How a Life of Playing Video Games Made Me a Better Creative
by Ryan Farmer, SVP and Creative Director of Mad Genius
Ever since I can remember remembering, I have loved video games. I remember squeezing in rounds of Excitebike before kindergarten carpool. I remember visiting homes for my parents’ dinner parties and searching for the room that had the gaming system in it, then disappearing for hours. The controller has always felt natural in my hands. Eventually, my parents were embarrassed enough by my actions that they decided to get a gaming system for our house. They bought me a Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) with the hopes that I would play it a bunch, get burned out, and put that “fad” behind me. Thanks, Mom & Dad.
I wanted new games for my birthday. I wanted fist-fulls of quarters to go to the arcade with my dad and brothers on weekends. I would park weekly at the grocery store magazine aisle to read the latest Electronic Gaming Monthly and GamePro while my mom picked out the worst tasting vegetables imaginable. I could not get enough video games in my life.
In college, I was introduced to a major that is planted firmly in the middle of an art and computers Venn diagram: graphic design. My personal passions were lining up with my school work, and it was awesome. I got to make things on the computer, then go back to my dorm room and play games until I passed out. Those college years, plus a few kidless ones right after school, were my gaming “prime.” My circle of friends was centered around getting together and shooting zombie Nazis or red- and blue-hued Master Chiefs. This was fun and all, but we wanted to be challenged, we wanted pixelated glory. I decided to join my friends in the ultimate test of video game prowess, a raiding World of Warcraft (WoW) guild. We played religiously for years, achieving great feats of digital strength that inspired generations of wide-eyed youths. (Translation: we have an infinite supply of stories that our kids roll their eyes over.)
So, what does any of this have to do with being a professional? Great question. The best example I can find to bridge these ideas comes from an article I read in Wired about someone who listed being a WoW guild leader on his job application and how it helped land a job. I remember being shocked that a business decision maker would actually have the wherewithal to appreciate this, and being shocked that yes… yes, this was absolutely true. Let’s unpack this in ten different ways:
A life of gaming made me a better professional by:
- Exposing me to new art styles, worldviews, and sources of inspiration.
- Giving me awareness and insight to a booming industry with its own subculture.
- Forcing me to think about good design.
- Thrusting me into cutthroat competition.
- Giving me situations to use strategic problem-solving.
- Working with others towards a common goal.
- Placing me in leadership roles to make tough decisions.
- Prioritizing efficiency in order to succeed.
- Requiring research in order to understand the game.
- Fueling passions that are creatively fulfilling.
Exposing Me to New Art Styles, Worldviews, and Sources of Inspiration
In 2012 the Smithsonian American Art Museum formally recognized video games as an art medium.
“The Art of Video Games is one of the first exhibitions to explore the forty-year evolution of video games as an artistic medium, with a focus on striking visual effects and the creative use of new technologies. It features some of the most influential artists and designers during five eras of game technology, from early pioneers to contemporary designers.”
I’ve known this my entire life. I have stood mesmerized in awe thinking that “Graphics technology will never get better than this” a few times in my life. I have wept over a story where my character tragically fell to the antagonist in an 80-hour interactive story. I have used patterns and forms as the muse for my designs. Yes, you will read about congressional hearings over video game violence. Don’t let those stories keep you from seeing the absolute beauty in an art medium centered around the user actively participating in and sometimes dictating the story. I don’t visit many museums of art, but I have garnered more creative inspiration from video games than any oil painting ever could.
Giving Me Awareness and Insight to a Booming Industry With Its Own Subculture
The video game industry is on track to pass the $200 billion mark by 2023. The average age of the US gamer is 35 and the US gamer population is 54% male and 46% female. The average citizen is actually less worldly by not playing video games, and I have been firmly entrenched in that demo since I was six years old. Every time I see a gaming slang like “trolling” or “sus” infiltrate mainstream dialects, I am already armed with context, years of usage, and ideas for how to use it in creative communications.
Forcing Me to Think About Good Design
When I have to press and hold three buttons to do something that should take one action, it is bad design. When I can’t read the text on screen because it has too many sparkles and not enough contrast, that is bad design. When I don’t notice anything frustrating getting in the way of my experience, that is good design. These core principles have deeply impacted my ability to think about how good design is applied to website interfaces, outdoor boards, and anything that requires rapid communication.
“If the user can’t use it, it doesn’t work.”
—Susan Dray
Thrusting Me Into Cutthroat Competition
I am a very competitive person. Probably the most competitive person you know. My heart still races when beating my kids at Mario Kart. I resist the urge to throw controllers when I don’t. I don’t like to play things that I can’t win or succeed at with practice. I love working on all the little things that add up to the winning formula, and a lifetime of trying to figure that out digitally has helped the discernment carry-over at the business level. It’s fun to win, and it’s motivating to lose.
Giving Me Situations to Use Strategic Problem-Solving
“I got taunted near the tower and lost the lane.” “I got taunted near the tower and lost the lane, again.” My League of Legends teammates loved me. I quickly needed to figure out a different approach, or we were going to have zero chance at winning. Every game is a puzzle, and the experimentation of keystroke combos in clutch moments can really get the blood pumping. Looking at a client’s creative problem and experimenting until the unique solution reveals itself is equally invigorating.
“Creative without strategy is called ‘art.’ Creative with strategy is called ‘advertising.’” —Jef I. Richards
Working With Others Towards a Common Goal
It’s really fun to win, but it’s even more fun to win with friends. If you are playing a modern online game, you are likely playing alongside a collection of other humans, trying to win together. If you can’t carry your weight in the role that you are designated to play, you won’t have much success. Some players are drawn more towards a supporting role. Others like the glory and choose to be the vanguard. The way in which all of these different pieces come together in harmony can be a beautiful thing, both in gaming and in business. I cannot think of a single successful advertising project that was executed by one single person.
Placing Me in Leadership Roles to Make Tough Decisions
Back in the WoW raiding guild days, it was super cereal. We had designated time slots to show up for raids, with attendance records, performance charts, and a merit-based loot distribution system. You had to put your best people in the best situations for them to succeed, and sometimes that meant hurt feelings. You needed to be clear to a group of 50 people what the expectations were and what the consequences were for failing to meet those standards. And, you had to live those standards yourself as all eyeballs were focused on you, ready to scrutinize. It sounds silly, but no greater experience in my life prepared me for the management of people.
Prioritizing Efficiency in Order to Succeed
“Time is money” is not a concept I struggle with. It just started off as “time is rupees, gold coins, crystals, credits, or gil.” When you take hundreds of little actions every minute, they all add up. When you swap between dozens of different tools in Adobe Photoshop, it adds up. I can fully appreciate a nine-button mouse, macro scripts, cursor sensitivity, and translate that over to keyboard shortcuts, batch processing, and anything else that takes a three-second action and turns it into a two-second one. A commitment to this thinking reduces the amount of lost time and allows for more time to think about creative solutions.
Requiring Research in Order to Understand the Game
A few times a year, I get the privilege of talking to college students and sharing advice on how to get hired in an ever-shifting market. The best skill to learn isn’t a deep understanding of Photoshop filters or CSS. The best advice I can give is learning how to Google stuff constantly, and live there. Odds are, there is some math nerd out there in the world who has figured out how to get the highest DPS on that raid boss, or how to get around your website navigation not working in ie8. There are probably charts.
Fueling Passions That Are Creatively Fulfilling
I was created with an itch that never gets fully scratched. This trait isn’t a bug, it’s a feature. I need to constantly fill that void up with the new and interesting. Video games and creative advertising are my backscratchers. A new game can open up my eyes and get me out of a creative rut. Replaying an old favorite can give my mind some much-needed comfort food to decompress from deadlines. This last point is less of a cause and effect example, and more of a common ground as my life-long passions that can’t help but be similar in nature. Lord willing, I’ll be playing games with grandkids and telling them stories about the projects I was lucky enough to work on.
So, what am I playing these days? Nothing with the intensity that I used to play with. I have four kids, it’s hard to get any time on the TV. For whatever reason, they don’t really like to watch me play. But, I’ll occasionally get on and play with them. There is no way that I’ve played less than 10,000 hours of games in my life, and they can still beat me in Mario Kart. Malcolm Gladwell is sus.
If you’re curious about working with an agency staffed with people who leverage their experience of being complete nerds into exceptional creative work, contact us.