From One End to the Other: MLG and the Wii

In these our modern times, what people thought of gaming and gamers has radically changed. The image of some fat nerd playing in front of his computer has largely been eradicated due to the more accesible consoles that have been created. Nevertheless, these consoles may have come to change more than the gamers' image.
What is a harcore? One look at the wonderful world of MLG will tell you that. Only those who go through rigourous tests can have the honor to become an MLG player...or you pay you way up. Like everything else in life, MLG is all about the money. In order to enter into a tournament, you basically only need to pay the fee and create an account online. The only thing that stops most people from entering is the extreme level of competition of most players in there. These are people who devote almost all day long to practicing in these tournaments. They often live from the sposoring that companies like ATI, INTEL, Ubisoft, and the alike provide for them.

The league is not only for men; believe it or not, there are very hardcore girls out there. Ubisoft, a company that makes games, sponsors what could be one one of the most deceiving teams out there: The Frag Dolls (pictured right). The picture only shows four of a group of about twelve which play everything from PC to Xbox 360. Hence, anyone can be MLG, but if you don't want to go in the first round of the competition, do you? If you guys are interested in battling it out online out go to MLG (click here) to see what's up.

On the other side of the spectrum, we have the Wii which has come to break what a lot of people thought was possible in the world of video gaming. The success of the Wii comes from its super cheap price point . Although most people don't have $250 just lying there in the floor, it is still not such a high price to pay to have some fun. The Wii is a pretty cool machine to bust out when your friends come home. Still, the Wii can have unforseen consequenses for "hardcore" gamers.

Some of these consequences are that as people buy more and more "party" games, the rest of the genres may vanish away. Games like Halo, Half Life, or even Mario and Zelda may not even be made in the future if people aren't buying them. That is why many hardcores are angry at the Wii, because it may destroy all that they care and love.

In the middle, of these two extrmes, we have games like World of Warcraft (WoW). WoW has attracted not only casuals, but also hardcores into its world. Personally, I haven't really play that much WOW since it has a monthly free to play. I don not have a WoW account but I have, seen someone else playing and have often times wanted to jump in. However, WoW also is one of those games that makes the time disappear really fast; next thing you know five hours have slipped by hence, it is not my type of game.

What is the future of gaming? I don't know, really. I just hope that in the future I still get to play first person shooters with a joystick.