Okay so you feel "bullied and harassed" and (if I'm interpreting your responses right) feel people are ignoring your responses and just telling you to shut up because they disagree with your disagreement with Bob's work? Is that right?

I think I'm going to pull out all my legos and lay in them to celebrate this film.

... I wanna see it.

There's some great talent in there. Amanda Seyfried ,Neil Patrick Harris, Giovanni Ribisi, Sarah Silverson. Looks like a fun flick. I'm in.

"unprofessional"

Pot calling the kettle black?

Great episode.

"....2 dimensional to 3 dimensional dimensional space.." -facepalm- I'm a college student.

"I have to skip Christmas this year due to my financial situation."
^I'm not commenting or assuming anything on your present situation. I was commenting on the fact that your statement was dismissive of anyone that doesn't identify their "gamer-ness" with their "cred".

3

Why would I mention a "Z-list" critic then? Because that was the moment I realized there was more to this social identity of gamer than being and elitist, there was critical thought. That is when I started to look at games with an analytic eye. That is when I feel there was a change in my level of "Investment" "Gamer-ness". Oh, that's right, you think it's the "Cred" stuff that makes a gamer. Fine. Despite already having college credits for culinary, I changed my focus of studies in High school and took the newly offered class Game Design in the tech wing. Only having a simple 3d design class prior to this, I wound up surpassing the teacher and teaching half the class. I have 3 different builds of games on my computer that will never see the light of day, simply because of the bugs and my new understanding of code, but they entertain me. After high-school I went to a tech school to study graphic design(planning to get a better understanding of designing huds, character models, and visual conveyance) but mostly because they offered a game design program(later this turned out to be less then I imagined). I transferred to a university and worked two jobs over the summer just because I learned they had a game journalism internship. I'm contributing writer and designer with a small (15 people) international(art department is in Canada) game company (we're a third completed with our first project rpg for tablet). A double major I attribute every ounce of academia I gain to video games. I put the same amount of research and effort into my bi-weekly column for the game journalism internship as I do my midterm papers. I live, breath, eat and sweat video games.

But I didn't bring any of this "gamer cred" crap up because I know it's nothing more then a masturbatory act. What ticks me off, is when people think they're expression of their investment in gaming either is or should be the standard of what it means to be a "real" gamer. And that they have the right to dismiss another's experience or validity as "gamer". And that's exactly what you've done. Sure an interaction with the media in some degree might be a prerequisite but to attach any number of hours or list of titles to that are a "necessity" before someone attains the label of "gamer" creates a definition of the word that breaks down in reality. And it is that exact tendency. That exact dismissive-of-others, entitled, elitist hipster attitude that gives gamers a bad rap. It's that exact crap that Bobs referring too when he says there are people that want games to be a "man's space". It's that illogical bigoted mindset that's resulted in anyone who has a valid qualm with Anita being shut down and marked as a manoginist pig.

Congratulations, you've highlighted the kind of thinking that is the problem.

2
Do you see the flaw in this "I played more then you." logic? Please tell me you do. Because if your only back up for being a gamer is having played games when you were young I have news for you. You're in a generation where everyone has played games. Hell Anita's got that! We've all seen the picture. She included that for the soul purpose of not having to deal with that idiocy. She very well could have been playing the same games you were, at the same time. This logic is akin to "You weren't born in the sixties, you don't really like the Beatles." It really is, think about it. The logic of that is "Because you don't have the exact shared memories in the same context with the material that I have, I don't validate your experience of the material." The notion of "you had to be there" does not apply. Games are a complete experience and their influence on the player does not degrade or become any less meaningful to the player if the game happens to be popular or not. (here an argument could be made that mmos evolve and the experience changes but that's neither here nor there.)

As to your judgment of the moment when I said I really felt like a gamer. I distance the identity of Gamer from the act of gaming simply because everyone games, it's nothing special. And don't fool yourself into thinking that gaming "wasn't cool" in the 1990's because it was. Let's be real that was the explosion of the home console market, things just don't explode before they're "cool". At one point when gaming wasn't widespread, early arcades, sure that is what gaming might have been. "Gamer" defined by simply the act of playing, but through the nature of the medium and social group dynamics I tend to doubt it. The reason I didn't take this stance of "I game therefor I am" was because I realized people who had better luck then me and had consoles at home, who played games in entire series, people who had money to buy guild books and then as result could spit out facts and names, aren't automatically gamers. The "-see these are real gamer's because they distinguish themselves from the general 'I game' population by having the privilege and opportunity to know a bunch of trivia." is a bullshit mindset and we all know it. I could get on Google in the public library if that made me a gamer. The ability to do a Wikipedia search doesn't mean jack. Sure back in the day it might have been more valid, because it was a reflection of true effort, a sign that you were INVESTED. But to measure someone's investment in gaming by the economic status they were raised in, the amount of the medium they've had the opportunity to explore, or the moment they discovered their love for the medium, is idiotic.
"You don't know final fantasy? Don't talk to me." "You haven't heard of Earthbound? Casual." "You know, some us were "gamers" before it was cool." To try to measure my Investment in this media, my "Gamer-ness" by something so material, that's just hipster.