Meet the Hounds: GamerEdie

It seems kind of weird to be introducing myself to so many of you. I mean, I am the founder of the GameHounds site and have been the host of the GameHounds for nigh on two years. But then, as I take on yet another job at GameHounds — editor and contributor — it occurs to me  that I never formally introduced myself in the first place, so it’s a bit overdue. And if you’re new here, well then, that’s just one more reason that I think a bit of meet-and-greet is in order.

My name is Edie Sellers, and I am an alcoholic. I love long walks on the beach and men who make me laugh. My dislikes are fake people, lima beans and jerks who teabag my corpse in Modern Warfare.

Okay, honestly. Not an alcoholic — but I am, arguably, a gameoholic. And it’s surprising because games are like cigarettes in that both tend to be habit most people pick up in their teens but I didn’t get into until well past the prime.

I avoided both throughout high school and most of college. Not actively, just because neither seemed very interesting. Oh, sure, I dabbled. My first gaming system was a Magnavox Odyssey and we were proud owners of a Commodore 64 with a ton of pirated games, but never did either long enough to make it a habit. It was all very “take it or leave it.”

And then, in my sophomore year in college, one of the guys on the floor of my dorm got a Mac SE and a copy of Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards. And that was all it took. Face down, full-frontal addiction.

However, because I was so focused on computer games, I never made the cross over to the console. The Dreamcast, the Nintendo 64, the Saturn? I had neither a need nor a desire. Those days, technology of the computing world so far exceeded that of the consoles, I was more than happy to drown myself in games like MULE, Pirates, and Railroad Tycoon. Mario, Sonic, or Link were cartoons — kids games — to me. Little pixelated blobs jumping about like golf drives in tile bathrooms. Give me something to build, create, develop, and maintain. Make me multitask! That got my juices running, as did, the Civilization series, SimCity and eventually, the Sims.

But what made me jump over to the console side was my husband. We began dating in September 1999, and by December 2000 (Ed note: Whups. PS2 out in 2000.) he was so sure of me, he obtained the holiest of Holy Grails that holiday season: A Playstation 2.

That was, incidentally, the moment I knew I would marry him.

From that day on, games became an important part of my life — mostly because the PS2 was the first console with titles I really became involved with and enough processing power to allow me to build relationships with characters the way I built civilizations or cities on the PC.

From there, it was all downhill — or uphill, depending on your perspective. As a loyal Apple junkie, my jump over to the “dark side” came with the Xbox 360, which I bought on the way home from E3 the year Sony debuted the Playstation 3. Trust me, many tears were shed that day. Of course, since then I’ve acquired the PS3. And I got a Wii as well. I won’t say that I’m an Xbot, but it is my console of preference for the moment. Some weeks, it’s my PS3, but more times than not, I’m attracted to the ease of social interaction I get with my 360.

My games of preference haven’t changed much since those early days: I still love sims, and I still love stories. But when you can wrap an expansive, fluid, open-world gaming experience with a great, well-thought out story — and you back it with great characters — I’m helpless. My games to me allow me to live out other lives, be involved other stories, live in other places. My favorite games transport me to their worlds and make be care and, in some ways, feel cared about. They can fill a void created by a bad week, or a dull job, or a depressing day with an existence where I’m the hero and I know there will be a happy ending. Where life is exciting and I know with conviction and certainty that I will win against unspeakable odds.

So when “entertainment experts” say that video games can never achieve the artistic level of films or books, I say play my games. Sit with me for 60 hours and see what I see, feel what I feel. Spend a night in an Xbox party running around Battlefield Bad Company 2 with my friends, hanging like jackasses off a helicopter one minute and then saving each other under heavy fire another. Sit with Dragon Age: Origins and fall in love with a bastard prince with me, and sacrifice your life to save his, like I do. Run a team through a collapsing enemy ship with me in Mass Effect 2 and send off the woman you love to possibly die alone in an engineering shaft.

Then you’ll know why I… love… games.

GamerTag: GamerEdie
PSN Name: GamerEdie
Twitter: GamerEdie
Facebook: Edie Sellers

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