Virtual Identities in Video Games

Today's generation of gamers have been altered a significant amount over the years. The advancement in video games has had a tremendous impact on popular culture as a result. Among these advancements have been the ability to play games with people online, or across the world. I remember a time when the only type of multiplayer games were local, which meant you had to sit around on the couch with your friends and play on the same television and console. It seems as though that this type of social interaction and competition among friends locally has and is continuing to become abandoned as games get more and more complex. However, achieving these advancements and reaching these plateaus has not had only a positive impact on gamers, because some gamers use different identities in games creating an socially awkward or dangerous atmosphere.

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Most people would believe that the creation of a character or avatar in a online multiplayer game should be a reflection of that person's real identity to a certain extent. However, Online multiplayer games have come to such an extreme point that this is no longer the case. For some reason, gamers in these worlds have felt the need to deviate their gaming character to an extent to which the comparison with that person in reality can not be recognized. Popular culture as well as the media have had something to do with this by labeling people that play these games as nerds or geeks associated with a negative connotation, to a degree where people that indulge themselves in these games take that to heart and feel the need to alter themselves in an alternate reality I suppose. With the advancements of technology, such as in videogames have had a huge impact on society in terms entertainment purposes, but is not entirely true in terms of social factors of society to the point where people can receive all the entertainment behind a screen and not have to interact face to face with a single person, thus creating a general decline of social skills in today's society and future generations to come if something is not to be done about the insecurities, people such as the gamers with virtual identities in pop culture.

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