Let's be frank: I am a gaming enthusiast, particularly videogaming. My mother likes to tell the story of how, as a young child, I managed to climb up to the family computer and turn it on. I prefer the story of how my dad would sit me on his lap while he played Lemmings, and we would "work together" to solve the puzzles. Of course, I was too young to really understand what was going on; I knew that we needed to get the little green-haired men from one door to the other without losing too many to traps or pits, but it would be a few more years before I understood how that was accomplished. But it was enough; I loved the colorful environments and the classical music that sparked the imagination and the creative solutions my dad came up with to help the Lemmings reach the exit. (Though, I'll admit, part of it was watching the fireworks whenever we got stuck and needed to restart the level. What can I say, kids love explosions.)
After that, I devoured anything gaming-related I could get my hands on. I'd beg to play my cousins' Nintendo Entertainment System when we went over to visit, used birthday money to buy a Game Boy and plowed my way through every shareware games disc we could find. But more significant than any of those, the one experience that I could say has influenced me more than any other, is one I'll never forget: me, my dad and the Skeleton King.
When Diablo came out in '96, I was 10 years old. I'd battled robots with Mega Man, explored alien worlds with Commander Keen, struggled to survive the Oregon Trail and made prime numbers part of my diet, but this looked to be something else entirely. I'm not quite sure what it was that grabbed my attention when my dad brought the box home from the store, but I pleaded with him to let me play it, despite his warnings of violent images (something I hadn't had much tolerance for previously) and disturbing monsters. Finally, he relented, and I started up the game and made a Warrior character. He had been right to warn me; I had a hard time seeing bloody corpses strewn about the labyrinth, demons and undead lurking in the shadows haunted my dreams, and that music made me jump at every unexpected noise. But I stuck with it, partially to show that I could handle such mature content, and partially for the burning desire I had to explore more of these ancient tunnels and uncover their secrets.
After a rough beginning, I started to get the hang of it; armed with a sword, shield, and a few assorted magic spells I'd learned from books I picked up, I was able to hold my ground against the horrors that populated the labyrinth and made decent progress. Then I met my first major challenge: in order to keep going further down, I had to find and defeat King Leoric, the fallen monarch that had been driven mad by the game's titular villain and raised from the dead as a powerful skeletal warrior. The previous boss I'd encountered, the terrifying Butcher, had been waiting by himself in a small room; surely the Skeleton King would be the same, right?
Not quite; when I ran in to fight him, I was ambushed by groups of additional skeletons hiding in the alcoves at the corners of the room and suddenly found myself surrounded. I panicked, got trapped, and died horribly; the unexpected, merciless defeat was so abrupt that I put the game down and declared it too hard, too scary. When I told my dad, he could have given me a simple "I told you so" and that would've been the end of it. But, despite his earlier warnings, he assured me I could handle the fight and even sat down to guide me through my second attempt. He pointed out features of the area I could exploit, doorways I could use as choke points and more easily deal with the overwhelming numbers, and spells I had that would be particularly useful against Leoric and his undead minions.
That second attempt went much more smoothly, due in no small part to my dad's encouragement, and it served as a powerful lesson; that through a cool head and a little bit of preparation, you could face your fears and overcome even the toughest of challenges. It's a philosophy that I've carried with me ever since: to try and remain calm in a crisis, to stay mindful of your options, and to fight back instead of cower in fear. I'm not sure it would've stuck with me so strongly if I'd just read about it in a book or seen it in a movie; it's the fact that the experience was so personal that resonated with me, the time that my dad and I fought the Skeleton King.
I still dream, sometimes, of being stalked by horrifying monsters, of being lost somewhere dark and unforgiving. But this time I face them as a Warrior, armed with sword and shield and powerful magic, ready to confront my nightmares and win.
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