Why I Want My Kids To Get Killing Sprees

I grew up in religious, family-oriented household, smack dab in the middle of the 90′s game rush. Because of this, an uncomfortable contrast always seemed to be looking over my shoulder. My brother, being the only boy out of the six of us, was my best friend and player 2. I was part of a gaming culture that I didn’t even know existed at the time, but at least I wasn’t completely isolated with my brother at my side, memorizing maps and betting on the success of the huge releases that we caught wind of during our daily 30-minute “internet time” cycles. For the most part, all we had was our junky Nintendo 64, about 5 cartridges, and a wishlist that our parents could never afford; even so, those days were some of the best of my life.

First-person shooters were probably the greatest thing to happen to us after my uncle bought an old Xbox from a neighbor’s yard sale. The metal was cracked, dented, and unscrewed so that the top would fall off if you nudged it, revealing the metal spinning machinery inside and chunks of melted blue crayon. But it at least worked well enough to play a cracked version of the original Halo. The competitive levels in my house, after that game entered the threshold, created high enough tension levels to keep us up well after our 9PM bedtime, sweat dropping from our foreheads and punches occasionally being thrown.

But in those winters, while the heater roared on full blast against our toes and the cocoa was boiling, that Xbox was the spawn-point of my most cherished memories. My parents, as strict and worried as they were about me talking to boys or knowing what a penis was, were absolutely fine with me and my bro putting bullets in each others skulls in a war stimulation. My favorite gun was the MA5B Assault Rifle. His was the M90 Shotgun. But we both loved, above all, the M19 Rocket Launcher, and the matches soon became nothing more than a race between the two of us to the rock formation above Battle Creek to blast each other to bits with badly-aimed missiles. It got so bad that we eventually had to establish “house rules”, as if it were Monopoly and not an alien killing-spree, usually banning rocket launchers and sniper rifles.

As a result of those uncountable evenings after school, used up on competitive spirit and laughter, my brother became one of the only ones I could ever talk to in a house full of nosy women and cookbooks. We had a strong bond with a lame secret handshake, all because of the games we played together and pillow fights on a “lava” floor. Where some people see “violence” and “fighting”, we saw challenges and strategy. We kept lists to memorize the locations of every note in Banjo-Kazooie, and took turns with the final Bowser battle in Super Mario 64. Our evenings were not spent on the streets of a shitty neighborhood in Detroit, but in a safe virtual field of collaborative efforts in our living room, surrounded by people who loved us. And let me remind you, FPS games are virtual. The kills don’t exist, and the blood is all pixels; but the teamwork was real. Aside from the occasional case of screen-watching, we rarely fought when games were involved.

I say this now because I haven’t seen my brother in 3 years. Words were said and things were done that could probably never be taken back, eventually sending me on the other side of the map. At the end of the day, I chose to leave the family, and he had to stay; so the burden of the months and co-op matches I missed are glued to my shoulders alone. He might hate me, but that’s what has come to pass, and I’m slowly starting to cope with it.

I might have forgotten a few embarrassing stories of time I first experimented with make-up, or maybe even the shape of my mother’s face outside of a few photographs. But you know what I will probably never forget? The skills, memories, and efforts that were honed and created with a video game that I wasn’t even that great at with a brother I wish I treated better. I developed coordination, communication, and leadership skills, along with a better sense of how to treat people, all because of the multiplayer games I could get my hands on.

When I have children, I hope they don’t make the same mistakes I made. But even more importantly, I hope they learn the same lessons.

And if you’re reading this, player 2: I still remember our secret handshake.