- [Craig] Thanks to KiwiCo for sponsoring this video.
(grunts)
Get 'em, get 'em!
Oh, hey!
I'm not gonna actually throw that.
You okay, Nintendo?
Right there, is that good?
Good?
All right.
I was super addicted to video games my entire childhood
and here's what happened.
It shaped who I am and I like who I am.
I think video games can be part of a healthy life style.
True, as I got older, I stopped playing them so much
because this feeling developed when I played them,
I don't know where it came from.
And that feeling is cannibal--
No, guilt.
I know it's stupid to feel guilty
to enjoy something that you love
as long as you're not harming yourself or someone else,
unless I want to be harmed.
That feeling of guilt never happened when I was a kid
when I played way more, why now?
I'm making this video to figure that out
and to hopefully figure out how I can have
a more healthy relationship
with a thing I love.
Cannibalis--
Video games.
(bitcrushed music)
(dramatic musical sting)
- Are we the baddies?
(audience laughs)
- I love the power glove.
It's so bad.
- If you do a Google,
you'll find lots of studies
that show that video games are good or bad.
I'm not gonna go through all of them,
I got some video games to play later.
But, after reading a lot of
"the videos are the baddies" arguments,
I think it all boils down to this.
Ways video games might be bad for you,
you could be doing other things instead,
with your money, with your time, with your relationships,
with thoughts, energy, and your body,
and that's pretty much it.
There's a debate about whether video games
will cause certain undesirable traits,
depression, aggression, obsession by Calvin Klein,
I'm just meshin'.
But that's the whole correlation versus causation debate.
Is it video games that lead to this trait
or is it the trait that leads to the video games?
Chicken or the egg?
Is a hot dog a sandwich?
That one doesn't apply, but it's interesting.
But to go back to doing other things instead,
it's a waste of money, it's a waste of time,
you could be (claps hands)
building a career, you could be exercising.
Yeah, video games might be bad
if you don't moderate, which is true about anything.
What you can do, you can overdo.
Everything in moderation,
I believe it was Nietzsche who said,
"Maybe set a maximum of two or three days
"at a time in 'Stardew Valley,'
"unless you've got a lot of iridium sprinklers
"and you don't have to water everything all the time,
"then maybe add a day or two.
"By the way, do you have a starred void salmon yet?
"I can't find them but I'm trying to
"do it without Googling it so,
"I guess don't tell me, don't tell me.
"I'll find it, I'm Friedrich (beep) Nietzsche."
Also, saying you could've done something "better"
with your time denies the actual possible
benefits of video games, which I'll talk about later.
Also, if you do anything, read a book,
learn some crap, build something, draw something,
listen to music, you will always could have
done something else instead.
FWBMO, forever will be missing out.
One thing, though.
Video games are uniquely immersive.
I'm more likely to lose track of time
playing video games than doing other things,
except for maybe sleeping.
You guys should've seen the dream I recently had,
the graphics were so good.
The writing was a bit artsy and the control
didn't make a lot of sense when I tried to run,
but it was still mostly good, I'll stream it next time.
("Green Acres" theme playing)
♪ Video games is the place to be ♪
♪ Video games is the life for me ♪
Now then, it is time to regale you
with my lifetime video game journey to establish cred,
which is short for "incredibly addicted
"to video games in my past."
I remember the first home console video game I ever played.
When I was a wee lad, my dad brought home this.
The Atari 2600, because pre-year 2000,
numbers that began with two were the future.
We popped in "Frogger" and I played it a lot.
(glasses clattering)
So many dead frogs.
And then, one fateful day in 1985,
a wily scientist sent me back in time in a DeLorea--
Nope, a friend on my block down the street
introduced me to this, the Nintendo Entertainment System.
(NES creaking)
I keep forgetting to get the oil changed.
And he solidified his status as my best friend for life.
Thank you, what's-his-name.
And then my uncle got one and my parents took me
to play "Super Mario", and I played
for nine hours, not an exaggeration.
I had a blister, for real, on the back of my thumb.
I don't know how it happened,
maybe 'cause my thumb bends weirdly.
Anyway, thank you to my favorite uncle, what's-his-name.
Needless to say, I was very quickly addicted.
Well, if it was needless, why did I say it?
"Needless to say" is needless to say.
Love me some Mario, Zelda, "Excitebike",
"Battletoads", "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles",
not the one that I thought it was in the arcade,
but just the at-home one, which wasn't as good,
but I still loved it.
I had a game called "Conan",
which was based on Conan the Barbarian,
not Conan O'Brien, unfortunately,
and it was terrible.
And I played it for hours!
But this was just the genesis of my love,
it was eventually time to move on
to the Genesis, and then the Super Nintendo,
I don't have that one.
Wow, the amount of hours I logged
playing "Final Fantasy III".
Nintendo 64, PlayStation, wow,
the amount of hours I logged playing "Final Fantasy VII".
When was the fantasy gonna be actually final?
Also, I can currently play tons of games on computer.
Love me some Sierra "King's Quest", "Space Quest",
"Leisure Suit Larry", don't tell my mom.
LucasArts filled our hearts with point-and-click adventure,
and then, I went to college.
(foghorn blowing)
My video game playing began to fade.
What's-his-name and I went our separate ways,
I'll never forget you.
I still played video games occasionally,
up to this very day, but not every free hour I could find.
You know, I actually have a gaming channel,
WheezyGamer, that I don't really update right now.
- [Announcer] WheezyGamer.
(beatboxing)
- I did play "Breath of the Wild" in its entirety
and "Dark Souls" in its half-tirety,
and that's where we are.
I was incredibly addicted, it shaped my childhood
in lots of ways, and now, I sometimes get really into a game
but it's not a huge amount.
♪ We guilt this city ♪
♪ We guilt this city on video games ♪
Guilt.
Why?
I think it's because of just the nature of adulthood,
and a family, and "you could be doing other stuff instead."
For instance, my wife's texting me right now.
Our two year old just named her mountain lion Winny
and the big cat she has Kenny, it's adorable.
I love it.
That's better than a video game.
Never cared about stuff like that before.
If you told me your daughter named their stuffed animal,
I wouldn't care at all, I'd rather play video games.
And yes, we text each other in the same house.
It's a pandemic, we like to feel like
we're out in the world, okay?
Also, there's a funny thing you discover
when you're an adult and you don't do things.
(drum roll playing)
(clears throat)
They don't get done! (fanfare playing)
So spending time playing video games
actually does kind of feel like wasting time.
However, I also watch TV, and movies,
and go to the bar with friends,
or I did before the pandemic,
and that doesn't feel like wasting time.
Or I spend lots of time scrolling on Twitter,
actually that does feel a little bit like wasting time.
Wait, why do I feel guilty about that too?
What's the commonality with Twitter and video games
and not those other things?
List time! (claps hands)
Solitary experience.
When I play video games, I play by myself.
My wife doesn't like to play, my daughter's two.
There's hope, she likes to watch me fly through the air
when I play "Hollow Knight"
and we made a "Stardew Valley" account for her
called Adapotato, and I asked her what she wanted
to name her cat and she said, "Puffinnooti,"
so the cat's name is Puffinnooti.
Point is, usually when I'm binging Twitter
or playing video games, I am doing it by myself.
When I was a kid, I would play video games with friends,
but the problem is now, my friends are adults too!
And we live kind of far away from each other.
Yes, you can play video games online with friends,
and I do actually play "Worms" with my friends
and band mates every Monday since the pandemic started,
and it's actually super fun,
and I don't feel guilty about that.
That's different than playing online with strangers
and I tend to like playing games by myself.
Kind of a lone hero. (fanfare playing)
What does that say about me?
I don't know, probably just that I like
the world to revolve around me, and I'm super arrogant,
and I want to hoard all the glory,
which isn't surprising for someone who
made himself his own boss,
making thousands of videos about himself online
for 13 years, that's a separate topic.
Anyway, another Twitter/video game commonality,
they're both open-ended.
A lack of start/stop structure,
there's no bell going off
telling me when I should stop.
Movies have a solid beginning and end.
TV shows have episodes,
I can binge those sometimes too,
and I do feel guilty about that,
but often, I don't.
Mostly because Chyna wants to stop
and I don't want to watch it without her.
But it's more likely that I will let
Twitter and video games go on for far longer
and hinder my sleep.
So with video games, the binge danger is larger,
and as an adult, I feel like I have more
stuff I have to do.
But I also have more stuff that I want to do.
As a kid, I mostly just wanted to play video games,
but now I actually value interaction with people
in person, probably 'cause I don't have it as much.
I also have a career that's very time consuming,
but I also want to do it,
and I spend more time exercising
because of my deteriorating old man body,
and I enjoy it.
The exercise, not the body.
Well, I kind of enjoy my body.
(giggles) Never mind.
As a kid, I just basically cared about
movies and video games.
I would sit there, drinking my Tab and my Yoo-hoo,
wearing my Pizza Hut "Back to the Future" sunglasses,
playing Virtual Boy as I floated around on my hover board.
Those were real, right?
Video games
(dramatic music)
- Maketh
(locks clanking)
man.
- Okay, we established why video games
might be bad and why they make me feel guilty,
but we've also established that I binged video games
hard throughout my childhood, and it made me who I am,
and I like who I am.
Except for this elbow.
Hate you, elbow!
Why can't you be like my other elbow?
I love this elbow.
(clears throat)
So, how exactly did video games make me who I am?
What was good about that?
List time!
Hand-eye coordination is an obvious one,
that really helps me with video editing, driving,
and literally manipulating anything with my hands
while looking at it.
Puzzle solving, again, video editing.
In a lot of ways, making these videos
is a giant puzzle.
Or this one.
Like, I could use this clip right now.
Wait, I did that wrong. (beep)
Like, I could us this clip right now.
Or this one.
That's better.
Memorization, which, again, is useful for these videos
because I have to remember what I wrote
and then say it to the camera.
Problem solving with hardware and software.
My life is all hardware and software now,
but I remember when I would buy a computer game,
I would sometimes have to work for a week
trying to figure out how to get the game
to work on the computer, which leads to,
made me comfortable with failure,
not just with software, but playing the actual game.
"Super Mario Brothers", you could not save the game!
You would play, and you'd get really far,
and then you'd die, and then you do it all again,
and you die, you do it all again,
and sometimes you die before that point
you made it to before and you get really frustrated!
It taught me practice, trying different things,
not giving up, dealing with failure.
When I do play video games now,
the things I get out of it are
it's fun and it reduces anxiety.
Back when we would take airplanes,
when I played "Zelda: Breath of the Wild" on my Switch,
it was the best thing for flight anxiety.
I have mild flight anxiety.
It works better than anything else
at taking my mind off of being on a plane.
Ultimately, I think, in moderation,
video games probably are and have been good for me.
I shouldn't feel guilty about it
and I probably will get over it, don't worry.
And you shouldn't feel guilty about it,
if it's not harming you or anyone else.
You hear that, Aunt Judy?
I can play video games if I want, Aunt Judy!
Another thing I would like to acknowledge
that doesn't necessarily have to do with me
because it didn't exist when I was a kid,
but it's a legitimate career now.
I probably would have pursued it as a career.
If you would have told me I could play video games
for a living as a kid, well,
I guess that wouldn't have been good for me
'cause I would've died of shock,
but it's not just a career in an eSports kind of way,
but also video commentary, live streaming on Twitch,
being a game reviewer, a game maker.
Video games, man.
I'm for them.
Now I would like to thank
the sponsor of this video, KiwiCo.
Right now, kids might be experiencing what they call
Summer brain drain.
Maybe not successfully moderating their screen time
with, yes, video games, but also online chats
or virtual classes, which are good,
but they're also more screen time.
If only there were someone,
perhaps an organization seeking to inspire kids
to see themselves as makers, engineers,
and creators of their own innovative designs and outcomes!
Maybe this organization would provide them with
the tools to become creative problem solvers
and critical thinkers.
Said tools could be hands-on projects and toys
designed to expose them to concepts in STEAM.
No, not the watery vapor that fogs up my glasses,
but that is included because it's scientific,
but I'm talking about science, technology,
engineering, art, and math.
Maybe they could provide these toys
in a box that go right to your homes,
perhaps on a monthly basis
or an individual purchasing basis,
and within that box would be all the supplies required,
no runs to the store.
Wait a second.
That random thought I had is exactly what KiwiCo is, wow!
They send boxes with super fun projects in them
for kids to enjoy.
Eight subscription lines, each catering to
different age groups and topics.
We got the Koala Crate.
What's in it?
Let's open it with my little daughter.
- [Chyna] Ada, do you want to open a KiwiCo box?
- [Ada] Okay!
- [Chyna] Okay!
- [Ada] Okay, let's do that.
(laughs)
What could be all in here?
- [Chyna] What could be all in here?
- [Ada] Book.
- [Chyna] A book!
- [Ada] Oh, what's this?
- [Chyna] What is that?
(toy thudding on floor)
Yellow.
Can you stand on a yellow circle?
- [Ada] Okay. (gasps)
- [Chyna] Okay, what about...
What color is that?
- [Ada] Purple.
- [Chyna] Can you stand on a purple circle?
- Okay. - [Chyna] All right.
- We're doing something!
- [Chyna] Yeah, we're playing a fun game!
- They have a very easy to navigate online store
where you can purchase individual projects
based on age and subject matter.
No subscription needed!
Old one-offs, I like to call them.
That was the first time I've ever
called them that in my life.
Or you can get a monthly subscription,
or three-monthly, or six-monthly, or 12-monthly,
and then get your steady stream of STEAM.
Your STEAM stream.
Regardless if it's a subscription or an old one-off,
you can get 20% off if you go to
kiwico.com/wheezywaiter, or you use the promo code, WHEEZY.
Wheezy, that's wheezy with an H.
The H stands for "heck yeah, that's a deal!"
Also, something very cool,
KiwiCo has created a resource hub
for this time of uncertainty and school closures.
Kiwico.com/kids-at-home,
which is updated daily with helpful content
for parents teaching kids at home.
Thank you, KiwiCo.
That is all.
Thank you for watching this video.
Now you can get back to your
possibly-good-for-you video games.
YouTube thinks you'll like this video.
Here's my previous video featuring three things
that I did to achieve my dreams.
You can support me on Patreon where I do a week-daily vlog,
and I do a monthly live stream,
and a monthly minute-long banjo face.
Do you know what a banjo face is?
This. (banjo music)
I do that for a minute on Patreon once a month,
and it's something.
Subscribe, like, comment!
(high piano note)