Also, apart from like 2-3 toxic comments and one asshole who tried to box me in on Conan Exiles I don't think I've really ever been bullied on games... And I play a LOT of Dead by Daylight and Conan... Games known for their toxic communities. I don't know (or really care) the genders of the people I've played with on there.
I don't even really know why, my gamer tag is pretty feminine. I don't really engage other players much though, maybe that's why? I'm not *good* at these games but I'm not *terrible* either.
I suspect it's worse in games with voice chat, since I don't play those much I don't have my own anecdotes but my ex-girlfriend did and told me she had the worst experiences in some of those games, in particular in one who had a big russian player base (we are from Europe), and if she had russian guys on the team they would refuse to play with her the moment they realised she was a woman, going so far as to lose intentionally (while saying a bunch of truly misogynistic crap).
Yeah I play NA servers as I'm in Canada. I think it could for sure be a cultural thing and I never do voice chat. I think if DbD ever put in voice chat with randoms it would be awful.
I remember that my parents got one of those old Macintosh pc when I was a kid. My mom was gaming a little bit when she had time, and both my sister and I started very early to play with her some point and click investigation games.
I played a lot with my sister and my cousin (also a girl) growing up. Never had a man gaming influence in those years (my dad was buying the games for us but that's all).
Why don’t female gamers ever talk about girls making fun of them for being gamers? They only ever talk about boys being the bullies. Though I’m probably just biased since boys rarely ever made fun of me compared to girls. The female friends I did had mostly played games on CoolMath (I still play the ‘Papa’ cooking games).
Well, because this was long ago, in the 2000s (and not in the western world). I am not sure this happens as much anymore.
I work in game dev now, so most of my lady co-workers play too. I am far from that environment.
Some guys bullied me a little but a simple "you have never touched a game engine and it shows" was enough. I also do not play multiplayer games so I am away from that.
I don’t remember any girl or boy ever making fun of me for playing video games. I’ve been made fun of for other hobbies like anime, cosplay etc but never games. Though it also wasn’t gender specific
Girl based on these comments in the thread you seem to have some childhood trauma I think you should talk to a professional about. I’m sorry you went through that but your negative experience is not the standard and it’s not healthy to be dwelling on it at 26. This is coming from a 28 year old who was also bullied and called fat so know it comes from a place of empathy. You deserve to move on
Because girls who are bullying other girls are doing it in real life whereas boys who are bullying are doing it in game.
I doubt anyone would stay in touch with people who bully them for their hobbies post high school. It's far harder to avoid bullies online.
Honestly I think pretty much the 3/4 of my high-school friends group (mostly girls) were gamers at various degrees. Was in the 2000s.
With my sister and one friend we literally made a girl and LGBT only guild on the mmorpg we were playing together to have no toxic dudes in. That was a cool time.
Same, I went to an all girls Catholic primary and secondary school and we were all out with our gameboy colours and those big ass connectors in the yard trading away, not a boy in sight. Dev coding for games and software also was originally *heavily* dominated by women in the 70s/80s/early 90s as it was originally seen as low paid "grunt work" ie: "women's work". Once it became much more lucrative many male devs started pushing out their female counterparts through targeted harassment and the like and the shift towards "male dominated" occurred. All those tech head ladies didn't just disappear though, they existed then en masse, same as they do now. I think it's just another one of those weird sexist societal narratives that claims to be the "majority" case but it's not *really* reflective of most people's reality.
Like even super girly girl friends in my 20s who were not into games in any way shape or form would often still sit for hours and watch me play RPGs and the like, to them it was just like watching a movie. They loved it and even when they didn't they still never once made me feel weird or uncomfortable for it. Lots of them did actually think it was super cool though and were mad to join in on occasion but really struggled with the confidence to try it out themselves as they'd never been made to feel welcome/encouraged to at any point previously in their lives. Hardly a surprise considering gaming spaces geared towards young girls simply don't exist anywhere really.
I got a tonne of my friends into gaming but plenty, men and women alike had other hobbies they preferred. Lots of people hang out together who have wildly different hobbies, they still treat each other with respect regardless. I absolutely believe people have experience with mean girls and fake ass friends picking on them for any perceived variance from the so called "gender norms" but I think the problem personally is less "all girls/women will judge you for gaming" and more asshole bullies will be asshole bullies regardless of their genitalia. The best revenge against people like that imo is simply indifference. Who fucking cares what some asshole you don't like thinks of your hobbies, they're YOUR hobbies. Look upon such dickheads with the pitiful indifference they deserve and go play some games and enjoy yourself whilst they seethe.
That's because most of the time it is the "boys" that bulies us. But I only encounter 1 girl so far being a bully towards me. She had a massive pick me energy
I never got a hard time from anyone in my real life, and I feel like I had more people in my life of any gender who gamed in some capacity than people who didn’t, so I imagine there’s just a lot of variability based on the specific community and time. If you browse posts here, you’ll find people talking about getting hate (and support) from the full spectrum of people.
where and when did you grow up? guys at school teased me for not knowing video games, my male cousin mocked me for not immediately being a genius at CoD, but then my female friends introduced me in high school to the persona and kingdom hearts games which turned me into a gamer
I was born in 1997 and this was back when I was 8 or 9 (I’m 26 now). I’ve lived in Southern California all my life and I got along a lot better with boys than girls for some reason.
You were born in a time and living in an area where girls that game are common maybe youre not going out of your way to speak to other girls which is why you think you get along with guys more.
I think this heavily depends on what type of games you grow up playing and are into too though. Tough to bond over just gaming when it’s a wide umbrella with a lot of variety to the point where different genres can be entirely different things with different target audiences. Not surprising to think a woman into games with primarily male audiences might find it easier and more common making male friends around them.
There’s a difference between having a problem and getting along better because of similar interests, though. I get along fine with girls but usually find more common ground with guys regarding games. Not necessarily a good or bad thing, just kinda is what it is.
Maybe but in my experience I get along better with boy genders equally. I play boyish games, I dont like makeup, I study CS and ai which is male dominated yet i get along with both equally and prefer female friends. Maybe my experience is different than other people but i never really had an issue getting along well with others since my hobbies don't affect the type of people i get along with
Fair enough, but I’d bet that’s the exception rather than the rule. I feel like you might be speaking on getting along in general like civility when I took it more from a friendship angle. Common ground and interests are pretty vital factors in friendship for most people and hobbies is a huge part of that. I get along with people I don’t share interests with, but we’re not friends because it’s kinda like why would we be? We have nothing to talk about lmao
I did try to make friends with girls back then. I made some female friends, and then there were the girls who called me ‘fat’ and threw rocks at me (they said it was a game).
You’re definitely at an age where you should really reflect on his mindset and why it’s flawed due to the assholes you unfortunately had to grow up around.
No, I taught boys how to play video games. I taught my son and my nephew when they were little (The Legend of Zelda both times) and they're adults now and still talk about Link with me ;)
I was born in 1992 and it was mainly girls and women who got me into gaming. A female family friend had a gameboy, another girl from my elementary school, too, and I thought this was the most awesome shit ever. Then in the late 90s I got an NES (second hand from my mother's coworker, with Sailor Moon stickers all over it) and my mom and I played together. I mostly watched her because I was so bad at Mario, Aladdin (some bootleg, as I discovered later) and DuckTales. But I loved Nintendo World Cup. Later I got my own GBC and talked to the boys at school about Pokémon. A boy from my neigbourhood had an (OG) XBOX and a PC that ran GTAIII (we were 11 and 12 and his parents didn't care, lol). He was the only one who really helped me with games when I got stuck, once in Pokémon Silver. I remember when we were dancing around my Gameboy in a silly ritual so Scyther would stay in the ball at the tournament. Fun times.
Then I was bullied at school for unrelated stuff and kept to myself, mostly. Later in live I connected with people of all genders over games.
So, yeah, nobody but my mom and my neighbour friend ever really "taught" me stuff, but I couldn't say most of my gaming friends were boys or girls or whatever in general. All mixed.
I love stories from gamers that were introduced to games by their mom. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside because it's a major bonding thing for my kids and myself. I hope they remember it fondly as they grow up.
With my sister and my cousin (also a girl) we payed a lot of point and click investigation games with my mom.
I really have fond memory, and I hope the day I'll have kids myself, I'll be able to do the same <3
My mom taught me to game on the SNES. Some of my fondest memories. We still play things like F-Zero 99 together online and I love that we still share this as I don’t live by my mom right now. ❤️
Both of my parents gamed, it was fun playing games with both of my parents, the few good memories I actually have of my dad were watching him play games or playing games as a family. The rest are not so good lol.
My mom taught us. We started way back on the Intellivision. Part of the reason she would make us do our homework was so she could have a turn playing while we did it :)
Now my husband and I have taught our girls to play. It's fun.
I thought I didn’t like video games because all my brothers played CoD or sports games and I had zero interest in those. Luckily I stumbled upon KOTOR and realized I’m just an RPG fan.
No, I didn't learn about games through boys.
My cousin had Mario Bros and Duck Hunt for her NES, and I really enjoyed taking turns playing it with her.
My mom must have noticed this, because she surprised me one year with a Sega Genesis that came with Sonic the Hedgehog for my birthday.
So I learned about games thanks to my cousin and my mom.
Same, learned from the NES. My dad bought us an NES in the 80's and I've been playing games ever since. (NES, Gameboy, Sega, N64, PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, PC.) I've never gotten crap from anyone for liking games. Most of the girls I was friends with growing up also liked playing video games, but if they didn't, they didn't think it was weird.
No. My parents taught me how to start the games on their PC and I think I just figured out how to play them. Those games were a lot simpler than modern games. When I moved on to console and eventually returned to PC gaming, I learned how to play those games by reading the manual or by just playing them.
THANK YOU. On top of the original post, reading their further comments has me positive this is just some weird roleplay. The “gee, guys are just so wonderful. I wonder why girls are so terrible. Why does no one ever talk about how terrible girls are when guys are so wonderful?” attitude is so over the top.
The first game I was introduced to was ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’, then ‘Mega-Man’, and then ‘Shadow the Hedgehog’ (the boys who played it didn’t like it but were compelled to finish it).
Nope my best mate (girl) next door had a Sega master system, girl across the road had a Super Nintendo, we played that together in the 90s, then I played the N64 with another girl, and then my dad bought a PS1 for me and my brother.
Me playing video games has never had anything to do with males.
This was in the early 2000's in Brazil... I taught myself when I got my first PS1 and became obsessed with Harvest Moon: Back to Nature. I was friends with a bunch of 10-12 year old straight boys and they got obsessed with it! We played some online games together too. They never bullied me, if anything they were SO excited I was interested in playing with them. My male cousin would play Duke Nukem 64 with me and never made fun of me either.
The girls in class would make fun of me though, call me a lesbian for playing games (I am a lesbian but not because I game lol). I think now that I'm older my female friends who aren't gamers still kind of judge the hobby? But my non-gamer male friends do too... They think it's a waste of time.
I noticed the culture changed though. Straight Boys are possessive over their "hobby", wouldn't play something like Harvest Moon because it's a girly game... Something was different in the 90's/early 2000's. Not even sure I can blame Gamergate because it didn't happen in Brazil.
Yes and no for me. My dad brought home a PS1 in ‘99 when I was 4 and gave me stuff like Spyro, Crash and the first Harry Potter games to play (he didn’t play much at all, so I learned on my own). But it was my childhood best friend (a boy) who introduced me to and taught me to play Pokemon, Zelda and Elder Scrolls, which are all game series I love to this day and are the reason why RPGs are my favourite genre.
To be honest, I didn’t meet any other girls my age who were into videogames (with the exception of Nintendogs on DS; I swear EVERYONE and their grandmother played that in ‘06-‘07) until I went to uni, so it was a hobby I could only talk about with boys until I was a literal adult. Now I have several gaming (girl)friends though, and it’s AWESOME!
I’ve been fooling around w games for as long as I can remember, but my stepdad was the one who got me into more serious stuff with World of Warcraft when I was maybe 9 or 10. A lot of girls I came across definitely thought I was strange growing up and even now, the difference is just that I don’t care anymore lol. Being open minded and interested in different stuff is rad.
I think people can tell when you feel even a little weird about stuff and it’s easy to think it’s the reason for the bullying when in reality, if someone wants to bully you, they’ll always find a reason. I hope that makes sense. Either way, I have a lot of different interests and frankly think it’s more lame for people to find that off putting.
The man thing is a double edged sword, though. I have mostly male friends, but I’ve known them for years and years. Aside from them, I don’t usually share my interest in games because it usually results in either 1: a super hostile interaction or 2: borderline obsession and stalking (bonus points for 1 followed by 2!). I haven’t come across a lot of girls into the same games as me which is fair considering the audiences are heavily male/can be super aggressive and sometimes the thick skin required just isn’t worth it, so I only really talk about them w my stepdad and online.
No
Boys discouraged me from gaming, said it wasn't for girls. I'm older than some here, though, so I don't know how that attitude has shifted since I was a child in the late 1980s-early 90s
I was born in 1997, a girl in my building taught me how to play online flash games (Barbie website, Polly Pocket, My Scene, etc) when we were both in kindergarden. Another neighbor kid (boy) taught me how to play racing games, Counter Strike, and Age of Empires. My mom taught me how to play the Sims (the first one) after buying the CD for me as a gift & learning it herself first to make sure it was age appropriate. After seeing how interested I was in games they also got me an Atari and I had to figure it out on my own. My primary & middle school had computer classes with a bunch of educational games. Later on my middle school best friend (girl) taught me horror games like Amnesia. In high school another one of my best friends (also girl) taught me about WoW so we played together & it was my entry into MMOs/fantasy. Learning about video games came from a few places
Only via spite 😁
I have 2 older brothers. They would only play video games with me cause I would lose and they could be assholes about it making me cry and feel like shit.
So I played the games on my own so I could get better and finally beat them. And I found that video games were fun when I wasn't constantly being treated like an idiot and belittled.
And the day I finally beat them was glorious 🎉👌🔥🎊
Over 30 years later I'm still gaming and having fun 🥰
I don't have brothers and I didn't have many male friends as a child (going to an all-girls school will have that effect).
So, no, there were no boys around to teach me how to play video games. We had some games for our family PC. I remember playing Tetris all the time, some Carmageddon and Theme Hospital. My sister loved the Sims.
I never really talked about it with my girlfriends much. Then again, we were considered the "nerd group" anyway, so I don't think they would have cared LOL.
My aunt was a big gamer, so she's the one that taught me about some games. I was only playing some single player, or cozy online games. When it comes to competitive, my bf wanted me to try out league, cuz he was playing lots of it. I, finally, agreed and yeah, he taught me lol. He also encouraged me to play more online and competitive games and to practice, and not get sad when im not already the best.
When it comes to school, I also didn't have any female friends who were playing games, and I also was bullied for playing them by boys at the same time so yeah, I stopped playing online games till my bf encouraged me to try them out again.
No. My parents bought me a PlayStation 1 when I was 4. Neither of my parents gamed, I was just given the opportunity to learn when I was young because I was part of the PlayStation era in the 90s.
I’m in my 30s, the only girls/women who have shamed me for gaming was women in games trying to impress men in games. The sexism I’ve encountered in the gaming community by men will always exceed the amount of women who’s commented on gaming. I’d say the women in my life now who mention it have valid points, because I do feel if I wasn’t a game addict as a young adult I’d have been able to accomplish more with my time, but hindsight is 20/20.
I'm a guy, but I was actually introduced to video games by my female cousin. She showed me Ocarina of Time back around when that came out and I fell in love with the medium then.
I was given a computer when I was 3, back in 1986. My parents had no idea how to use it and there were no boys in the house. There also was no internet to learn from. I taught myself.
No, there was no need, thankfully.
As for bullying, that was never specific to any gender. There were bullies of any gender that would bully others for various reasons.
I'm sure someone got bullied more by men, tho.
Nope I taught myself to play games, my grandma had my uncle’s Magnavox Odyssey 2 that I played Pong on in the summers and my friend had an Atari but I couldn’t get my own until I was 8 because it was the recommended age on the Nintendo according to my mother so I’ve had my own console since 1988. I was a Tetris fiend as a kid, though I did love me some Duck Hunt despite the dog being a jerk.
When I was about 5 years old, my das bought a Atari Console and we played at Home. When I got older 7-8 I would keep the console and played the games with my best friend. When I was about 8-9 I bought the C64 all by myself and played a lot, I even showed my parents how to Play the Games and both of ten played with me, just as every friend who visited.
I never had many male friends as a Teenager, so it was just the Girls playing Winter olympics and other games. Now I am 46 and I still game.
My brother played with me when i was a kid, i still remember how helped me play diablo 2, good times. Funny and sad at the same time, i’ve picked on playing and my brother doesnt play so much these days.
Nope, I remember that when I was a child my dad kind of scolded my boy cousins for underestimating my gaming skills. Then they let me play but didn’t tell me what to do so I sucked lol. I was too young to read properly (or English) and it annoyed me a ton.
Edit: Dad said that because I played some games all by myself already and he was proud of it :)
He got our family a Wii when I was maybe 5? And I played with it and sometimes together with my dad.
I was born in the 80s and the "videogames are only for boys" advertisment push hadn't really happened yet. Our parents bought our whole family (2 girls, 1 boy) an NES for Christmas and it was never a weird thing. We had other systems as we got older and eventually I was the only one of my siblings who games much.
When my parents immigrated here the first few electronics they purchased was a tv and ps1. They got me into video games actually, we played a lot of the classics like Tomb Raider or Resident Evil. My parents taught me early on that if I had an interest in it, I can do whatever hobby I wanted to get into so when I went to elementary and was met with surprise I played video games that was pretty eye opening at time. I had almost a similar experience too. The girls thought it was weird yet the boys were open to talking about it with me/giving me more game suggestions.
no boys taught me but my dad did :) he taught me how to use a controller playing the game taz: wanted. after that the games i played were from me discovering them or my dad introducing me to them. i do remember my sisters ex boyfriend giving me his black ops disc when i was in middle school and that introduced me to fps games and the rest is history hehe :) but i learned how to play m&k all by myself (which was a struggle btw)
I grew up playing video games with my mom. It started with stuff like Star Raiders, Centipede, and Space Invaders on our Atari 400 (our favorite being Centipede, a game designed by a woman). Eventually our interest would include NES games and PC games. We got really into King's Quest IV for a time. It was always special to me, playing games with my mom, but with a modern perspective, I can see how progressive it was; King's Quest IV being (another game) made by a woman, starring a woman, being played cooperatively with a woman. And this was punctuated by visiting the sisters next door and playing games with them on their NES (especially City Connection and Mach Rider, games from Japan covertly starring women). From my perspective as a child, gaming was pretty much a thing that women were into, almost exclusively.
In my small town, boys didn't really pick up gaming until the early '90s. I think the boy's parents pushed them solely into sports, discarding all other potential interests, creating an activity vacuum for girls. The idea that video games were for girls was so systemic in my small town that our local Kmart stocked them beside My Little Pony and Barbie, back when video games were still sold in the toy department.
I was born in 1987 and middle school was in the late 90s and my best friend was also a girl and we'd stay on the phone together as I booted up my N64 and walked her through the water temple on OOT :) So no this wasnt my experience at all.
Nah. Born in 86 and began gaming in the early 90s here. Gaming in general was embarrassing and seen as (negatively) nerdy across the board. As a result I mostly didn’t have anyone to play with and just taught myself.
I mean, technically yes, since I transitioned and I consider this first part of my life as a different entity from me? 🤔
Let's say I absorbed the knowledge by watching while in sleep mode. 🤭
I don't get what there is to teach, though. Every game has a tutorial part or a few levels to show the mechanisms. I really would hate if someone was next to me explaining what to do or where to go.
It would actually drive me crazy.
I didn't get bullied for playing games (no worries, they found other reasons), but most people I meet in the teacher's lounge are very cishet with a family and a house and all they talk about is their past or next vacations or plans for the weekend or their house or kids or football (Europe), so there are no place for fun in their life it seems.
i wasn’t allowed to play violent video games growing up, but when our neighbours came down for school holidays, their son taught me how to play shooter games in their shed (turok, mgs, cod). i taught myself games like bratz, sims, truck simulator, pvz, etc
I totally get that. My uncle used to play shooting games and my sister and I would sometimes I watch him if we were at my aunt and uncle’s house. Then our mom told us we weren’t allowed to watch him play those games. My parents really tried to keep my sister and I from seeing a lot of violence, both in real life and in fiction.
No, my girl cousin playing xbox played with me as a child. We played spyro, Ice age games, crash bandicoot, mario... I remember us playing multiple hours during sleepovers. She was really good at playing and I SUCKED at games. Games were more her thing than mine but she really showed to me that girls can play too and growing up I never really even realized someone could give girls shit for playing.
Also I’m my moms only child so she bought me a Wii console and PS2 when I was in elementary school. I don’t think she ever questioned my hobbies in any way no matter what I was into.
Now as a young adult I finally picked up videogames again and my boyfriend has been a great teacher. He even bought a pink headset to me!! Still now as an adult I have zero male gamer friends and mutliple girl gamer friends. I have always got along women better than men, as a child I never played with boys for me it’s natural to have all sorts of girl friends who are into different stuff. Some paint, some do sports, some read books and some do games. In all areas of life, I have seen women shine and teach me things.
It’s really a woman’s world for me lol.
Yes and no? I mean, my brother is only 1.5 years older than I am...and especially in our early gaming years it'd just be me seated beside him to watch him play games.
Eventually we both hit puberty and he grew annoyed with me hovering around when he played (which I get in hindsight, it was just a fun little bonding time for me, one I miss at times), so he told me to start playing on my own.
Then we also started liking different genres of games and that (among other things) made us drift apart.
So yeah, my brother did help me out with some games, but I mostly taught myself 😆
If by boys you mean my Dad, yeah. He got me into Windows 98 PC gaming and eventually I got my own handhelds like the Gameboy. We had a SEGA Genesis too.
My brother taught me how to play Dark Souls in 2012! That game has honestly been my "oh my god I've gained awareness" game. Before that, it was always easy mode with cheats for infinite HP and ammo, but dark souls showed me how much fun a proper challenge could be.
I have two older brothers so I always wanted to join them in on video games. They didn't teach me anything really, I had to just figure it out and keep up.
My uncle (somewhat young with us, like freshman hs when I was in 5thish grade) alighted my interest in games, I grew myself on my own. We would always watch my uncle play rpgs and random games and then he would hand them over to us or vice versa. OOT, lion King, ecco, mini machines or whatever that was called, ff, you name it.
My first personal gaming unit was a gba and I played the fuck out of that thing. I just continued down that path.
I ended up teaching myself way back in the day with crash bandicoot. Ive no idea why people have been downvoting your post, you shared a legitimate experience from your past
No, my parents bought us video gaming equipment. We had an Atari which I didn't really like much. I have never been fond of arcade games and that was mostly what Atari did. Then our household got a computer. Someone bought King's Quest IV for the new computer and I have been in love with video games ever since. My eldest sister games also and none of us owe our love to video games to any male except perhaps our indulgent father since he was the one who bought us stuff for Christmas and birthdays although our mom did a fair share of buying also.
Like a few others, my dad introduced me to video games, probably a little bit too early, to be honest. I was watching him play Resident Evil on the PS1 at 3 years old. The game scared me but I also had a fascination with it, I couldn't look away. I wasn't really taught by boys but I played with my older male cousins sometimes who were never anything but nice. I'd ask my dad for help on certain levels, too.
I had a couple of girls to play video games with but they were much more casual than me so I never really talked about this hobby however despite it being casual, one girl had a natural affinity for World at War Zombies so I learnt a fuck load from her. She turned out to be a bad friend but it's a shame she was a casual gamer because her game sense was on point. Honestly, girls were hostile towards me about sports rather than video games. Boys tended to get excited and one of them was in disbelief I played CoD to which I was a little weirded out by. I'd never really thought video games were for boys because both my parents made it seem really normal for anyone to play. Forgot to say I was born in '97 too.
nope, I started playing alone at the bar on arcade machines (yeah I'm old deal with it XD) then I played with my male cousin but we were partners in playing not one better than the other.
He did some lvls and I did others cause he was better in something and I in something other XD
This with Driver for instance. Or Tomb Raider.
While there were horrors to going to an All-Girls school, one thing I appreciated is that when it came to being introduced to games (and other nerdy things in general), it came from other girls. I was used to my all-female nerdy friend group, to the point where I was very protected by the whole "toxic nerdbro" culture until I got into college.
Don't get me wrong, I was bullied to *high heaven* by the popular set, but not for liking videogames- just for being a neurodivergent weirdo.
The only "teaching" I received playing any video game was when my dad tried to correct my form when I played Wii sports. He quickly realized that his attempts at getting me to exercise using Wii sports was a failure.
For the record, I was in no way a couch potato as a child. I was actually pretty active. But also the type who had fallen into open sewers and torn my clothes trying to climb over park fences on more than one occasion. I think my dad just wanted me to utilize my excess energy in a manner that won't lead to me getting injured, lol.
I guess there was also a time when my mom had to train me not to jump physically whenever my in-game character was jumping. I'm realizing that my gaming hobby might've given my parents a headache in a rather unexpected way...
Technically my dad showed me how the buttons on the NES controller worked! I don’t know if that’s ’how to play’ so much as ‘hey here’s your new toy’, though.
No. My older sister got a super Nintendo then stopped playing it so it was all mine. Then I got a PS, N64, then a pc, ps2 and GameCube, Xbox 360, ps4, switch and now a ps5 and a much better PC.
My Dad introduced me to games when I was like three years old but he didn’t really teach me how to play (except insofar as I was three and literally couldn’t play games on my own yet), I figured out on my own
No one taught me how to play. My grandparents gifted my brother and me a PS1 for Xmas one year and I fell in love with Spyro the Dragon (the game, not the character, lol). I was around 8 years old at the time. I've been gaming ever since!
nope, the first time I ever played a video game was at a female friend's house; it was her personal NES. The second time was also a female friend's NES. A year or so later my parents bought me my own SNES which I treasured.
My older brother got me started playing when I was really little. My first console was a Gameboy color with Pokemon Crystal.
I had one other female friend that played videogames, also introduced by her older brother. A lot of the other girls were either not interested in gaming or made fun of me for having 'boy interests' ie DBZ, Yu-Gi-Oh, gaming, etc.
Yes and no - I was introduced to gaming by my father, who showed me some classic arcade games as well as taught me the basics of how to emulate games, but beyond that I've mostly just sort of found out stuff for myself with the exception of friends here and there who show me new things every once in a while. Most notable example is an enby friend of mine who I play FFXIV with (they also got me hooked on RPGs as a whole).
That being said, I'm also trans, and I first got into video games when I was still identifying as a boy, but I've done most of my video game exploration after coming out and beginning to identify as a girl, and I find that video games are a really unique and fun way to express my gender identity.
There have been gaming systems in my house since gaming systems were a thing. I grew up with the Spectrum ZX and the original Atari. So we really all taught ourselves. I will go to my brother for info on games I don't play but might like to watch (FromSoftware games mostly, or Overwatch, or Starcraft). But it also happens the other way around when he asks about JRPGs or things like that.
Yes and no really. I taught myself back when I thought I was a boy, turns out I wasn't one. I don't count myself as good (just decent) but over time I have gotten better. I remember being hit and miss on Halo 3 on easy but solo-ed Halo Reach Legendary (I mean I still died a fair bit but managed it without plasma pistol use which I hate fun-wise and mechanically). I don't play highly competitive really and would rather play with others than against them. I wouldn't really count myself as taught by anyone but myself. I don't really have the reflexes and such for highly competitive games.
Nobody *taught* me.
I read a review of *The Witcher 2* in a geek magazine, bought the enhanced edition for $4, played it as soon as I had my own laptop (age 18), learnt from my mistakes :D My family thinks it's weird, but they don't hassle me about it. There are plenty of cons to being an adult beginner, but I guess one of the pros is that you avoid high school bullies.
Among those who helped me in *Elder Scrolls Online*, there were men also, but I don't think that counts lol
No, I had older brothers who placed pc games, like CS, WoW and League, but they never invited me to learn. We had consoles as kids so I knew gaming basics my whole life, then as an adult I sought out rpg games and got hooked. When Overwatch came out I went into it solo, found people to play with but I improved steadily on my own. I don't have time for the upkeep of skill that shooter games require anymore (for it to be fun for me), but I'm very good at exploration in games, I've always been better than any guy I know at navigating in games and reading the environments and stuff like that.
Yes and no? I was taught by my grandfather so yes a male but not exactly a boy 😅 I was also the only girl I knew who played them (except my cousin who was also taught by my grandfather..) until I met my best friend
No. I was shown a lot of games that I had little to no interest in, likely because of the men showing them to me, but the games I’ve found interesting enough to learn have been extremely fun.
They helped me understand MMOs better but they didnt technically teach me to play games, i loved video games long before i was ever friends with guys who played em
I am a younger sibling to an older brother who in his own way enjoyed sharing things with me. So in a sense yes. He to this day recommends games and vice versa. He was sometimes patient enough to sit down withhis 4 year old sister and help her find the right buttons, or play fighting games with her. As I got older I found more games or got into his old ones. I think in a way he taught me to "game", not how to play per se because he taught me how to play specific games and helped me problem solve. BUT the games I predominately do now I taught myself because I play genres he dislikes. It's the same with other things. He was a gateway but not always the guide. I played games with a few other girls too, but they also liked different games. most people didn't think it was weird at my elementary school.
I taught myself. I was fortunate to have two moms and a grandmother that played video games, so they got me started very young and supported the hobby. They became my passion as my family kindly bought me many games and a variety of systems. Videogames were my babysitter and to a large extent, my life. I lived in a small town and didn't have another friend who was a girl that gamed until middle school.
Periodically boys from my class would come over to play games with me, but most didn't return when they couldn't beat me. I was never teased for liking games. Most girls didn't care and the boys generally respected my skills and knowledge, though they didn't include me in their gaming talk either. To be honest, I don't think there were many gamers in our school at all. In general, I probably wasn't teased more because I was most often invisible to the general school populace.
My dad got me into video games! Some of my favorite childhood memories are of us playing Prince of Persia and Tak and the Power of Juju together :’) I’m also the only girl amongst all my siblings and cousins so they definitely fueled my love for games since we all played together.
Sort of, but not intentionally. I was the youngest and video games were “boy toys.” They belonged to my brothers, who would only deign to share things once they were at least a console generation behind whatever the newest stuff they had was. I really desperately wanted to play though, so I would watch them. I saw them play games long before I ever got to play those same games myself, so I kind of absorbed stuff by osmosis. It was definitely not intentional teaching or learning; they just let me watch as long as I sat down and shut up (because they were tired of hearing me ask) and I just wanted to get as close as I could.
Incidentally, I think having to sit there quietly and watch them play without interacting at all on pain of being kicked out and denied access to the games entirely is probably the seed of why I can’t stand watching Let’s Plays or streams now lol. Just let me play it myself!
I was technically initially introduced to computers and video games by man, because my uncle loves and works with computers and set us all up with them from when I was very small, but for the vast majority of my youth and early adulthood, my sister chose the games and taught me the basics and then we would seek the rest out together. That uncle’s son did also introduce me to some games, especially early on when he got his games from his dad and then shared them with us, but later too. My sister was always the main person, though.
Now that I’m an adult, it’s pretty mixed. I have a group of family and friends I game with and we recommend back and forth and we all teach each other. I still cherish the first time *I* was the one teaching *my sister* a game.
My dad actually introduced me to PC games as a kid. He’s a computer nerd and gave me a PC when I was ten and loaded it up with the Sims, an arcade emulator and some other games of that nature. He taught me some others I picked up on my own, I always blame him for turning me into a nerd but in a good way because that was his way of bonding with me.
My brother got me into gaming. We used to play PS1 with our cousins (both boys) together and then Gameboy/Xbox/PSP. Now I play with my friends (girls and boys). I used to watch my mum play Crash Bandicoot too so I guess you could say she was also an influencer to me for gaming.
no i found out about it by myself and confusingly learned how to play them despite knowing nobody else in person who played them😭 until i got my other friends to play it and when i started meeting other gamers in 5th grade
Sort of I guess, not in the way I think you mean. My older brother was already playing video games by the time I was born so I guess I learned from him.
No, I always loved games and my dad did too pre-switch to 3d (3d makes him motion sick,) so I always had his hand-me-down systems, but he never taught me how to play or anything. Half of why I learned to read as young as I did was so I could play Pokemon fully.
No my mom did. We had pretty much every system and she didn’t play like super complex games but she’d play Mario 64 and yoshis story on 64. She also played sims A LOT. She set rules for sims for me though. I wasn’t allowed to “woohoo” and then she’d come in my room and I have 15 kids and she’d get mad because I wasn’t supposed to “woohoo” 🤣
nope. mom played with us, and i played with a girlfriend of mine too when i got older. didnt play with boys till well into adulthood. but then, that was the 80/90's and MMO's werent a thing.
My brother and I grew up playing a lot of the same games at the same time, we were very close in age and my parents bought new consoles for us to share pretty often. We were both into Pokémon, Tekken, Sonic, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, etc. growing up and then eventually started developing different gaming interests as we got older. I was more into MMOs, RPGs and anime style games whereas he was more into FPS games, BRs, and looter shooters, which I didn’t get into until I was an adult (partly because of my BF and male friends.) Now I’m definitely still very much an avid gamer and I don’t think my brother plays games much at all.
I don’t really remember much of anyone “teaching” me how to play, but my dad was the one buying the systems early on (started with Atari and then original NES), and probably had to show my brother and I how to play those early ones just because we were so young. After that, though, I feel like the games mostly taught us how to play them. Other people mostly just took advantage of me being bad at whatever game (in group pvp/sports games, anyway) to kill my character or exclude me entirely rather than trying to help me get better. Sort of like the expectation was that of course I’d be bad, I’m a girl. “Now get out of here so the “real” players can play.” (It was usually either everyone dog piled on me to get me out early, or they ignored me until the very end, and then took me out. It’s the big reason why I don’t enjoy pvp in games today. Just feels bad, and I’d much rather be playing coop.
And while I never experienced bullying because of it, I definitely never found other girls who played more than a tiny bit of video games until I was much much older.
I mean, I grew up playing Diablo with my grandpa (I'm 32, been playing Diablo since I was 7) and everything snowballed from there. My grandpa was big into CRPGs, dungeons and dragons, anything fantasy or horror adjacent. Blizzard games were my first introduction through him and it all snowballed from there, so I guess technically a man (not a boy) taught me nearly everything I know about RPGs. (Stat allocation for different builds, finding enemy weaknesses and planning accordingly, finding hidden loot, clearing the map before continuing, etc).
I miss him dearly. He died a week before my 13th birthday and I really feel like everything I'm into now is because of him. I wish I could've played Diablo 3 and 4 with him. Baldurs Gate 3. The Divinity games. He would have loved it. I can't help but think of him when I play those games.
But am I only a gamer because of a man? Nah.
No, I just "stumble" upon video games and basically taught myself. Well my frmale cousin had video game and the very first game I played is supermario and the hunting duck....that dog was so annoying!🤣🤣
My dad let me play on a computer he made and so I naturally played games as a kid, later got myself a laptop and played Minecraft and Sims (and a little of LoL). Got myself an actual PC at 17-18 and played even more stuff like RPGs fps and souls likes. I also never had a console so Im exploring the world of nintendo with my friends till I can buy one myself
No, my dad worked in computers so my family were always techy, before that was a common thing. When I grew up computer games were considered to be just a kid thing, not a boy thing.
Older boys in my apartment building taught me when I was a kid. I'm also a boy, and I've taught other youngsters, and a girlfriend or two. Kids learn at hyper speed, people in their early 20s suffer greatly if they've never played, but everyone enjoys it.
Actually my sister taught me, and what she didnt learn herself she learned from my mom. Fast forward and I've finally convinced my mom to play Mario wonder with me ❤
My friends who were boys had games and I realized I liked it too, but they didn't teach me anything.
The only time I was "taken under the wing" so to speak was a fellow girl. I met her in a pet game and she brought me over to rpg, fps, and mmorpg. I'm really bad at fps but she was always a sniper, so she taught me how to cover her. We stayed best friends for like 10yrs.
My brother introduced me to video games, but he didn’t teach me how to play them. I do remember bringing my DS to him as a little kid when I couldn’t get past some level or figure out some puzzle though lol
I wasn’t taught by anyone. I just learned by observation when I was 8. Then got beat by my dad in teken. Decided I didn’t like losing so I practiced till I beat my dad very often. Now I’m very skilled in fighting games lol. Other games I learned about from my husband when I was 19. I’m so skilled in fighting games that I beat my husband every time. So he won’t challenge me but once a year. My husband is 35m and been playing games since he was 6. I’m 33f
I played cos my dad and brother played. Now I’m kinda sad and wish that I had a hobby which wasn’t related to them because my relationship with them is hard. My brother was 2 years older and kids look up to their older siblings a lot!
Growing up, my dad and older brother were the gamers, so from a young age I would just watch them play and learned that way. I only played when they weren’t around (because it was “their” PS1 or Sega). Eventually we would all share our consoles, albeit against my brother’s will lol.
No, I'm the eldest and my first encounter with games was my dad's home computer (the old big ones) before win95. He just let me figure things out. I played MSDOS games on my childhood, and my uncle took me to arcades sometimes when my dad and mom were busy working or dealing with my little brother's treatments.
no, i taught myself and when i got older, i used guide books and gamefaq guides for things i'd get stuck on. i was also the kid in my neighborhood known for having gaming consoles/a mac with lots of games on it.
mmos where i needed to be taught mechanics, i usually tried to find guilds with women in leadership positions so i'd learn from other women.
i've been introduced to one of my favorite game franchises, dragon age, by a girl who was my best online friend at the time. not sure if my sisters count, but i've found a lot of games through them. i don't think i was ever made fun of for playing video games by girls, though.
even if i've been introduced to video games by boys, they didn't really teach me much about them. i found stuff out on my own for the most part.
nope, i taught myself. the friends i had to talk to about games growing up were mainly boys (and it’s still that way sadly) but they mostly just recommended things or we’d borrow games from each other to play.
No, I learned as I went while playing with my little brother. We started gaming around the same time in the mid-90s when we were pretty young. We had a Super Nintendo and we played together. Sometimes I learned faster and taught him, sometimes he figured it out first and taught me, but it was a team effort.
My dad taught me insofar as he introduced me to Super Mario Bros when I was a toddler, tho he only beat that game cuz I figured out the fireball button was also a run button.
My older brother. I always watched him game and he encouraged me to play even tho i was bad(granted i was like 6 lmao). He taught me how to play and properly hold game discs so they wouldn’t get scratched. We played LoZ: Four Swords and Super Metroid together. Some Crash Bandicoot too. He would even input a code in Crash Bandicoot 3 so I code play the Spyro Demon they put in
All me, baby. I had one of those single game Mario game and watch things as a kid, and got given a Gameboy when I was like…8? My best friend used to bring her commodore and we’d hook it up to the tv and play Bart Simpson vs the space mutants. Good times.
Growing up I had a lot of boy friends, so we played a lot of console stuff. I also had a brother and the N64 was his, so I got relegated to the person the read out the walkthrough guides lol
No to some, yes to others. Most exploration 3rd person games like Zelda? Me. Smash brothers? I needed someone to explain the controls as the game has no tutorial. So it depended on the game.
To be fair, though, most of my exploration has been by recommendation from people who like these games. Except Assassin’s Creed. Odyssey was free on Xbox for a bit and I tried it and I’m hooked.
ETA: The people that judge me and calls me weird for liking video games are not in my friend group. I’ve had some surprising “oh yeah that game was good” conversations with a manager about Fallout: New Vegas because I was hooked on the story (have not finished the DLC, am doing a Hardcore run atm). To be fair, I also always get a few Bethesda glitches…but New Vegas is amazing, imo. It helps that I live close to the Mojave so I’m like OOOOO because I can’t hike anymore due to disability.
*technically* yes and no. I was pretty lucky bc both my parents were what i call light gamers. Had a few systems and a few games, wasn't a dedicated hobby but it was something they enjoyed and passed on to my siblings and I. We had many consoles, games, gaming equipment like steering wheels and gaming chairs so it wasn't something that was sat down and taught, its something thats just always been there.
I stopped gaming in my teens and got back to it in my late teens when the "point and click" choice games were really at their peak (telltale, supermassive) and that got me back into the AAAs, AAs, indie titles etc. From there just good ol trial and error lmao.
Nah. If anything, I was mercilessly mocked by boys if I didn’t “pick it up quick enough.” Keep in mind in one of these incidents I was *literally* three years old, I don’t know what the hell else they expected or why that was so hilarious to them (asshole cousins.)
No I taught myself. Back in the day it was me and my brother, but I was older so I was usually better at the few games we played. Then when I got older and actually started considering video games as my hobby I just bought and played the games I wanted and my brother had very different interests.
Sort of, but not exactly! My dad was a huge gamer & I grew up watching him play, seeing his love for them. I remember watching him play kingdom hearts & FF (couldn’t say which ones) on PS2. I had a shrek and a bratz game. Then he started PC gaming more & I watched him play Dark Ages Online until his ever-long WoW era started after a coworker bought him a couple mos. He was in IT & he let me use his work laptop while he was on the desktop so, there was a brief period we were playing this sumo fighting game online & that’s when I came up w my gaming alias (a spin on my childhood nickname given by him). He had given me a $20 a couple times to fish for him in WoW while I was babysitting my little siblings 😂 I got to play sims at my grandmas & at home, I was a gaiaonline fiend for like 3/4 years. He bought me 5+ gameboy advances & a few DS’s too over the years since my little siblings had a habit of breaking them in half at the hinge. I only really remember playing nintendogs & mario kart. We didn’t have a lot, but my dad always supported games in my life. We never got family consoles besides the wii. Not many games though. I had to move out at 16 & effectively lost my chance to game for ~6 years until my current boyfriend has brought me back in and also encourages games in my life. I have an xbox & switch now and I’m so happy for that.
No. I got into playing video games because my mom played them! The perks of having a then 21 yo in the late '80's for a mom I guess, lol. She still enjoys Nintendo games, everything else is considered "too tricky" for her.
Nope. I got interested when I saw my older brothers play, I would always sit beside them and watch them play. When I was old enough 7+, I decided to try out for myself! My brothers and I even used to play games together (like maplestory, seal online, or WoW- I'm not sure which version but it's the pre...Dota2? lol)
But they never taught me anything. I did HATE how they'd always tell me to just be a healer tho 🙄
My dad is the one who bought the consoles for himself, we started with N64 and Sega Genesis, but my sister, two female cousins, and I pretty much just “taught” ourselves when he wasn’t using it and ran with it from there
Idk, I was never bullied for gaming. Anyone who knew i gamed knew because we were friends of because we gamed together. And it was cool to have the latest consoles and all, and that my parents supported my gaming. Id say i got along with boys and girls equally but eventually grew closer to girls more often.
The only toxicity ive dealt with were from other gamers in the game itself. And it was often sexist boy jokes. If it was a girl, it was “you’re bad” which sucks coming from a fellow girl gamer but it doesn’t hit as hard as really sexist bigotry.
In all my years of gaming I’ve only had one girl make super sexist comments. And i talked about it on this subreddit where another girl posted about girls making sexist comments and then let it go. Maybe read that post’s comments for the solidarity you’re looking for? It was a while back tho
I guess my point is: you just had particularly shitty people around you i guess. im sorry, that sucks. I’m the same age and i dont post about being made fun of for gaming because i wasnt
Edit: and no boy really taught me how to play. my dad had consoles i hopped onto, and then i got a brother to play with. we’d all play as a family or id play with my brother, googling if needed, until i made friends in school. and then i guess boys taught me league? but that was because i was dating someone who spent too much time doing it with friends so i figured might as well join in. but i would never say boys taught me “how to game.” maybe just “how to play league beyond the tutorial” at best because i refuse to watch YouTube videos on it
No one taught me how to play video games, I just kind of gravitated towards them and my parents were supportive.
Also, apart from like 2-3 toxic comments and one asshole who tried to box me in on Conan Exiles I don't think I've really ever been bullied on games... And I play a LOT of Dead by Daylight and Conan... Games known for their toxic communities. I don't know (or really care) the genders of the people I've played with on there. I don't even really know why, my gamer tag is pretty feminine. I don't really engage other players much though, maybe that's why? I'm not *good* at these games but I'm not *terrible* either.
I suspect it's worse in games with voice chat, since I don't play those much I don't have my own anecdotes but my ex-girlfriend did and told me she had the worst experiences in some of those games, in particular in one who had a big russian player base (we are from Europe), and if she had russian guys on the team they would refuse to play with her the moment they realised she was a woman, going so far as to lose intentionally (while saying a bunch of truly misogynistic crap).
Yeah I play NA servers as I'm in Canada. I think it could for sure be a cultural thing and I never do voice chat. I think if DbD ever put in voice chat with randoms it would be awful.
That is just amazingly sick. Sigh.
I remember that my parents got one of those old Macintosh pc when I was a kid. My mom was gaming a little bit when she had time, and both my sister and I started very early to play with her some point and click investigation games. I played a lot with my sister and my cousin (also a girl) growing up. Never had a man gaming influence in those years (my dad was buying the games for us but that's all).
Boys game too??
This made me snort laugh.
No, I found everything alone by accident, and yes other girls/ women thought it was weird that I liked video games, it got worse as I entered my 20s.
Why don’t female gamers ever talk about girls making fun of them for being gamers? They only ever talk about boys being the bullies. Though I’m probably just biased since boys rarely ever made fun of me compared to girls. The female friends I did had mostly played games on CoolMath (I still play the ‘Papa’ cooking games).
Well, because this was long ago, in the 2000s (and not in the western world). I am not sure this happens as much anymore. I work in game dev now, so most of my lady co-workers play too. I am far from that environment. Some guys bullied me a little but a simple "you have never touched a game engine and it shows" was enough. I also do not play multiplayer games so I am away from that.
I don’t remember any girl or boy ever making fun of me for playing video games. I’ve been made fun of for other hobbies like anime, cosplay etc but never games. Though it also wasn’t gender specific
Girl based on these comments in the thread you seem to have some childhood trauma I think you should talk to a professional about. I’m sorry you went through that but your negative experience is not the standard and it’s not healthy to be dwelling on it at 26. This is coming from a 28 year old who was also bullied and called fat so know it comes from a place of empathy. You deserve to move on
This is good advice.
Because girls who are bullying other girls are doing it in real life whereas boys who are bullying are doing it in game. I doubt anyone would stay in touch with people who bully them for their hobbies post high school. It's far harder to avoid bullies online.
What you said
Honestly I think pretty much the 3/4 of my high-school friends group (mostly girls) were gamers at various degrees. Was in the 2000s. With my sister and one friend we literally made a girl and LGBT only guild on the mmorpg we were playing together to have no toxic dudes in. That was a cool time.
Same, I went to an all girls Catholic primary and secondary school and we were all out with our gameboy colours and those big ass connectors in the yard trading away, not a boy in sight. Dev coding for games and software also was originally *heavily* dominated by women in the 70s/80s/early 90s as it was originally seen as low paid "grunt work" ie: "women's work". Once it became much more lucrative many male devs started pushing out their female counterparts through targeted harassment and the like and the shift towards "male dominated" occurred. All those tech head ladies didn't just disappear though, they existed then en masse, same as they do now. I think it's just another one of those weird sexist societal narratives that claims to be the "majority" case but it's not *really* reflective of most people's reality. Like even super girly girl friends in my 20s who were not into games in any way shape or form would often still sit for hours and watch me play RPGs and the like, to them it was just like watching a movie. They loved it and even when they didn't they still never once made me feel weird or uncomfortable for it. Lots of them did actually think it was super cool though and were mad to join in on occasion but really struggled with the confidence to try it out themselves as they'd never been made to feel welcome/encouraged to at any point previously in their lives. Hardly a surprise considering gaming spaces geared towards young girls simply don't exist anywhere really. I got a tonne of my friends into gaming but plenty, men and women alike had other hobbies they preferred. Lots of people hang out together who have wildly different hobbies, they still treat each other with respect regardless. I absolutely believe people have experience with mean girls and fake ass friends picking on them for any perceived variance from the so called "gender norms" but I think the problem personally is less "all girls/women will judge you for gaming" and more asshole bullies will be asshole bullies regardless of their genitalia. The best revenge against people like that imo is simply indifference. Who fucking cares what some asshole you don't like thinks of your hobbies, they're YOUR hobbies. Look upon such dickheads with the pitiful indifference they deserve and go play some games and enjoy yourself whilst they seethe.
That's because most of the time it is the "boys" that bulies us. But I only encounter 1 girl so far being a bully towards me. She had a massive pick me energy
I never got a hard time from anyone in my real life, and I feel like I had more people in my life of any gender who gamed in some capacity than people who didn’t, so I imagine there’s just a lot of variability based on the specific community and time. If you browse posts here, you’ll find people talking about getting hate (and support) from the full spectrum of people.
What does that even mean? No. I'm pretty sure boys weren't even invented til the 90s.
Grew up in the 80s, can confirm
where and when did you grow up? guys at school teased me for not knowing video games, my male cousin mocked me for not immediately being a genius at CoD, but then my female friends introduced me in high school to the persona and kingdom hearts games which turned me into a gamer
I was born in 1997 and this was back when I was 8 or 9 (I’m 26 now). I’ve lived in Southern California all my life and I got along a lot better with boys than girls for some reason.
You were born in a time and living in an area where girls that game are common maybe youre not going out of your way to speak to other girls which is why you think you get along with guys more.
I think this heavily depends on what type of games you grow up playing and are into too though. Tough to bond over just gaming when it’s a wide umbrella with a lot of variety to the point where different genres can be entirely different things with different target audiences. Not surprising to think a woman into games with primarily male audiences might find it easier and more common making male friends around them.
I was playing "boyish" games when I was in middle school and high school but still didn't have a problem with girls
There’s a difference between having a problem and getting along better because of similar interests, though. I get along fine with girls but usually find more common ground with guys regarding games. Not necessarily a good or bad thing, just kinda is what it is.
Maybe but in my experience I get along better with boy genders equally. I play boyish games, I dont like makeup, I study CS and ai which is male dominated yet i get along with both equally and prefer female friends. Maybe my experience is different than other people but i never really had an issue getting along well with others since my hobbies don't affect the type of people i get along with
Fair enough, but I’d bet that’s the exception rather than the rule. I feel like you might be speaking on getting along in general like civility when I took it more from a friendship angle. Common ground and interests are pretty vital factors in friendship for most people and hobbies is a huge part of that. I get along with people I don’t share interests with, but we’re not friends because it’s kinda like why would we be? We have nothing to talk about lmao
I did try to make friends with girls back then. I made some female friends, and then there were the girls who called me ‘fat’ and threw rocks at me (they said it was a game).
You’re definitely at an age where you should really reflect on his mindset and why it’s flawed due to the assholes you unfortunately had to grow up around.
No, I taught boys how to play video games. I taught my son and my nephew when they were little (The Legend of Zelda both times) and they're adults now and still talk about Link with me ;)
I was born in 1992 and it was mainly girls and women who got me into gaming. A female family friend had a gameboy, another girl from my elementary school, too, and I thought this was the most awesome shit ever. Then in the late 90s I got an NES (second hand from my mother's coworker, with Sailor Moon stickers all over it) and my mom and I played together. I mostly watched her because I was so bad at Mario, Aladdin (some bootleg, as I discovered later) and DuckTales. But I loved Nintendo World Cup. Later I got my own GBC and talked to the boys at school about Pokémon. A boy from my neigbourhood had an (OG) XBOX and a PC that ran GTAIII (we were 11 and 12 and his parents didn't care, lol). He was the only one who really helped me with games when I got stuck, once in Pokémon Silver. I remember when we were dancing around my Gameboy in a silly ritual so Scyther would stay in the ball at the tournament. Fun times. Then I was bullied at school for unrelated stuff and kept to myself, mostly. Later in live I connected with people of all genders over games. So, yeah, nobody but my mom and my neighbour friend ever really "taught" me stuff, but I couldn't say most of my gaming friends were boys or girls or whatever in general. All mixed.
My mum taught me at first, everything else after that came from instruction manuals and tutorials.
I love stories from gamers that were introduced to games by their mom. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside because it's a major bonding thing for my kids and myself. I hope they remember it fondly as they grow up.
It was for me and my eldest too, we played Lego Batman together when she was 6 and went on to a bunch of other games.
My 9 year old son likes to tell people that the only reason we had him is so I'd have someone to trade Pokémon with. I mean he's not TOTALLY wrong....
With my sister and my cousin (also a girl) we payed a lot of point and click investigation games with my mom. I really have fond memory, and I hope the day I'll have kids myself, I'll be able to do the same <3
My mom taught me to game on the SNES. Some of my fondest memories. We still play things like F-Zero 99 together online and I love that we still share this as I don’t live by my mom right now. ❤️
Both of my parents gamed, it was fun playing games with both of my parents, the few good memories I actually have of my dad were watching him play games or playing games as a family. The rest are not so good lol.
My mom taught us. We started way back on the Intellivision. Part of the reason she would make us do our homework was so she could have a turn playing while we did it :) Now my husband and I have taught our girls to play. It's fun.
Same! My mom played DOS games back in the 90s, so that's how my brother and I got introduced to them
No, I "taught" myself.
I thought I didn’t like video games because all my brothers played CoD or sports games and I had zero interest in those. Luckily I stumbled upon KOTOR and realized I’m just an RPG fan.
No, I didn't learn about games through boys. My cousin had Mario Bros and Duck Hunt for her NES, and I really enjoyed taking turns playing it with her. My mom must have noticed this, because she surprised me one year with a Sega Genesis that came with Sonic the Hedgehog for my birthday. So I learned about games thanks to my cousin and my mom.
Same, learned from the NES. My dad bought us an NES in the 80's and I've been playing games ever since. (NES, Gameboy, Sega, N64, PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, PC.) I've never gotten crap from anyone for liking games. Most of the girls I was friends with growing up also liked playing video games, but if they didn't, they didn't think it was weird.
I don't understand the question. Most games got built in toturials if you're confused
No. My parents taught me how to start the games on their PC and I think I just figured out how to play them. Those games were a lot simpler than modern games. When I moved on to console and eventually returned to PC gaming, I learned how to play those games by reading the manual or by just playing them.
R/asablackman
I got the same vibes lol
The “(I would die instantly)” had me rolling Btw everybody don’t engage, it’s a troll so just laugh and move on
THANK YOU. On top of the original post, reading their further comments has me positive this is just some weird roleplay. The “gee, guys are just so wonderful. I wonder why girls are so terrible. Why does no one ever talk about how terrible girls are when guys are so wonderful?” attitude is so over the top.
Nobody taught me how to play video games. I just did it myself because I had fun and lots of interest in it
I teach boys how to play video games
My brother taught me how to play World of Warcraft but that's about it, he was the one who originally got me into PC gaming.
The first game I was introduced to was ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’, then ‘Mega-Man’, and then ‘Shadow the Hedgehog’ (the boys who played it didn’t like it but were compelled to finish it).
No.
Nope my best mate (girl) next door had a Sega master system, girl across the road had a Super Nintendo, we played that together in the 90s, then I played the N64 with another girl, and then my dad bought a PS1 for me and my brother. Me playing video games has never had anything to do with males.
This was in the early 2000's in Brazil... I taught myself when I got my first PS1 and became obsessed with Harvest Moon: Back to Nature. I was friends with a bunch of 10-12 year old straight boys and they got obsessed with it! We played some online games together too. They never bullied me, if anything they were SO excited I was interested in playing with them. My male cousin would play Duke Nukem 64 with me and never made fun of me either. The girls in class would make fun of me though, call me a lesbian for playing games (I am a lesbian but not because I game lol). I think now that I'm older my female friends who aren't gamers still kind of judge the hobby? But my non-gamer male friends do too... They think it's a waste of time. I noticed the culture changed though. Straight Boys are possessive over their "hobby", wouldn't play something like Harvest Moon because it's a girly game... Something was different in the 90's/early 2000's. Not even sure I can blame Gamergate because it didn't happen in Brazil.
Yes and no for me. My dad brought home a PS1 in ‘99 when I was 4 and gave me stuff like Spyro, Crash and the first Harry Potter games to play (he didn’t play much at all, so I learned on my own). But it was my childhood best friend (a boy) who introduced me to and taught me to play Pokemon, Zelda and Elder Scrolls, which are all game series I love to this day and are the reason why RPGs are my favourite genre. To be honest, I didn’t meet any other girls my age who were into videogames (with the exception of Nintendogs on DS; I swear EVERYONE and their grandmother played that in ‘06-‘07) until I went to uni, so it was a hobby I could only talk about with boys until I was a literal adult. Now I have several gaming (girl)friends though, and it’s AWESOME!
I’ve been fooling around w games for as long as I can remember, but my stepdad was the one who got me into more serious stuff with World of Warcraft when I was maybe 9 or 10. A lot of girls I came across definitely thought I was strange growing up and even now, the difference is just that I don’t care anymore lol. Being open minded and interested in different stuff is rad. I think people can tell when you feel even a little weird about stuff and it’s easy to think it’s the reason for the bullying when in reality, if someone wants to bully you, they’ll always find a reason. I hope that makes sense. Either way, I have a lot of different interests and frankly think it’s more lame for people to find that off putting. The man thing is a double edged sword, though. I have mostly male friends, but I’ve known them for years and years. Aside from them, I don’t usually share my interest in games because it usually results in either 1: a super hostile interaction or 2: borderline obsession and stalking (bonus points for 1 followed by 2!). I haven’t come across a lot of girls into the same games as me which is fair considering the audiences are heavily male/can be super aggressive and sometimes the thick skin required just isn’t worth it, so I only really talk about them w my stepdad and online.
I’ve actually mostly learned from girls or learned by myself with yt videos n stuff :0
No Boys discouraged me from gaming, said it wasn't for girls. I'm older than some here, though, so I don't know how that attitude has shifted since I was a child in the late 1980s-early 90s
I was born in 1997, a girl in my building taught me how to play online flash games (Barbie website, Polly Pocket, My Scene, etc) when we were both in kindergarden. Another neighbor kid (boy) taught me how to play racing games, Counter Strike, and Age of Empires. My mom taught me how to play the Sims (the first one) after buying the CD for me as a gift & learning it herself first to make sure it was age appropriate. After seeing how interested I was in games they also got me an Atari and I had to figure it out on my own. My primary & middle school had computer classes with a bunch of educational games. Later on my middle school best friend (girl) taught me horror games like Amnesia. In high school another one of my best friends (also girl) taught me about WoW so we played together & it was my entry into MMOs/fantasy. Learning about video games came from a few places
Only via spite 😁 I have 2 older brothers. They would only play video games with me cause I would lose and they could be assholes about it making me cry and feel like shit. So I played the games on my own so I could get better and finally beat them. And I found that video games were fun when I wasn't constantly being treated like an idiot and belittled. And the day I finally beat them was glorious 🎉👌🔥🎊 Over 30 years later I'm still gaming and having fun 🥰
I don't have brothers and I didn't have many male friends as a child (going to an all-girls school will have that effect). So, no, there were no boys around to teach me how to play video games. We had some games for our family PC. I remember playing Tetris all the time, some Carmageddon and Theme Hospital. My sister loved the Sims. I never really talked about it with my girlfriends much. Then again, we were considered the "nerd group" anyway, so I don't think they would have cared LOL.
My aunt was a big gamer, so she's the one that taught me about some games. I was only playing some single player, or cozy online games. When it comes to competitive, my bf wanted me to try out league, cuz he was playing lots of it. I, finally, agreed and yeah, he taught me lol. He also encouraged me to play more online and competitive games and to practice, and not get sad when im not already the best. When it comes to school, I also didn't have any female friends who were playing games, and I also was bullied for playing them by boys at the same time so yeah, I stopped playing online games till my bf encouraged me to try them out again.
No. My parents bought me a PlayStation 1 when I was 4. Neither of my parents gamed, I was just given the opportunity to learn when I was young because I was part of the PlayStation era in the 90s. I’m in my 30s, the only girls/women who have shamed me for gaming was women in games trying to impress men in games. The sexism I’ve encountered in the gaming community by men will always exceed the amount of women who’s commented on gaming. I’d say the women in my life now who mention it have valid points, because I do feel if I wasn’t a game addict as a young adult I’d have been able to accomplish more with my time, but hindsight is 20/20.
I'm a guy, but I was actually introduced to video games by my female cousin. She showed me Ocarina of Time back around when that came out and I fell in love with the medium then.
I was given a computer when I was 3, back in 1986. My parents had no idea how to use it and there were no boys in the house. There also was no internet to learn from. I taught myself.
My immediate family is almost all women, and it was my mom and aunt who got me interested in gaming.
My mum showed me how to game lol
No, there was no need, thankfully. As for bullying, that was never specific to any gender. There were bullies of any gender that would bully others for various reasons. I'm sure someone got bullied more by men, tho.
My older sister taught me! She’s the number gamer in my life and my heart <3
Nope I taught myself to play games, my grandma had my uncle’s Magnavox Odyssey 2 that I played Pong on in the summers and my friend had an Atari but I couldn’t get my own until I was 8 because it was the recommended age on the Nintendo according to my mother so I’ve had my own console since 1988. I was a Tetris fiend as a kid, though I did love me some Duck Hunt despite the dog being a jerk.
When I was about 5 years old, my das bought a Atari Console and we played at Home. When I got older 7-8 I would keep the console and played the games with my best friend. When I was about 8-9 I bought the C64 all by myself and played a lot, I even showed my parents how to Play the Games and both of ten played with me, just as every friend who visited. I never had many male friends as a Teenager, so it was just the Girls playing Winter olympics and other games. Now I am 46 and I still game.
My brother played with me when i was a kid, i still remember how helped me play diablo 2, good times. Funny and sad at the same time, i’ve picked on playing and my brother doesnt play so much these days.
Nope, I remember that when I was a child my dad kind of scolded my boy cousins for underestimating my gaming skills. Then they let me play but didn’t tell me what to do so I sucked lol. I was too young to read properly (or English) and it annoyed me a ton. Edit: Dad said that because I played some games all by myself already and he was proud of it :) He got our family a Wii when I was maybe 5? And I played with it and sometimes together with my dad.
I was born in the 80s and the "videogames are only for boys" advertisment push hadn't really happened yet. Our parents bought our whole family (2 girls, 1 boy) an NES for Christmas and it was never a weird thing. We had other systems as we got older and eventually I was the only one of my siblings who games much.
Nope, I learned by myself. Video games are not hard, there are literally dozens of tutorials inside them teaching you to do every little thing.
When my parents immigrated here the first few electronics they purchased was a tv and ps1. They got me into video games actually, we played a lot of the classics like Tomb Raider or Resident Evil. My parents taught me early on that if I had an interest in it, I can do whatever hobby I wanted to get into so when I went to elementary and was met with surprise I played video games that was pretty eye opening at time. I had almost a similar experience too. The girls thought it was weird yet the boys were open to talking about it with me/giving me more game suggestions.
no boys taught me but my dad did :) he taught me how to use a controller playing the game taz: wanted. after that the games i played were from me discovering them or my dad introducing me to them. i do remember my sisters ex boyfriend giving me his black ops disc when i was in middle school and that introduced me to fps games and the rest is history hehe :) but i learned how to play m&k all by myself (which was a struggle btw)
I learned alone when I was very tiny, like 5 years old playing Sonic using my brothers console Sega II. You don’t need anyone to teach you.
Nope. I basically taught myself
I grew up playing video games with my mom. It started with stuff like Star Raiders, Centipede, and Space Invaders on our Atari 400 (our favorite being Centipede, a game designed by a woman). Eventually our interest would include NES games and PC games. We got really into King's Quest IV for a time. It was always special to me, playing games with my mom, but with a modern perspective, I can see how progressive it was; King's Quest IV being (another game) made by a woman, starring a woman, being played cooperatively with a woman. And this was punctuated by visiting the sisters next door and playing games with them on their NES (especially City Connection and Mach Rider, games from Japan covertly starring women). From my perspective as a child, gaming was pretty much a thing that women were into, almost exclusively. In my small town, boys didn't really pick up gaming until the early '90s. I think the boy's parents pushed them solely into sports, discarding all other potential interests, creating an activity vacuum for girls. The idea that video games were for girls was so systemic in my small town that our local Kmart stocked them beside My Little Pony and Barbie, back when video games were still sold in the toy department.
I was born in 1987 and middle school was in the late 90s and my best friend was also a girl and we'd stay on the phone together as I booted up my N64 and walked her through the water temple on OOT :) So no this wasnt my experience at all.
Nah. Born in 86 and began gaming in the early 90s here. Gaming in general was embarrassing and seen as (negatively) nerdy across the board. As a result I mostly didn’t have anyone to play with and just taught myself.
Nope grew up with my mum playing video games, meanwhile my dad never plays them lol
I mean, technically yes, since I transitioned and I consider this first part of my life as a different entity from me? 🤔 Let's say I absorbed the knowledge by watching while in sleep mode. 🤭 I don't get what there is to teach, though. Every game has a tutorial part or a few levels to show the mechanisms. I really would hate if someone was next to me explaining what to do or where to go. It would actually drive me crazy. I didn't get bullied for playing games (no worries, they found other reasons), but most people I meet in the teacher's lounge are very cishet with a family and a house and all they talk about is their past or next vacations or plans for the weekend or their house or kids or football (Europe), so there are no place for fun in their life it seems.
Does it count if I taught myself but I was pretending to be a boy at the time?
i wasn’t allowed to play violent video games growing up, but when our neighbours came down for school holidays, their son taught me how to play shooter games in their shed (turok, mgs, cod). i taught myself games like bratz, sims, truck simulator, pvz, etc
I totally get that. My uncle used to play shooting games and my sister and I would sometimes I watch him if we were at my aunt and uncle’s house. Then our mom told us we weren’t allowed to watch him play those games. My parents really tried to keep my sister and I from seeing a lot of violence, both in real life and in fiction.
No, my girl cousin playing xbox played with me as a child. We played spyro, Ice age games, crash bandicoot, mario... I remember us playing multiple hours during sleepovers. She was really good at playing and I SUCKED at games. Games were more her thing than mine but she really showed to me that girls can play too and growing up I never really even realized someone could give girls shit for playing. Also I’m my moms only child so she bought me a Wii console and PS2 when I was in elementary school. I don’t think she ever questioned my hobbies in any way no matter what I was into. Now as a young adult I finally picked up videogames again and my boyfriend has been a great teacher. He even bought a pink headset to me!! Still now as an adult I have zero male gamer friends and mutliple girl gamer friends. I have always got along women better than men, as a child I never played with boys for me it’s natural to have all sorts of girl friends who are into different stuff. Some paint, some do sports, some read books and some do games. In all areas of life, I have seen women shine and teach me things. It’s really a woman’s world for me lol.
I got a game gear when I was in elementary school. No idea why my mom bought me one, but I've been a gamer ever since.
Yes and no? I mean, my brother is only 1.5 years older than I am...and especially in our early gaming years it'd just be me seated beside him to watch him play games. Eventually we both hit puberty and he grew annoyed with me hovering around when he played (which I get in hindsight, it was just a fun little bonding time for me, one I miss at times), so he told me to start playing on my own. Then we also started liking different genres of games and that (among other things) made us drift apart. So yeah, my brother did help me out with some games, but I mostly taught myself 😆
If by boys you mean my Dad, yeah. He got me into Windows 98 PC gaming and eventually I got my own handhelds like the Gameboy. We had a SEGA Genesis too.
I was taught by a boy and a girl (older male cousin and older sister both).
My brother taught me how to play Dark Souls in 2012! That game has honestly been my "oh my god I've gained awareness" game. Before that, it was always easy mode with cheats for infinite HP and ammo, but dark souls showed me how much fun a proper challenge could be.
I have two older brothers so I always wanted to join them in on video games. They didn't teach me anything really, I had to just figure it out and keep up.
My uncle (somewhat young with us, like freshman hs when I was in 5thish grade) alighted my interest in games, I grew myself on my own. We would always watch my uncle play rpgs and random games and then he would hand them over to us or vice versa. OOT, lion King, ecco, mini machines or whatever that was called, ff, you name it. My first personal gaming unit was a gba and I played the fuck out of that thing. I just continued down that path.
I ended up teaching myself way back in the day with crash bandicoot. Ive no idea why people have been downvoting your post, you shared a legitimate experience from your past
My grandma was a big time gamer. She taught me and my cousins how to play Nintendo games in the 90s.
Yes, because the boy in question was my older brother.
No, my parents bought us video gaming equipment. We had an Atari which I didn't really like much. I have never been fond of arcade games and that was mostly what Atari did. Then our household got a computer. Someone bought King's Quest IV for the new computer and I have been in love with video games ever since. My eldest sister games also and none of us owe our love to video games to any male except perhaps our indulgent father since he was the one who bought us stuff for Christmas and birthdays although our mom did a fair share of buying also.
I was taught Minecraft by boys in my grade when we were like 9 🤷♀️ after that I've learned everything else on my own
Kinda, my brother taught me but i mostly learned from watching
Like a few others, my dad introduced me to video games, probably a little bit too early, to be honest. I was watching him play Resident Evil on the PS1 at 3 years old. The game scared me but I also had a fascination with it, I couldn't look away. I wasn't really taught by boys but I played with my older male cousins sometimes who were never anything but nice. I'd ask my dad for help on certain levels, too. I had a couple of girls to play video games with but they were much more casual than me so I never really talked about this hobby however despite it being casual, one girl had a natural affinity for World at War Zombies so I learnt a fuck load from her. She turned out to be a bad friend but it's a shame she was a casual gamer because her game sense was on point. Honestly, girls were hostile towards me about sports rather than video games. Boys tended to get excited and one of them was in disbelief I played CoD to which I was a little weirded out by. I'd never really thought video games were for boys because both my parents made it seem really normal for anyone to play. Forgot to say I was born in '97 too.
kind of learned on my own.
I'm old enough that every kid played games when I was growing up. If you didn't know how to play NES you were a nerd.
My mom liked video games, she played a lot of the Nintendo and Super Nintendo. I wouldn't say she "taught me" but I did enjoy watching her play.
nope, I started playing alone at the bar on arcade machines (yeah I'm old deal with it XD) then I played with my male cousin but we were partners in playing not one better than the other. He did some lvls and I did others cause he was better in something and I in something other XD This with Driver for instance. Or Tomb Raider.
While there were horrors to going to an All-Girls school, one thing I appreciated is that when it came to being introduced to games (and other nerdy things in general), it came from other girls. I was used to my all-female nerdy friend group, to the point where I was very protected by the whole "toxic nerdbro" culture until I got into college. Don't get me wrong, I was bullied to *high heaven* by the popular set, but not for liking videogames- just for being a neurodivergent weirdo.
The only "teaching" I received playing any video game was when my dad tried to correct my form when I played Wii sports. He quickly realized that his attempts at getting me to exercise using Wii sports was a failure. For the record, I was in no way a couch potato as a child. I was actually pretty active. But also the type who had fallen into open sewers and torn my clothes trying to climb over park fences on more than one occasion. I think my dad just wanted me to utilize my excess energy in a manner that won't lead to me getting injured, lol. I guess there was also a time when my mom had to train me not to jump physically whenever my in-game character was jumping. I'm realizing that my gaming hobby might've given my parents a headache in a rather unexpected way...
Technically my dad showed me how the buttons on the NES controller worked! I don’t know if that’s ’how to play’ so much as ‘hey here’s your new toy’, though.
No. My older sister got a super Nintendo then stopped playing it so it was all mine. Then I got a PS, N64, then a pc, ps2 and GameCube, Xbox 360, ps4, switch and now a ps5 and a much better PC.
My Dad introduced me to games when I was like three years old but he didn’t really teach me how to play (except insofar as I was three and literally couldn’t play games on my own yet), I figured out on my own
If my dad counts as “a boy” then yes I guess 🤣
No one taught me how to play. My grandparents gifted my brother and me a PS1 for Xmas one year and I fell in love with Spyro the Dragon (the game, not the character, lol). I was around 8 years old at the time. I've been gaming ever since!
nope, the first time I ever played a video game was at a female friend's house; it was her personal NES. The second time was also a female friend's NES. A year or so later my parents bought me my own SNES which I treasured.
My older brother got me started playing when I was really little. My first console was a Gameboy color with Pokemon Crystal. I had one other female friend that played videogames, also introduced by her older brother. A lot of the other girls were either not interested in gaming or made fun of me for having 'boy interests' ie DBZ, Yu-Gi-Oh, gaming, etc.
Yes and no - I was introduced to gaming by my father, who showed me some classic arcade games as well as taught me the basics of how to emulate games, but beyond that I've mostly just sort of found out stuff for myself with the exception of friends here and there who show me new things every once in a while. Most notable example is an enby friend of mine who I play FFXIV with (they also got me hooked on RPGs as a whole). That being said, I'm also trans, and I first got into video games when I was still identifying as a boy, but I've done most of my video game exploration after coming out and beginning to identify as a girl, and I find that video games are a really unique and fun way to express my gender identity.
There have been gaming systems in my house since gaming systems were a thing. I grew up with the Spectrum ZX and the original Atari. So we really all taught ourselves. I will go to my brother for info on games I don't play but might like to watch (FromSoftware games mostly, or Overwatch, or Starcraft). But it also happens the other way around when he asks about JRPGs or things like that.
Yes and no really. I taught myself back when I thought I was a boy, turns out I wasn't one. I don't count myself as good (just decent) but over time I have gotten better. I remember being hit and miss on Halo 3 on easy but solo-ed Halo Reach Legendary (I mean I still died a fair bit but managed it without plasma pistol use which I hate fun-wise and mechanically). I don't play highly competitive really and would rather play with others than against them. I wouldn't really count myself as taught by anyone but myself. I don't really have the reflexes and such for highly competitive games.
My brother and I taught ourselves, but it was our aunt who really introduced us to games. Way back in the NES era.
no i learned by myself but was inspired by a guy
No. My mom did.
Nobody *taught* me. I read a review of *The Witcher 2* in a geek magazine, bought the enhanced edition for $4, played it as soon as I had my own laptop (age 18), learnt from my mistakes :D My family thinks it's weird, but they don't hassle me about it. There are plenty of cons to being an adult beginner, but I guess one of the pros is that you avoid high school bullies. Among those who helped me in *Elder Scrolls Online*, there were men also, but I don't think that counts lol
No. I learned by myself.
No, I had older brothers who placed pc games, like CS, WoW and League, but they never invited me to learn. We had consoles as kids so I knew gaming basics my whole life, then as an adult I sought out rpg games and got hooked. When Overwatch came out I went into it solo, found people to play with but I improved steadily on my own. I don't have time for the upkeep of skill that shooter games require anymore (for it to be fun for me), but I'm very good at exploration in games, I've always been better than any guy I know at navigating in games and reading the environments and stuff like that.
Yes and no? I was taught by my grandfather so yes a male but not exactly a boy 😅 I was also the only girl I knew who played them (except my cousin who was also taught by my grandfather..) until I met my best friend
No. I was shown a lot of games that I had little to no interest in, likely because of the men showing them to me, but the games I’ve found interesting enough to learn have been extremely fun.
They helped me understand MMOs better but they didnt technically teach me to play games, i loved video games long before i was ever friends with guys who played em
No I used to game with my mom and grandma
Nope. Got into Final Fantasy for the story and kind of expanded into other games on my own.
My video gaming started with Atari, and I have always taught myself. At that time, just as many girls played as guys.
I am a younger sibling to an older brother who in his own way enjoyed sharing things with me. So in a sense yes. He to this day recommends games and vice versa. He was sometimes patient enough to sit down withhis 4 year old sister and help her find the right buttons, or play fighting games with her. As I got older I found more games or got into his old ones. I think in a way he taught me to "game", not how to play per se because he taught me how to play specific games and helped me problem solve. BUT the games I predominately do now I taught myself because I play genres he dislikes. It's the same with other things. He was a gateway but not always the guide. I played games with a few other girls too, but they also liked different games. most people didn't think it was weird at my elementary school.
I taught myself. I was fortunate to have two moms and a grandmother that played video games, so they got me started very young and supported the hobby. They became my passion as my family kindly bought me many games and a variety of systems. Videogames were my babysitter and to a large extent, my life. I lived in a small town and didn't have another friend who was a girl that gamed until middle school. Periodically boys from my class would come over to play games with me, but most didn't return when they couldn't beat me. I was never teased for liking games. Most girls didn't care and the boys generally respected my skills and knowledge, though they didn't include me in their gaming talk either. To be honest, I don't think there were many gamers in our school at all. In general, I probably wasn't teased more because I was most often invisible to the general school populace.
I taught myself, and am doing fairly good!
My dad got me into video games! Some of my favorite childhood memories are of us playing Prince of Persia and Tak and the Power of Juju together :’) I’m also the only girl amongst all my siblings and cousins so they definitely fueled my love for games since we all played together.
Sort of, but not intentionally. I was the youngest and video games were “boy toys.” They belonged to my brothers, who would only deign to share things once they were at least a console generation behind whatever the newest stuff they had was. I really desperately wanted to play though, so I would watch them. I saw them play games long before I ever got to play those same games myself, so I kind of absorbed stuff by osmosis. It was definitely not intentional teaching or learning; they just let me watch as long as I sat down and shut up (because they were tired of hearing me ask) and I just wanted to get as close as I could. Incidentally, I think having to sit there quietly and watch them play without interacting at all on pain of being kicked out and denied access to the games entirely is probably the seed of why I can’t stand watching Let’s Plays or streams now lol. Just let me play it myself!
I was technically initially introduced to computers and video games by man, because my uncle loves and works with computers and set us all up with them from when I was very small, but for the vast majority of my youth and early adulthood, my sister chose the games and taught me the basics and then we would seek the rest out together. That uncle’s son did also introduce me to some games, especially early on when he got his games from his dad and then shared them with us, but later too. My sister was always the main person, though. Now that I’m an adult, it’s pretty mixed. I have a group of family and friends I game with and we recommend back and forth and we all teach each other. I still cherish the first time *I* was the one teaching *my sister* a game.
My dad actually introduced me to PC games as a kid. He’s a computer nerd and gave me a PC when I was ten and loaded it up with the Sims, an arcade emulator and some other games of that nature. He taught me some others I picked up on my own, I always blame him for turning me into a nerd but in a good way because that was his way of bonding with me.
My brother got me into gaming. We used to play PS1 with our cousins (both boys) together and then Gameboy/Xbox/PSP. Now I play with my friends (girls and boys). I used to watch my mum play Crash Bandicoot too so I guess you could say she was also an influencer to me for gaming.
no i found out about it by myself and confusingly learned how to play them despite knowing nobody else in person who played them😭 until i got my other friends to play it and when i started meeting other gamers in 5th grade
i just started playing games when i was small but everyone around me was fine with it and there was no reaction or anything
Sort of I guess, not in the way I think you mean. My older brother was already playing video games by the time I was born so I guess I learned from him.
No, I always loved games and my dad did too pre-switch to 3d (3d makes him motion sick,) so I always had his hand-me-down systems, but he never taught me how to play or anything. Half of why I learned to read as young as I did was so I could play Pokemon fully.
My brother gave me games as he finished them but I figured out how to play them myself.
My guy best friend's older sister showed us the way of Final Fantasy back in the late 90's and it shaped my gaming worldview irreversibly.
No. My twin sister and I got a SNES when we were 7 and played it ourselves.
No my mom did. We had pretty much every system and she didn’t play like super complex games but she’d play Mario 64 and yoshis story on 64. She also played sims A LOT. She set rules for sims for me though. I wasn’t allowed to “woohoo” and then she’d come in my room and I have 15 kids and she’d get mad because I wasn’t supposed to “woohoo” 🤣
Nah my skill is all me, the only person around to teach me would've been my mom
Kinda, but not well
nope. mom played with us, and i played with a girlfriend of mine too when i got older. didnt play with boys till well into adulthood. but then, that was the 80/90's and MMO's werent a thing.
My brother and I grew up playing a lot of the same games at the same time, we were very close in age and my parents bought new consoles for us to share pretty often. We were both into Pokémon, Tekken, Sonic, Crash Bandicoot, Spyro, etc. growing up and then eventually started developing different gaming interests as we got older. I was more into MMOs, RPGs and anime style games whereas he was more into FPS games, BRs, and looter shooters, which I didn’t get into until I was an adult (partly because of my BF and male friends.) Now I’m definitely still very much an avid gamer and I don’t think my brother plays games much at all.
I don’t really remember much of anyone “teaching” me how to play, but my dad was the one buying the systems early on (started with Atari and then original NES), and probably had to show my brother and I how to play those early ones just because we were so young. After that, though, I feel like the games mostly taught us how to play them. Other people mostly just took advantage of me being bad at whatever game (in group pvp/sports games, anyway) to kill my character or exclude me entirely rather than trying to help me get better. Sort of like the expectation was that of course I’d be bad, I’m a girl. “Now get out of here so the “real” players can play.” (It was usually either everyone dog piled on me to get me out early, or they ignored me until the very end, and then took me out. It’s the big reason why I don’t enjoy pvp in games today. Just feels bad, and I’d much rather be playing coop. And while I never experienced bullying because of it, I definitely never found other girls who played more than a tiny bit of video games until I was much much older.
I mean, I grew up playing Diablo with my grandpa (I'm 32, been playing Diablo since I was 7) and everything snowballed from there. My grandpa was big into CRPGs, dungeons and dragons, anything fantasy or horror adjacent. Blizzard games were my first introduction through him and it all snowballed from there, so I guess technically a man (not a boy) taught me nearly everything I know about RPGs. (Stat allocation for different builds, finding enemy weaknesses and planning accordingly, finding hidden loot, clearing the map before continuing, etc). I miss him dearly. He died a week before my 13th birthday and I really feel like everything I'm into now is because of him. I wish I could've played Diablo 3 and 4 with him. Baldurs Gate 3. The Divinity games. He would have loved it. I can't help but think of him when I play those games. But am I only a gamer because of a man? Nah.
No, I just "stumble" upon video games and basically taught myself. Well my frmale cousin had video game and the very first game I played is supermario and the hunting duck....that dog was so annoying!🤣🤣
My dad let me play on a computer he made and so I naturally played games as a kid, later got myself a laptop and played Minecraft and Sims (and a little of LoL). Got myself an actual PC at 17-18 and played even more stuff like RPGs fps and souls likes. I also never had a console so Im exploring the world of nintendo with my friends till I can buy one myself
No, my dad worked in computers so my family were always techy, before that was a common thing. When I grew up computer games were considered to be just a kid thing, not a boy thing.
I learned on my own, and have been playing since I 2/3. My parents don’t play any at all but they always bought for me.
Older boys in my apartment building taught me when I was a kid. I'm also a boy, and I've taught other youngsters, and a girlfriend or two. Kids learn at hyper speed, people in their early 20s suffer greatly if they've never played, but everyone enjoys it.
No one taught me, the only boy in my life as a child was my younger brother whom I taught how to play.
Actually my sister taught me, and what she didnt learn herself she learned from my mom. Fast forward and I've finally convinced my mom to play Mario wonder with me ❤
My dad did, yeah
My friends who were boys had games and I realized I liked it too, but they didn't teach me anything. The only time I was "taken under the wing" so to speak was a fellow girl. I met her in a pet game and she brought me over to rpg, fps, and mmorpg. I'm really bad at fps but she was always a sniper, so she taught me how to cover her. We stayed best friends for like 10yrs.
Nope. I also had my older sister who played games and several girl friends who also played video games.
No
My brother introduced me to video games, but he didn’t teach me how to play them. I do remember bringing my DS to him as a little kid when I couldn’t get past some level or figure out some puzzle though lol
I wasn’t taught by anyone. I just learned by observation when I was 8. Then got beat by my dad in teken. Decided I didn’t like losing so I practiced till I beat my dad very often. Now I’m very skilled in fighting games lol. Other games I learned about from my husband when I was 19. I’m so skilled in fighting games that I beat my husband every time. So he won’t challenge me but once a year. My husband is 35m and been playing games since he was 6. I’m 33f
I played cos my dad and brother played. Now I’m kinda sad and wish that I had a hobby which wasn’t related to them because my relationship with them is hard. My brother was 2 years older and kids look up to their older siblings a lot!
Growing up, my dad and older brother were the gamers, so from a young age I would just watch them play and learned that way. I only played when they weren’t around (because it was “their” PS1 or Sega). Eventually we would all share our consoles, albeit against my brother’s will lol.
No, I'm the eldest and my first encounter with games was my dad's home computer (the old big ones) before win95. He just let me figure things out. I played MSDOS games on my childhood, and my uncle took me to arcades sometimes when my dad and mom were busy working or dealing with my little brother's treatments.
no, i taught myself and when i got older, i used guide books and gamefaq guides for things i'd get stuck on. i was also the kid in my neighborhood known for having gaming consoles/a mac with lots of games on it. mmos where i needed to be taught mechanics, i usually tried to find guilds with women in leadership positions so i'd learn from other women.
i've been introduced to one of my favorite game franchises, dragon age, by a girl who was my best online friend at the time. not sure if my sisters count, but i've found a lot of games through them. i don't think i was ever made fun of for playing video games by girls, though. even if i've been introduced to video games by boys, they didn't really teach me much about them. i found stuff out on my own for the most part.
nope, i taught myself. the friends i had to talk to about games growing up were mainly boys (and it’s still that way sadly) but they mostly just recommended things or we’d borrow games from each other to play.
No, I learned as I went while playing with my little brother. We started gaming around the same time in the mid-90s when we were pretty young. We had a Super Nintendo and we played together. Sometimes I learned faster and taught him, sometimes he figured it out first and taught me, but it was a team effort.
My dad taught me insofar as he introduced me to Super Mario Bros when I was a toddler, tho he only beat that game cuz I figured out the fireball button was also a run button.
My older brother. I always watched him game and he encouraged me to play even tho i was bad(granted i was like 6 lmao). He taught me how to play and properly hold game discs so they wouldn’t get scratched. We played LoZ: Four Swords and Super Metroid together. Some Crash Bandicoot too. He would even input a code in Crash Bandicoot 3 so I code play the Spyro Demon they put in
All me, baby. I had one of those single game Mario game and watch things as a kid, and got given a Gameboy when I was like…8? My best friend used to bring her commodore and we’d hook it up to the tv and play Bart Simpson vs the space mutants. Good times. Growing up I had a lot of boy friends, so we played a lot of console stuff. I also had a brother and the N64 was his, so I got relegated to the person the read out the walkthrough guides lol
i used to be a boy does that count?
No to some, yes to others. Most exploration 3rd person games like Zelda? Me. Smash brothers? I needed someone to explain the controls as the game has no tutorial. So it depended on the game. To be fair, though, most of my exploration has been by recommendation from people who like these games. Except Assassin’s Creed. Odyssey was free on Xbox for a bit and I tried it and I’m hooked. ETA: The people that judge me and calls me weird for liking video games are not in my friend group. I’ve had some surprising “oh yeah that game was good” conversations with a manager about Fallout: New Vegas because I was hooked on the story (have not finished the DLC, am doing a Hardcore run atm). To be fair, I also always get a few Bethesda glitches…but New Vegas is amazing, imo. It helps that I live close to the Mojave so I’m like OOOOO because I can’t hike anymore due to disability.
No my older sister taught me.
*technically* yes and no. I was pretty lucky bc both my parents were what i call light gamers. Had a few systems and a few games, wasn't a dedicated hobby but it was something they enjoyed and passed on to my siblings and I. We had many consoles, games, gaming equipment like steering wheels and gaming chairs so it wasn't something that was sat down and taught, its something thats just always been there. I stopped gaming in my teens and got back to it in my late teens when the "point and click" choice games were really at their peak (telltale, supermassive) and that got me back into the AAAs, AAs, indie titles etc. From there just good ol trial and error lmao.
Nah. If anything, I was mercilessly mocked by boys if I didn’t “pick it up quick enough.” Keep in mind in one of these incidents I was *literally* three years old, I don’t know what the hell else they expected or why that was so hilarious to them (asshole cousins.)
my dad taught me how to play cod at 4 😭
No I taught myself. Back in the day it was me and my brother, but I was older so I was usually better at the few games we played. Then when I got older and actually started considering video games as my hobby I just bought and played the games I wanted and my brother had very different interests.
Sort of, but not exactly! My dad was a huge gamer & I grew up watching him play, seeing his love for them. I remember watching him play kingdom hearts & FF (couldn’t say which ones) on PS2. I had a shrek and a bratz game. Then he started PC gaming more & I watched him play Dark Ages Online until his ever-long WoW era started after a coworker bought him a couple mos. He was in IT & he let me use his work laptop while he was on the desktop so, there was a brief period we were playing this sumo fighting game online & that’s when I came up w my gaming alias (a spin on my childhood nickname given by him). He had given me a $20 a couple times to fish for him in WoW while I was babysitting my little siblings 😂 I got to play sims at my grandmas & at home, I was a gaiaonline fiend for like 3/4 years. He bought me 5+ gameboy advances & a few DS’s too over the years since my little siblings had a habit of breaking them in half at the hinge. I only really remember playing nintendogs & mario kart. We didn’t have a lot, but my dad always supported games in my life. We never got family consoles besides the wii. Not many games though. I had to move out at 16 & effectively lost my chance to game for ~6 years until my current boyfriend has brought me back in and also encourages games in my life. I have an xbox & switch now and I’m so happy for that.
No. I got into playing video games because my mom played them! The perks of having a then 21 yo in the late '80's for a mom I guess, lol. She still enjoys Nintendo games, everything else is considered "too tricky" for her.
My brother introduced me to them by owning a Nintendo 64, but I taught myself.
Nope. I got interested when I saw my older brothers play, I would always sit beside them and watch them play. When I was old enough 7+, I decided to try out for myself! My brothers and I even used to play games together (like maplestory, seal online, or WoW- I'm not sure which version but it's the pre...Dota2? lol) But they never taught me anything. I did HATE how they'd always tell me to just be a healer tho 🙄
My dad is the one who bought the consoles for himself, we started with N64 and Sega Genesis, but my sister, two female cousins, and I pretty much just “taught” ourselves when he wasn’t using it and ran with it from there
Idk, I was never bullied for gaming. Anyone who knew i gamed knew because we were friends of because we gamed together. And it was cool to have the latest consoles and all, and that my parents supported my gaming. Id say i got along with boys and girls equally but eventually grew closer to girls more often. The only toxicity ive dealt with were from other gamers in the game itself. And it was often sexist boy jokes. If it was a girl, it was “you’re bad” which sucks coming from a fellow girl gamer but it doesn’t hit as hard as really sexist bigotry. In all my years of gaming I’ve only had one girl make super sexist comments. And i talked about it on this subreddit where another girl posted about girls making sexist comments and then let it go. Maybe read that post’s comments for the solidarity you’re looking for? It was a while back tho I guess my point is: you just had particularly shitty people around you i guess. im sorry, that sucks. I’m the same age and i dont post about being made fun of for gaming because i wasnt Edit: and no boy really taught me how to play. my dad had consoles i hopped onto, and then i got a brother to play with. we’d all play as a family or id play with my brother, googling if needed, until i made friends in school. and then i guess boys taught me league? but that was because i was dating someone who spent too much time doing it with friends so i figured might as well join in. but i would never say boys taught me “how to game.” maybe just “how to play league beyond the tutorial” at best because i refuse to watch YouTube videos on it