great Men and not just talented musicians. But that outlook is a property of the boomer generation. It was focused on the inner world after the sheen from the antiseptic world created by returning WWII heroes. It makes sense that they had heroes of a different sort than their elders.

My generation didn’t have the heroes and we sure didn’t have the enlightenment or the free love. Lonely, geeky gen-X’ers like myself grew up hearing about that last bit and wondering where we could get some of our own. But it was not to happen; it was a blip of change in a generation that would itself change even more.

“How it feels right now” is part of life that continues to interest me. Getting at how things felt then is what steers me toward historical readings. When you think about how it feels and then tie to a time period, things the subjects get more interesting. To put a finer point on it: Have you ever wondered what it was like when Teddy Roosevelt was a child.

In the 60′s, baby boomers innovated a lot of spiritual and social revolutions. Let’s not be biased toward the hippies though, there was plenty of revivalism going on in Christianity – the flipside of the coin. It seems that my generation has a more pragmatic edge as a result. You got some grandiose capitalism? Socialism? Some other isms? Seen it. Most of those things resulted in stacking bodies like cordwood so I’m going to pass.

So we have Jeff’s Google example as our standard. It seems to make enough sense. But thinking about that got my brain moving toward another innovation that I often forget about – video games. While members of the boomer generation innovated the personal computer, my generation made games on the things.

It’s funny to think that I’ll tell stories about how, in m youth, you were mildly ostracized if you loved video games. It meant you were a geek, a nerd. Console gaming changed that eventually, but the only thing that could really change it was time.

I’m excited to see how our culture will regard gaming when Gen-X’ers retire. I can’t wait to play Team Fortress 5 with my other geriatric gaming buddies, between bowel movements. When none of us have a job anymore, we’ll lead that raid. We’ll be the first generation to know what it’s like for the innovation to be completely mainstream. When everyone alive has grown up with them, what will that feel like?

Some actual research into the basis for this perception would be awesome, but this post is something new. It’s a mostly misshapen set of observations is what I’m calling a Quick Thought. The idea is to get more content out there. It may lack the polish of my usual essays, but it’s a “get this idea down now” approach. I hope it fills the gaps suitably.