I WILL be uncommonly candid with you here, folks, and confess that I’ve never really got computer gaming. I know: my bad.
Lord knows, I’ve tried. Some of it looks right Lord of the Ringsy, which should float my skiff, but it just seems so naff: bad cartoons on flat landscapes with characters moving about jerkily. I just don’t get how it is so unrealistic; can’t see how anybody could possibly escape into this.
I even went so far as visiting a gaming shop – well, it was in a mall where I was doing my proper shopping – and couldn’t find one game that didn’t involve violence.
True, you could probably say the same about movies, where every problem is solved with a punch or bullet. But, all the same, while I wanted to like games – anything, please, to distract me from the real world – I just can’t get into them.
Perhaps it’s because I’m not very bright. Many gamers are and, indeed, the sedentary pastime requires objective-setting, strategy, hand-brain coordination, patience, focus and analytical ability. Certainly, it sounds more demanding than Ludo.
All of which wittering is by way of announcing Insomnia X Resonate, a gaming extravaganza coming to Glasgow this week and expecting 10,000 visitors.
It will have interactive shows, panel talks, and opportunities to try any amount of games, both modern and retro. The main stage will showcase the Switch, the latest console from Nintendo, and there will also be a Scotland v English match between YouTubers.
The “turn up & play” schedule includes PC, PS4, Xbox, WII U, and TUPS tournaments, including Team Deathmatch and Kill Confirmed. The interactive zone sounds a bit more touchy-feline, with Mao Mao the Cat-Dragon, while games in the virtual reality zone include Space Pirates, Unseen Diplomacy and Fruit Ninja.
The Retro Zone includes Super Nintendo Campus Challenge 1992 and, from the same year, Sonic 2, where competitors are invited to “race … to the Death Egg Zone in this sidescrolling platformer”.
This has been Robert McNeil, and I have had no idea what I have been talking about.
Insomnia X Resonate is at the SEC, Glasgow, July 21-23.
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