I used to be a pretty big gamer growing up, I don't play video games very often anymore outside of some Clash Royale on the phone..
Though.. It was a significant part of my life, I made some good friends doing it, gained some great memories, learned a lot and even made it pretty high in the ranks of some of these games.
For example in Rainbow 6 our group NFN/negh went pretty much undefeated 24-0 and to 2nd place before we got banned for some unruly behavior from our members, I was a lil guilty as well.. We were kids though! I mean.. What do you expect, kids can be savage especially cause they're still learning and this world raises us on violence and power and greed and dominance.
Anyways.. My favorite game EVER.. My #1 pick is an old game called Suikoden 2. The one before it and the ones after it were fun as well.. But #2.. Really hit me..
It was the only game I think I ever played where I literally felt depressed and sad when I beat it.. I wanted to keep playing it forever, I wanted it to sort of be my life.. I wanted to live in that game.
The story in each game I've played is very similar.. You're basically a charistmatic individual who is at odds with the current government and you meet up with other likeminds and at some point in the story find or obtain a castle as a place to sort of set up and build and resist the empire.
It's sort of a regular role playing game where you go around doing quests and fighting and leveling up, but.. The castle element made it epic.
Each hero in your group would have a place in the castle they tended to hang out, and you could do all kinds of things in your castle like have cooking competitions and musicians playing and spas and places where you could buy or sell stuff and also serious rooms like the "war room" where you would plan strategies and such.
Eventually you have to go to war with the empire because like most empires they don't seem to like free peoples minding their own business and see it sort of as a threat to their own power and way of life.
And.. Looking back, I think one of the reasons I vibed with that game so much was.. It was sort of displaying principles in me I probably didn't really know I had yet that I would later develop in life.
Some qualities I already had, like trying to be an honorable person and such, trying to fight back against oppressive forces..
Yet.. There was also an element of "Anarchy" going on.. Cause while the character you play in these games tends to be the "leader" or one of the main characters or whatever.. It's not like you're a king, it's more like.. You're just one of many very influential people who are coming together to resist and it's more of a group of likeminded peoples who believe in freedom than it is a society of royalty or decree or "force" like modern governments kind of are per se.
It's more like a rag tag group of regular people who are just sick of being oppressed and decide to finally not take it anymore and they create their own community and try to live free and then like usual the powers that shouldn't be try to encroach.
Sorta like.. The story in Star Wars or Braveheart which was based on a real story and it's sort of like the US fight for independance also and other things like that, it's sort of a common theme through history with freedom minded people and governments of control.. With the resistance and the "empire".
Also in that same vein.. Suikoden means "Water Margin" or "Outlaws of the Marsh", so they are sort of like outlaws that come together to push back against the tyranny of the times.
Anyways.. Moving on. Most of my life I've tried to push back against what I feel is the "evil empire" in my own ways, which is mostly just speaking out on the internet and talking to people and making artwork like poetry and movies and stuff.
And to tie this all together and explain the reason why I'm even posting this is.. In recent times, perhaps starting around a year ago or less..
I mean I've known for many years I want to be a movie maker, though around a year ago I got extra serious about it and started especially trying to grow on YouTube and started even doing vlogs and things like that..
Because I wanted to try to make some money while also doing what I love.. Speaking out against power.
When I was researching how to grow on YouTube I remember one video where someone explained how.. Having a video on YouTube is sort of like having PROPERTY in the digital world.
So.. I started looking at each video as a separate building and each view a person walking through and each follower or friend as someone who is hanging out in my "castle" and the YouTube channel itself was the "castle"...
And it really started to make doing all of this a lot of fun, because.. I was starting to see it as my absolute favorite game growing up.. I was building my digital buildings in my digital castle and making digital friends who were sort of likeminded in our opposition to injustice by governments in the world or the "empire".
Additionally I saw a Tedtalks video recently about a woman who is a game designer who had a serious injury and her life was unbearable until she started looking at it as a video game.. Like the happy moments with family she would consider a "power up" and the difficult parts she would sort of see as the "bad guy" or the "villain" so to speak as challenges in the game she had to overcome... And when I heard that, what I had already been doing started making even more and more sense.. Cause.. It was also likewise for me, giving me more motivation to do what I wanted to do in life since it was linked to one of my most favorite things ever.
Not too long ago I had a video reported and taken down for copyright stuff on YouTube.. I then decided to delete all other videos I was a bit questionable about and it felt like I had been "attacked" by the empire.
They took one of my buildings down in my castle and through the thought of losing my entire castle I took other ones down as well.. They succeeded in hitting me hard right as I was starting to build.
Plus just recently I am now worried about having my whole channel deleted because I heard they have been doing that and there is graphic images of war and stuff like that in a few of my videos and I don't want to delete these out of principle.. I'm going to see if they decide to censor me and delete me or not..
I'm still so small and no Pewdiepie, I can't put up much of a fight against the empire and in the end on YouTube.. You're ultimately at their mercy...
I started thinking about this more recently.. If they're possibly about to delete my channel, I could definitely rebuild and do it without the graphic images and stuff and I probably will.. Yet.. That's not enough anymore.
I also see the trends and I see that it looks like YouTube is sort of dying because of these policies and other new technologies and social medias that are coming out that are more free. So why should I invest so much in a dying platform?
Then just recently I started looking at my steemit account as like my new "castle", I still have YouTube, and I even have Facebook and Instagram a lil bit as well, so in reality my "castle" extends out over numerous different platforms and if they delete me on YouTube, I'm still elsewhere..
In fact.. On steemit.. It seems like I can't be censored or deleted nearly as much... So.. I sort of feel now like steemit is my "main base". I have the most subscribers/followers on steemit and it rewards me with actual investment which I can turn into real money.. It just makes sense to me that steemit right now is where I wanna build the most.
Facebook used to be a lot better for me until they nerfed the algorithims and I cleaned up my list a bit, though now it often feels like a ghost town.. My instagram is small too and almost entirely just photography based.. But I do still plan on keeping a presence on the other social media I'm on and perhaps even extending to other platforms in the future.
I hear there's another new one that pays people called sola and I wanna look into that more when I get time.. Though.. I think trying to look at this all this way for me is very helpful and will give me even more energy to do what I love and keep fighting against the injustice I see in the world.
And strangely enough.. This metaphor world or reality I've created to mirror the real one, it has a lot of interesting truths to it.. It all overlays very well.. Cause.. I do feel like I've been trying to push back against injustice most of my life and I'm trying to build something and many others are too, and now on steemit we're all meeting together in a place and in a sense.. steemit itself is sort of like a metaphor for Water Margin.. Or.. Outlaws of the Marsh.
Cause.. Many of us are anarchists who have gathered here, and we believe in freedom and are against injustice and ruthless empire... And we've gathered here on the steemit platform and who knows.. Maybe some really amazing things will come out of it and the world will be changed in many positive ways and we can push back against the empire a bit more than we could before.
Gonna end this shortly, and in summary I just sort of want to say that.. I'm now looking at all of my presence on the different social media as a sort of metaphor for the Suikoden series but especially Suikoden 2.
I'm looking at my attempts at building a presence on different social media as similar to me as owning property in the digital world and building houses and castles with the end goal of spreading more freedom and peace and honor in the world, yet knowing.. That the ultimate end result is likely to be a confrontation with the "empire".
And I don't mean that in like I'm going to physically fight or try to overthrow any government so please don't indefinitely detain me without a warrant or worse, lol.
To me it's more a battle in the minds of people, I'm trying to change the way people look at certain things, help reconnect them with their empathy and compassion.. Yet, metaphorically it is sort of like a battle.. Which is one reason I always like Alex Jones's choice of the name for his show so much.. Infowars.. That is one of the only things I really agree with him on.. This is an information war.
As weird as it may sound.. I look at the random people who interact on my social media as people basically just walking through my town and checking it out, just regular people who are curious and want to socialize or whatever.
And I look at all of my friends or subscribers depending on the platforms as "heroes" especially the ones who are very likeminded in regards to injustice in the world and trying to do something about it or at least speaking out about it or researching it and being aware of it or whatever.
Though even regular people who aren't into the bigger threat happening in the world in regards to "empire" are still heroes to me, they just choose to focus on other areas in life but are still incredibly useful to the whole cause of freedom in general.
Maybe they cook or play music or do something else, not everyone is a fighter! That's one thing Suikoden definitely taught me is that.. There's a lot of different ways you can be helpful! Even if you're not on the front lines risking your life in a much more literal sense.
Additionally there might even be a few spies or people who just don't like me wandering around through my various cities on social media.. That's sort of normal and to be expected.
That's just life, not everyone is going to like you.
So for whatever it's worth to any of you who may happen to read this.. Whether on Facebook or steemit.. If you're one of my friends.. I sort of see you as a hero. :)
And perhaps in time.. We can all in our own unique ways push back against a lot of the corruption in the world. <3