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Video games and being succesful
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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LockeTazeline
2390 Posts
If it's the former, then take a break, or at least cut it back a bit. Go find some friends and hang out with them. Being with people can make just about anything interesting. Try out some new things. Explore the arts: painting, music, writing, etc. Look into some of the school clubs and get involved. Even if you don't end up liking it, it's an experience, and you learn things about others and yourself and grow as a person. If it's the latter, then you need to think carefully about whether that's really practical. It's my impression that gaming is a tough area to make a career out of, but I don't know. Regardless, there's almost certainly other things in life that you'd enjoy doing; you just need to explore and find them. Perhaps it would help to ask "What is it about video games that make me like them so much?" and then think about where else that quality is perpetuated. | ||
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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Kalingingsong
Canada633 Posts
Edit: are you in highschool btw? | ||
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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Kalingingsong
Canada633 Posts
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Chocolate
United States2350 Posts
I'm not trying to crush your dreams either, but just remember: sometimes life takes a little bit of perspective. If you can, try to look at yourself, your life, and your future from the point of view of a detached observer. What would that person think? If that person knew you as well as you know yourself, what would that person suggest you do differently? | ||
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IgnE
United States7681 Posts
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Varanice
United States1517 Posts
On March 19 2014 12:08 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: So I don't really have any other place to rant about this so I'm just gonna jump right in to it, I have been playing SC2 for a while now and just video games in general I have recently started streaming on twitch.tv hoping that I could get enough views to have a subscribe button and start making some money off of gaming. I enjoy video games so much and it's basically all I do other than go to school and sleep. But here is the issue recently one of my teachers noticed me not doing well in his class and asked to talk to me, basically he tried crushing my hopes and dreams, he told me video games are a waste of time and I will never be successful if I continue to play them and it is impossible to make a career out of gaming. I didn't say anything about it or try to prove him wrong (Even though I know he is completely wrong) I just let him try to tell me I am a loser and I will never be successful (He knew I played video games because he asked me what my hobbies were outside of school) I don't know why I'm writing about this it just makes me so mad because video games are my favorite thing to do and if I wasn't playing video games all day I have absolutely no idea what I would be doing. I just need someone to help me should I just give up on a hobby I've had since I was 6 years old? I can't really disagree on what was said because I'm probably never going to do anything big with SC2 even though I made a promise to my self a few years back that I would make it to grandmasters league in SC2. I just really don't know what to do anymore. I love people like this. It gives me drive to push even harder. It's perfectly fine that you spend your free time playing games as long as you can control yourself. Imagine for a moment if you were able to drop everything except for games, part time job, and school. And you just gave it 100% your all. Just think of how much of a massive "fuck you" that would be to him, and it would be insanely impressive. Becoming as good as you can at your craft. Gaining a degree. And becoming less and less dependent on another job for income. For me, proving all the people that doubted me in my dreams/goals is one of my most powerful motivators.Your mistake was letting it get to you. You need to focus your priorities on your goals. (Which sounds like school + gaming.) Do you think you have a legitimate chance at making your goals? Are you spending your time efficiently? If your in a position where you can safely (Planning for future, economically, socially, etc.) achieve whatever you wanna do, I don't see the issue. | ||
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Mothra
United States1448 Posts
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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Kalingingsong
Canada633 Posts
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knOxStarcraft
Canada422 Posts
On March 19 2014 13:05 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: My high school is really awful with classes that can help build skills for what you want to do which just kinda sucks. I have thought about programming games and maybe doing art for them. But my school just does not have good classes for computer tech so I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I feel like I was in a very similar situation to yours, though I was pretty social and played sports in high school. I thought I liked comp sci in high school too but it was more of a "oh it's related to video games so I'll do that" type of thing, and maybe it is for you without you realizing. Anyways, I went to uni for comp sci with an entrance scholarship that I promptly lost cause all I did was play sc2 and had a c+ average in uni (DONT LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU). Turns out I didn't really like comp sci at all, and luckily for me I found physics, something I now study and love, and switched into that through the uni internal transfer system. Funnily enough, I now play sc2 at a higher level and keep an A average in uni, all because I play sc2 for fun instead of planning to make it a job. If your situation is as similar to mine as I think it is, I hope you can turn it around before I did, cause I would be $6000 richer right now if I had realized what I was doing sooner. | ||
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LockeTazeline
2390 Posts
On March 19 2014 13:05 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: My high school is really awful with classes that can help build skills for what you want to do which just kinda sucks. I have thought about programming games and maybe doing art for them. But my school just does not have good classes for computer tech so I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I'm pretty new to programming myself, so I'm not entirely sure what you use to make games, but This is a great website to begin learning the basics of some coding languages, and you can do it all by yourself for free. I started it earlier this school year and quickly began to fall in love with programming. And if you're interested, message me your SC2 ID and character code. I'm really busy with school stuff right now, so I wouldn't have time this month, but maybe sometime in the future we could play some games together. In my experience, gaming is always a lot more fun with other people. | ||
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Targe
United Kingdom14103 Posts
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y0su
Finland7871 Posts
On March 19 2014 15:14 Targe wrote: You should stream because you enjoy it, not because you want to get a subscribe button This is a great point. It's important to understand priorities. Is gaming a future or a hobby? (This does NOT mean that a hobby can't remain a hobby throughout your life, just that it shouldn't BE your life.) If something is affecting your future/life (like gaming is affecting your grades) you really need to figure out what's more important ... (I'm working on similar issues if you ever want to PM) | ||
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PiGStarcraft
Australia987 Posts
Hearing advice from a teacher who knows nothing about gaming, eSports and all the industries behind it can be a bit jarring. They're going to be really overbearing and just make out like it's a dead-end. This isn't the whole story though... You know there's streamers, professional gamers, commentators, youtubers, games designers and so on all out there making a living off gaming! So how about instead of dwelling on what your teacher said, let's try and give you some more accurate information about career prospects in the world of gaming. First of all, whenever anything is dragging your grades down, it's a bad thing. School is an important time where you learn the basic skills which allow you to get through university/college. That being said there's also a lot of pointless silly stuff that goes on there. Be smart and keep your grades up by focusing on the assessed work, and ignore the rest. If you can't will yourself to do your schoolwork and graduate with nice grades then life becomes a lot harder. However you do have the option of dropping out of school but if you do that you need to throw yourself into work with all your efforts. Whether that means streaming nonstop (not a viable career path unless you're a very "out-there" person who enjoys interacting with people and doesn't mind being in the public eye - and even then takes huge effort+hours to build up.) - or if it means learning computer programming, web-design, digital-art or something else that leads to a gaming career. The fact of the matter is if you drop school you're going to be diving head-first into a big world of hard work. Making a career in gaming is never easy. Everyone out there wants a job in it and you need to be the special one who's better than everyone else in some way. You can do that through hard work, creativity and good networking skills, but you won't have much of a life. Most days you will wake up and it will be like any other job, just harder as it's more competitive. It won't be fun-fun gaming a lot of it will be the same tedious tasks as you'd find in any other field, just at the end of the day you'll know you're contributing to something awesomely gaming related  .So basically what I'm saying is, stay in school unless you're willing to go all-out on learning these other skills and investing into building a career for yourself. And if you stay in school, keep your grades up. It's really hard as a teenager to not get sucked into gaming and using it as an escape. But this can be really harmful for you. I know I was very lucky in that I had a lot of friends in school and my parents wouldn't let me play many games, otherwise I probably would have been massively addicted. Instead I was distracted by socializing and the fact that it was difficult and expensive (PC bangs) to game TOO much. Make sure you understand that streaming a little here and there or for fun doesn't really lead to anything. Unless you're producing attractive, unique content or one of the top players in the world, you won't attract enough viewers to earn any meaningful sum of money. So don't fool yourself into thinking you're building towards something. What you MIGHT be getting from it is learning how to market yourself using social media/forums, how to present + be comfortable on camera talking to your viewers. How to create unique content, and the basics of video production. All of these are useful skills. But don't think that playing 6 hours a night, even with 20-30 viewers, will be leading to a huge following, ad revenue or large sub donations. Followings in the gaming world can disappear overnight if you aren't very famous or as a game loses popularity and all thouse hours could be for nothing. If you really are committed to getting a job in gaming choose your focus and stick to it. My advice would be if you like building computers start learning IT stuff, if you're really good with computers getting a job in IT can be really simple, and I know in my country with just 6 months studying in TAFE (kinda like community college) you can be earning a good salary doing IT work (assuming you already learnt most of it as a teenager). Alternatively start learning basic programming languages, or practicing your drawing/digital-art skills. If you're crazy enough to want to become a pro-gamer, then focus purely on getting to GM before you think about streaming/marketing yourself and go from there --> it's a long way from GM to getting paid even a small eSports salary (and small salaries in eSports are barely an allowance compared to real life) though. If you really think streaming is for you then you need to be particularly entertaining or unique in your content. This is hard work to do, and even then will take a year of non-stop streaming to get to the point where you can make some small income. Try to find like-minded friends, whether online or in real life and make sure you continue to talk to these people about your goals and ask for advice from the people you trust also. Ok so all of this... what am I trying to say? 1) Do well in school - don't drop out unless you're brave enough to slog down a much harder road 2) Don't fool yourself into thinking streaming a few hours a night is helping you build towards something 3) Don't get addicted to games/use it as an excape 4) if you want a job in gaming - start building skills now by learning applicable skills, choose a path and start learning the basics now, if you can't be bothered, then it's probably not for you. 5) be prepared to work really, really hard at what you choose and don't go into streaming or progaming unless you're absolutely blindingly passionate it and have explained to your parents what your goal is to achieve 5-years from now, and what you'll be doing to help get there as fast as possible. Without your parents support working towards an esports/streaming career is near impossible. at your age. gl mate, do what you love, but only if you're prepared to work really hard for it. Don't let grumpy-old-man teacher get you down! | ||
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betaflame
175 Posts
TLDR: yea you can't really make a career OUT OF gaming. But you can make a career of one involving gaming. | ||
intrigue
Washington, D.C9933 Posts
even if you have some degree of talent and got to GM on your own it still doesn't mean much. i'm not saying to give up - play hard and do your best to improve. but giving school some real consideration is important if you don't want to come out of your adolescence a burnt-out wreck with no skill sets, interests, and social skills. video games are my favorite thing to do and if I wasn't playing video games all day I have absolutely no idea what I would be doing. this is a fair thing for a progamer to say but if you aren't at their level it just becomes really alarming. how many socially withdrawn people wouldn't love to play video games all day? it's the easiest escape. balance your life out dude | ||
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LaNague
Germany9118 Posts
They are badly payed, even as a programmer you earn twice as much in other fields of work. And betting on a career as progamer is like betting on a career as popstar, the chances are just not that high. You can just keep playing games for fun in your spare time, as many do. In this regard, gaming is not unhealthy. How many people come home from work and sit their ass on the couch and watch tv until they fall asleep? Now THAT is depressing to me, but that is somehow socially acceptble behaviour. When i was in highschool, i played games like all freaking day, and yet i had one of the better grades that allowed me to study whatever. However, i was a bit more socially active. Maybe you should try that, you are sorrounded by people of your age 5 days a week anyways. Its really not that much work. | ||
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negatratoron
United States2 Posts
If you spent all your time on schoolwork, you could have straight A's. But there's more to life than school. You can turn the dial, spend more time on school and get better grades, or spend more time on other things and get correspondingly worse grades. I think the most important thing is that this balance is a conscious choice. It's not wrong to spend your time on hobbies instead of school/work. But no matter how you divide your time, my advice is to always stay in control. As I'm sure you know, it's not good to spend all your time playing games while your school-life balance haphazardly falls to one side. I personally have always tried to err on the side of following my hobbies. I disagree with betaflame: so what if progamers ultimately go back to school? The real question is whether progaming was worth it as a life experience. I don't know whether it is or not, but I think it would be foolhardy to toss out the very idea just because you think you'll go back to school anyway. I assume you plan on going to college, just because most kids do these days. When you're writing your college applications, you should make sure that your biggest hobbies are spoken for. If you've gotten recognition related to gaming, that could be a great thing to add. Just because it's not "academic", doesn't mean it's not relevant, and doesn't mean college application readers won't think it's cool. | ||
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ETisME
12413 Posts
otherwise you won't be saying "if I wasn't playing video games all day I have absolutely no idea what I would be doing", you should be saying out of everything, gaming is your fav thing to do. I am older than you, I started playing longer than you ever did and the reason why I am telling you this is because if you don't change your attitude, you will either end up with poor grades and forced to work in long hours low paid jobs and no time to play or you push yourself to try streaming and be successful until you hit reality. I am of cause not saying you shouldn't try, but look at the scene, streamers can make a living without making video game their only thing to do and it certainly shouldn't be because it isn't healthy. | ||
GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
Imagine you show up to a job interview. When asked what you do, you say, "I play video games". Does that impress your interviewer? For some, yes. Why? Because they've worked really hard at playing video games. They've put in so much effort, in fact, that their gaming is now actively providing a benefit for other members of society. So much benefit that some of those members of society actually pay to watch that person play games. But if all you're doing is just grinding games mindlessly because it's fun and gives you a little dopamine rush, you're not doing anything productive. You aren't contributing to society. You aren't filling a need in someone's life. In other words, you're just jacking off. You're spending all your time leveling up a stat that no quest or NPC ever checks. You need to take a step back and re-evaluate your priorities in life. | ||
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dUTtrOACh
Canada2339 Posts
A guy in high school should be questing for pussy, grinding some homework, and most importantly, exploring career opportunities that interest him. If you're super-passionate about games don't even think about a career in gaming, unless you're willing to have a shit life, and eventually grow to hate games. Making games is also very different from playing them all day, but you actually have to be interested in putting in some work, and catering your education in preparation for this. If you flunk out of school, you'll delay your life by years, or completely flush your dreams down the toilet. You won't have money to afford the things you enjoy, nor will you have time to enjoy them. Make some friends, try some new activities (sports, outdoorsy stuff, arts & culture); explore the world of things other than gaming, man. Forget trying to get a subscribe button on twitch. You have no responsibility to try and entertain others like a circus monkey while your life crumbles around you. Focus on what matters. Vagina and Money. EDIT: I'm not saying to give up your hobby, but try and understand the difference between a hobby and an obsession. Learn to manage your time so that your hobby doesn't affect your career (right now, your career is student). Find some time for social activities, too. Lastly, have fun when you play games; don't attach an agenda to what you do for fun. | ||
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QuanticHawk
United States32062 Posts
On March 20 2014 00:39 GrandInquisitor wrote: If you don't have the work ethic to succeed in school, what makes you think you have the work ethic to succeed as a pro gamer? This is really, really right. | ||
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biology]major
United States2253 Posts
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NukeD
Croatia1612 Posts
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negatratoron
United States2 Posts
Don't listen to these people saying video games are a waste of time. They are not. Humans play. It's a fact of life. No one knows whether you should play less video games. Your teacher doesn't know, it sounds like you are unsure, your parents probably don't even know, and forum posters like me especially don't know. Listen to yourself honestly. Admit all your flaws to yourself, without judging yourself harshly. That's easier said than done, but it will enable you to make the right kinds of decisions in these kinds of situations. Unrelatedly: I saw you were interested in programming. That just stood out to me because I'm a programmer. I have always loved video games. The idea of making video games is what got me into programming in the first place. It's a good life Anyway, good luck with your life and everything. | ||
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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Chocolate
United States2350 Posts
On March 20 2014 10:20 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: I'm just gonna quit gaming I'm shit at it anyway, this will just leave me with nothing else. I feel so bad right now because my life is going to be all depression from this point on maybe everyone is right maybe I am good for nothing I don't really care. It was fun while it lasted. Cheers You're just fishing for people to tell you to continue gaming, and poorly at that I hope you find some good new hobbies. A good one to start with, that is admittedly not even a hobby per se, is doing your best in school. Seriously, it's boring but it is the best, and if you get good at it you will meet TONS of interesting people | ||
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Crazedrabbit89
United States23 Posts
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Mothra
United States1448 Posts
On March 20 2014 10:20 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: I'm just gonna quit gaming I'm shit at it anyway, this will just leave me with nothing else. I feel so bad right now because my life is going to be all depression from this point on maybe everyone is right maybe I am good for nothing I don't really care. It was fun while it lasted. Cheers No one said you are good for nothing. Hopefully you will consider some of the good advice you were given when you've finished with the self pity. | ||
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y0su
Finland7871 Posts
On March 20 2014 10:20 Crazedrabbit89 wrote: I'm just gonna quit gaming I'm shit at it anyway, this will just leave me with nothing else. I feel so bad right now because my life is going to be all depression from this point on maybe everyone is right maybe I am good for nothing I don't really care. It was fun while it lasted. Cheers I strongly suggest you find someone to talk to. School councilor, teacher (the one that first talked to you seems to care), clergy, psychologist, friend or even a parent or family member. I say that because I've had the exact same train of thought for the exact same situation...(offer to PM still stands) We all NEED hobbies and free time activities. They help us relax and be able to get back to what's really important. | ||
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Shottaz
United Kingdom414 Posts
Pick a goal (computer science, game design, car mechanic etc) and make that your target, find out what you need to do to get where you want to be. Little anecdote for you... I work 8-5 monday to friday and sometimes saturdays and I have a girlfriend and no kids. Yesterday I took a day off work (mainly because I had a day I needed to use) and played League all day. You will still have time to do what you want to do, just make sure you focus on what you NEED to be focussing on. I don't even understand how some of the weaker pro gamers manage to feed themselves let alone pay rent. | ||
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GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
Imagine if someone told you that they only watched TV, and didn't know what to do with their life if they weren't watching TV. What would you tell them? Tell yourself that same thing. Also, it's high school. I was a real shut-in in high school with few hobbies of any sort. In college I discovered a whole bunch of things I liked to do, and then my life took off. It gets better, man. For example -- you said you like programming but you didn't have any good programming courses. Talk to a teacher you like and see what they can do for you. Try working through something like Project Euler or some online learning course about programming. Make that the center of your college application. There are lots of options out there. | ||
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GrandInquisitor
New York City13113 Posts
I used to be in a very similar place to you. For me, it was movies or the internet. Hours gone. Some people say it's not wasted if you're enjoying yourself. But I wasn't. It was more of a passive, unproductive, numb way to spend my time when I should've been doing something else. Here's what I learned. Self awareness is the key. What I mean by that is when I would say I was going to quit, I would later find myself back on the computer or on the couch watching tv. It took a long time for me to even realize what I was doing. It was like a habitual auto-pilot for me. You have to wake up. Be aware of what you're doing and where you are. If you need to, make a schedule. And adhere to it very strictly. Set alarms if you want. But you just have to wake up and be present and plan your time. Know what you're going to do, and do it. If you don't know what to do, you'll fall back into your natural pattern and just say "I'll start tomorrow." Once you've got that down, you have to make sure you don't transfer the obsession/addiction to something else that's just as bad. The goal is to make positive, long lasting changes. But you also should just take baby steps. That will help the reinforcement. For example, when I first woke up, I would want to immediately turn on the tv or get on the computer or worse: both simultaneously. At first, I did something small. When I first woke up, I would just sit. No television, no computer, no phone, nothing. Just quiet. Allow my brain to wake up, process, slow down, and make plans. The reason I did that is because, like you, I wanted to transfer my leisure time to reading but I was too annoyed/used to a quick fix to immediately start reading all day every day every chance I could. I had to transition slowly away from relying so heavily on screens for entertainment. Don't think you're a failure if you relapse. Don't say "Well, I messed up a little while today so I might as well go back to my old habits for the rest of the day/week/month." No. Small corrections. Positive encouragement. When you do start reading, make sure you are reading things that truly interest you. Don't read something because someone else said it was great and you just HAVE to read it. If you don't like what you're reading, you will stop. Then you'll feel guilty. Then you'll go back to your old habits and feel even worse. So if you don't like what you're reading, move on. Find something else. It's okay not to like everything you read. We are our own worst enemies and problems. But we're also our solutions. So just be honest with yourself, know and recognize your limitations and weaknesses, and move forward with your head held high. The OP hasn't been back in a while. I hope he's doing all right. | ||
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SupplyBlockedTV
Belgium313 Posts
Dont try to make a living out of gaming please. Your teacher probably ment what he said in a good way. You want to live in a team house getting paid a wage that is below the poverty threshold? Yea...you dont get rich from it. Besides that, trying to be the best in a game like starcraft does help you to succeed in other areas of life...so its not a waste of time...just dont try to only succeed in gaming, because while the world of pro gaming looks really cool...its actually a really really sad place...low wages, lots of stress, alot of hard work... i've heard stories from ex-team members who had joined big teams that i will not name...its frustrating when you realise these people are heavily underpaid and get abused like shit. Sorry, but e-sports still has a long way to go...i really hope that in the future it grows into something that actually offers people a real future, and more perspective after their careers...now its only the happy few the happy few that actually make it...you can probably count those people on 2 hands... Besides that, i never once regretted putting many and many hours into starcraft, i am 100% sure it helped me in other areas of life...im now into game dev. So yea, try find some useful skillsets besides gaming and you'll be fine...and who knows, maybe you will be the next big name in gaming! | ||
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