From time to time, I get referred to as a "True" gamer: I've been there, played that, beaten this, completed that and totally finished a number of impossible tasks in games that has made me really quite proud. And apparently, I'm part of a culture.

When did that happen?

Frankly, I'm about as cultured as a mangy dog, and so are all the other gamers that I know. But, according to some journalists and alarmist tabloids, I'm part of a thing called "Gaming Culture", a mythical title for something about as solid as mist. I've never felt cultured before in my life �not even after having a bath in yoghurt that one time. Gaming Culture exists though, but no-one told me.

So, hands up then: who feels like a culture? Anyone? You, at the back there; do you feel like a culture? Did it ever occur to you that you might be?

Are we a subculture then? Logic dictates no, as there exists several types of gamer, such as the Casual gamer and the True gamer. But what is a True gamer? Is it a man who buys every console on launch day; a man who owns every single iteration of Final Fantasy right back to the original cartridges and has a stack of imported games from Japan that is taller than he is? Or is it much more likely that the True gamer is a myth, perpetuated by disaffected gamers who see their hobby being tainted by the influx of gamers from all walks of life?

The True gamer does not exist as a physical thing: the True gamer is simply a state of mind. Just as being a Casual gamer is nothing more than a label for someone who does not play as many games as you do: the Casual gamer might consider himself to be a True gamer �he enjoys games as much as you do, and sees your over-zealous dedication to the preservation of your hobby as more than a little freakishly absurd, needless, if you will. The True gamer has a shelf full of cuddly Sonic the Hedgehog toys and a DVD cabinet bursting with anime films and video-game tie-ins. And I'm supposed to be a True gamer? Heck no! Heck no at all! Most game tie-ins are embarrassingly awful and I think I had a remote controlled Mario Kart once, that was politely stashed away for years in its original box and sold on eBay recently for a nice sum of money.

At the same time, however, I freely admit that I schedule most of my free time around my gaming: I look forward every day to the time when I get home from work that I have specifically set aside for solving that puzzle that had me struggling in the wee hours of the previous night. The evening cannot be a happy one without a great deal of relaxation with my newest purchase. I look forward to the release of new games with the same religious fervour that I reserve for payday- which is incidentally the day I buy most of my games.

For me, Gaming Culture is just a group of people who enjoy games. However, the good thing about this particular culture is that it is an unspoken global one: people all over the world enjoy games and they may never consider themselves part of a culture. There will always be someone too extreme, or too casual in their interest to pin down a 100% accurate definition of this intangible thing. Some gamers play for five minutes after work, others dedicate whole weekends to their favourite pastime, thinking about it every spare minute they have away from the TV.

Gaming Culture is real, but it does not begin and end with the True gamers; those are mostly gamers with a wholly superior and purist attitude to gaming, and we should view them with the same contempt they reserve for our brothers and sisters that game casually. However, as a culture, we need every one of ourselves together, whether they be True or Casual. Every culture is made up of disparate elements, and for any culture to survive, it needs every one of those elements, even though they may not always like each other.

Iun Hockley
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