Time to Vent - “Gateway Games”
A few years ago I noticed a term in gaming which for some reason just rubs me the wrong way. It makes my skin crawl and bile rise up in my throat. Well, perhaps that is a little dramatic, but the term “Gateway Game” is the largest load of shit that I’ve seen dropped since a traumatic day in High School when I thought it would be a good idea to eat Taco Bell for four meals during the day.
The concept behind a gateway game is they are a select group of games that will magically transform your average Joe into a full out gamer dork. I can imagine the religious experience one must feel when they realize that all the games that they thought they’ve played and enjoyed are not really games but ways to pass the time and that there is a promise land just beyond this magical wall whose gate can only be unlocked by Ticket to Ride, Settlers and other trite like that.
But before I go too far off the handle, lets actually take a look at the phrase itself. The second word is easy and not really much to question or critique there, but “Gateway” on the other hand drives me nuts. A gateway is something used to separate two areas that are supposed to remain separate and independent with only minor interaction. Now with the way the phrase is used, on one side of the gate is mass produced popular games like Axis and Allies, Clue, Monopoly, The Game of Life; Scene It and so on. The other side of the gate is “hobby games”; these are the games that are published by Fantasy Flight, Games Workshop, Rio Grande, Z-Man, Mayfair…etc. They are the ones that are found in specialty shops and sometimes on little carts in the mall during the holiday season. Since the mythical gateway game is a tool to be used to bring people from one side to the other the assumption is that one group is superior to the other.
So now that I’ve set up how I see the term Gateway Game, I’ll go into a little bit as to why I really hate that term and how I feel it does harm the hobby in general.
I touched upon the notion that one group is superior to the other. This is my first problem with the term. No group or genre of game is superior…People may disagree and offer personal experience or elaborate explanations as to why one genre is better than another, but the bottom line is people will play what they like to play and invest time into something that they are satisfied with the return on. A few months back I was talking with a co-worker about music and he told me a quote from a famous musician (whose name escapes me, but I want to say it was a Blues or Jazz guy). The quote went along the lines of “Good music is whatever music you like”. Which if you think about it no greater truth has been spoken. People may take a highbrow approach to Classical, or think that Rap is degrading the urban youth, or that Country is for simpletons who just like to sit on the front porch, can of PBR in hand and watch the sunset over the rusted out small block pick-up immobilized on blocks. There are parallel opinions in boardgames regarding various genres and bottom line is they are wrong. Whatever you like is your own opinion and as “can’t we all just be friends” this may sound, people are entitled to their own opinions. Just like life shaped you to like what you like, life has shaped them to like what they like. So that is the first problem I see with the term gateway game, it stratifies and artificially places one genre above another. If someone considers themselves a “gamer” and all they play is Monopoly and Stratego then good for them, just because they don’t play the games you want to play does not disqualify them as a gamer or place one person above the other.
That is the other thing, what qualifies someone as a “gamer”. This gateway is to bridge someone who isn’t a gamer and morph them into a gamer, one has to ask “What is a gamer?” To me, this is a grey term (which by the way is also used as a way to stratify people and place one above the other). If a person is serious into Stratego, plays it 20 hrs a week, 52 weeks a year some might not consider them a true gamer because Stratego is a “lesser” game, or some would have you believe that. Say someone hosts a boardgame night and has a group of ten people over on a weekly basis to play Pictonary and Baulderdash would any of those people be a gamer? Well of course they’re not gamers because those are mass produced games. My contention is that everyone is a gamer of some level. I know a group of guys that gets together weekly for a Poker game and this group ranges from 12-18 people. They obtain all the social benefits of gaming, they play a game on a weekly basis…So why aren’t they a “gamer” (not to say that they want the title and the negative stigma associated with the term, but I’d still contend they are gamers). If a person plays a game of Axis and Allies once a year with a group of High School buddies years after graduation, they still us games as a mode of social activity and ultimately that is what I feel games are about. Continuing my above commentary, people like what they like, they’ll invest the time that they want to learn and play and just about everyone at some point in their life plays games, likes games, and sees games as a mode for socialization.
So I’ve stated my opinions and you may not agree with me, but looking back at my life, I can’t identify any one or two games that made me decide that games are the hobby I’d like to pursue. There was no point in my life where I said “I’m just your average guy” to “I’m just your average gamer”. When I started gaming the staples of Monopoly and Clue and Stratego were often played, as well as Axis and Allies, Fortress America, Shogun and Mighty Empires. Now some may say “well due to the second grouping of games, you became a gamer then”. If that is the case though, why did I take close to three years off where those games started to lose favor in my group for other activities (not games) and once I moved away from that group I didn’t get into gaming for some years before I met someone locally? Could you say A&A was my gateway game because it was the first game that I played that had rules that were more than a page long? Could you say that Space Marine was my gateway game because after a few years hiatus that is what got me into miniature gaming? Could you say it was Carc because that was the first game that had the Euro flare to it? Could it be Zombies because that was the first game that brought me from miniature games over to board games?
To me, there are no gateway games. People will put for the effort to learn a game, no matter the difficulty, if the entire package is something that is interesting to them. I have a buddy who doesn’t play games at all…I’ve introduced him to a few “gateway games” to no avail. But one day when hanging out in my room he saw a copy of StarCraft: The Boardgame and he was interested because he played StarCraft on the computer and greatly enjoyed it. A few days later we were in his basement playing a game, he was absorbing the rules and eager to play. Currently we’re in the process of scheduling another game with another friend of his who was his StarCraft buddy during High School (and this would be his introduction to these deeper games of ours). By the definition that some gamers have applied to gateway games, StarCraft was his gateway game, and hopefully his friend as well, where games like Family Business and Pandemic fell flat (both are common recommendations for “Recommend me a Gateway Game” forum threads).
All the term gateway game does is imply a superiority over others and allow people to look down their nose at people, huffing saying “you think you’re a gamer becasuse you play Axis and Allies…Hmrph…” It stratifies the hobby both internally and externally. Within the hobby isn’t as damning but once it stratifies gamers as a unique social group stereotypes will get tied to the group and often those stereotypes are damaging to the hobby. D&D players got stratified by society in the 80’s. People thought they were spawn of Satan himself whereas the group, who actually knew what the game actually was became ostracized and because of this seperation in society we gamers decades later are still dealing with fallout. This false seperation between gamers and non-gamers allows these stereotypes to continue and keeps us seperated in society. By seperating the games mass culture is aware of from the games that we like, we in turn seperate ourselves from society and retreat into a world of our own making trying to bait people over “to our side” ofen using decpetion.
If at any point in life, you feel you need a recommendation for a good gateway game just do this: Think about the person or group you’re bringing a game to (quite and introverted; loud and outgoing); Think about the types of people (same as before but on the individual basis and not the group basis); Think about the people’s likes and dislikes (or any material that a person may find objectionable); Think about what they’ve been exposed to in the past (or in other words think about the games that they’ve been exposed to in the past, even if not playing just seeing a D&D group can be scaring). You know better than anyone what should have a chance at success. No specific game or genre of games will every time cause a person to be bathed in holy light as a choir of cherubs circle around their head dropping rose peddles at their feet. There is no game that will make a person see the light and what they’ve been missing. All that will happen is, with luck, you may find a game that has acceptable levels of learning, concentration and forethought for a person.
‘Till Next Time - Happy Gaming
LvT
