Video games have always been thought to be a waste of time, yet during the pandemic, many people used this online world as a get-a-way. A place to relax and connect with friends and family. This article intends to take a closer look at how video games blossomed during the pandemic and how students used video games to help them through their educational pathway.
This pandemic has and probably will be, one of the worst things that we will experience in our lives, but some gaming franchises found a lot of success due to everyone being locked down in their homes. Most of the sports titles (FIFA, Madden, NBA2K, and MLB the show) gained a bonus amount of popularity and an increase in player usage. Games like Minecraft, Roblox, and Fortnite, looked like they had found a second flame because there was a huge jump in the player base, and because of this huge player base increase all these games have been booming in the video gaming industry.
Since we were, and still are in lockdown, teachers had to improvise to keep the learning engaging for there students. Video games allowed students to recreate scenes from famous plays in english, experiment with physics and chemistry for science, and even travel back in time for history.
Multiplayer video games were a big part to video games being a very popular activity that most people used to pass time during the pandemic. These games grew tremendously because of social interaction. People used these multiplayer games to talk and connect with their friends. Games like: Among Us, Fall Guys, Call of Duty Warzone, Minecraft gained a lot of popularity. To see that something that 20 years ago was called a “waste of time” and “antisocial activity” which is now one of the leading ways to connect and interact with friends and family, is a sight to behold.
Before lockdown, a lot more people thought that video games were a waste of time. Now that video game creators and the games themselves can and have shown that they can help people with their social, mental and academic lives. It truly does make sense that video gaming and the internet have become such a big part of this world, with the oppurtnities being endless and a tool so powerful the sky is the limit from where ever video games can take us.