A few decades ago the masses believed video games were a waste of time for lackadaisical youths to pacify themselves while ignoring their responsibilities as both kids and young adults. As more and more people started understanding the benefits of gaming so too did the perception of what a video game is and, most importantly, the benefits gaming can bestow on a person’s life changed.
Hi, my name is James Bullock and I am a gamer who has spent the better part of his existence testing the laws of physics, exploring the vastness of a world ruined, and been a champion inside various arenas courtesy of digitized worlds both driven by reality and created through pure unbelievable ingenuity unlike anything seen by human eyes. And as a gamer I’ve discovered something else video games provide: life lessons. Today I examine how Sega used brand loyalty to make a generation Nintendo haters in the best way possible.
Step Out in Love & Faith
“Fallout: New Vegas” accomplished something very few spin-offs in any entertainment genre does by surpassing a majority of its predecessors and even its successors. Headed by Obsidian Entertainment – the same studio responsible for the phenomenal “Fallout 2” – “New Vegas” mixed the best aspects of the most heralded entries in the franchise then-thus far: a great amount of choices that dictated the narrative’s conclusion as seen in “Fallout 2” and the 3D environments rooted in the first-person shooting genre from “Fallout 3”.
Through financial troubles and their ideas being funded by loyal fans, Obsidian thrived when lesser studios would’ve faltered; giving birth to the “Fallout” experience fans have wanted since “New Vegas” without the “Fallout” name attached as journalists & fans alike were promoting “The Outer Worlds” as “Fallout in Space”. But there was so much more to “The Outer Worlds” than flying through space & destroying human enemies, robots & giant bugs alike mostly thanks to a small town girl named Parvati Holcomb.
Introduced incredibly early in the game and presented as the protagonist’s first “companion”, Parvati is immediately taken out of the Space Tuna-funded factory town of Edgewater that is on the verge of financial collapse. Parvati is left family-less after tragedies & general health issues stemming from the toxicity of factories literally clouding the air on a daily basis; leaving her to become solely focused on being the best engineer possible. Parvati interactions with her new captain while on the road of various planets reveals that she wants more than just being a well-skilled mechanic able to fix almost anything from robots to an electrified hammer; she wants to be accepted for who she is.
It isn’t until the cap’s crew reaches the port town of Groundbreaker that Parvati finds something that makes her feel an emotion beyond gratification for what she’s created by encounter with the incredibly knowledgeable & profoundly commanding Junlei. Junlei & Parvati immediately have a connection rooted in their mutual appreciation of the other’s technical & engineering abilities. But Parvati’s small-town existence prior to the game’s narrative didn’t nurture her budding bisexuality. The cap helps his crewmember & eventual friend find her confidence in stepping forward and admitting her want for more with Junlei. It’s a struggle for Parvati to overcome her general shy & introvert nature to achieve something almost unexplainable courtesy of a love between two people who compliment & admire each other so much. Don’t be afraid to go for love even when it doesn’t make sense. No matter the outcome a life of regret and unwarranted & unanswered questions isn’t a life well lived.
Have you learned any major life lessons from “The Outer Worlds” or any video game for that matter? Leave them in the comments below and, as always, thanks for reading.
