Brandon Sheffield, Senior Contributing Editor at Gamasutra and Editor Emeritus of Game Developer magazine, has announced in a recent op-ed that it’s time to retire the word “gamer.” This meme comes up once in a while – don’t call them games, don’t use the word gamer, etc. – always with the same basis. It’s derisive. It minimizes the medium and the hobby. Yadda. These articles, including Sheffield’s, usually leave something out, though: what “gamers” should be called, if they can’t be called “gamers.”
Kotaku weekend editor Owen Good has a terrific and thought-provoking article worthy of discussion: he’s currently acting as a live-in caregiver for his 86-year old grandfather, a WWII vet and Harvard MBA who’s been asking him recently about video games in general. Owen asks the Kotaku crowd how best to introduce a man who’s never once experienced one – but is genuinely interested – to the medium we all love.