Are gamers really that pathetic?

[Incenjucar]

I agree that game stores should feel free to regulate the environment. I, for one, am particularly appalled that anyone should think or be allowed to think that a gaming store is an appropriate environment for any sort of flirting.

...I'm assuming you mean obnoxious harrassment that would get you thrown out of anywhere else...?

If you catch someone looking you over and wink at them for it, I hardly see why that would be bad in a gaming store...

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

...I'm assuming you mean obnoxious harrassment that would get you thrown out of anywhere else...?

If you catch someone looking you over and wink at them for it, I hardly see why that would be bad in a gaming store...

Well certainly for the first part, but for the second part...

...given that most stores feature all the romantic atmosphere of a cut rate libarary/cafeteria...

...I might wink, but only as a prelude to taking it outside.

 

[Desdichado]

I agree that game stores should feel free to regulate the environment. I, for one, am particularly appalled that anyone should think or be allowed to think that a gaming store is an appropriate environment for any sort of flirting.

Oddly enough, though, nobody has a problem with flirting at the video store, or at the restaurant, or pretty much any other store. Why are game stores particularly inappropriate?

I have to say that I prefer stores that keep the actual role-playing in a more out of the way corner.

Not that I think that it's a shameful activity, but it is sort of intimate, more so than chess or bridge, in that it requires a fairly high level of interaction between the people involved.

Having it out in front of the register, even the role-playing is respectable or interesting, creates this odd sort of social obstacle you have to work around to get any business done.

Or, conversely, it can be a great marketing tool for anyone walking in. It all depends on what's being done with it, I suppose. In general, I agree with you personally, but I can see reasons for putting it in an area where people browsing can also see it.

I guess it also depends on who's playing. If you have the "we rape everyone in the halfing village" kind of players, or the really noisy disruptive players, then you particularly do not want them up front, I'd think. Otherwise, it may not be a bad idea.[/QUOTE]

 

[WizarDru]

Oddly enough, though, nobody has a problem with flirting at the video store, or at the restaurant, or pretty much any other store. Why are game stores particularly inappropriate?

Possibly because at the video store or restaurant, the male-to-female ratio is generally much more even, perhaps? Moreover, it's a much more socially normalized situation, I think. Everyone has eaten at a restaurant at some point, and the social contract is pretty straightforward and well-known. In a gaming store (and to a lesser degree, comic store) it sometimes appears like neither potential customer nor employee fully grasp the implied contract when a woman or girl enters the place.

Or, conversely, it can be a great marketing tool for anyone walking in. It all depends on what's being done with it, I suppose. In general, I agree with you personally, but I can see reasons for putting it in an area where people browsing can also see it.

I agree. It's a potential mixed-bag. One way that my mother handled my getting into D&D was by letting us hold the games at my house, and she watched them. When you actually see people playing, it seems much less mystical and threatening than what you might concieve of in a mental fantasy of it. On the other hand, I've long held that Role-playing is not a spectator sport, for the exact same reason. The minutiae of gameplay can be terribly tedious if you'r not involved.

 

[WayneLigon]

Or, conversely, it can be a great marketing tool for anyone walking in. It all depends on what's being done with it, I suppose. In general, I agree with you personally, but I can see reasons for putting it in an area where people browsing can also see it.

I guess it also depends on who's playing. If you have the "we rape everyone in the halfing village" kind of players, or the really noisy disruptive players, then you particularly do not want them up front, I'd think. Otherwise, it may not be a bad idea.

Before the current gaming store, we had a large used bookstore that had a significant section devoted to RPG's and board games. The owner would let card and board games be played out in front, but not RPG's because the players apparently were either just too strange or they were more of the 'we kill everyone in the halfling village then rape them' type. I have no idea if at one point they ever did let people play RPGs in the front area and there was an 'incident' or not.

I still think it's a great marketing tool if you can find a group that will behave itself. Seeing people sitting around gaming is what got me into the hobby in the first place.

 

[Desdichado]

Possibly because at the video store or restaurant, the male-to-female ratio is generally much more even, perhaps? Moreover, it's a much more socially normalized situation, I think. Everyone has eaten at a restaurant at some point, and the social contract is pretty straightforward and well-known. In a gaming store (and to a lesser degree, comic store) it sometimes appears like neither potential customer nor employee fully grasp the implied contract when a woman or girl enters the place.

Forgive me if I seem to be putting words into your mouth that you don't mean to be saying, WizarDru, but this doesn't seem to be a complaint about the inappropriateness of the location as a meat market (relative to the local Blockbuster or Krogers, at least, not that any of those locations are the kinds of meat market I'd be interested in) so much as it is that the typical guy at this store is very poor at flirting and therefore is more likely to cause problems not because of what he's doing but because he's the one doing it, or because he doesn't grasp the intricacies of doing it appropriately.

In which case the argument has come full circle again, and we're back to saying, essentially, that cat piss man is hitting on the chicks in the gamestore, scaring them away. :\ After all, if Vin Diesel were hanging around the game store hitting on chicks, we'd likely see a lot more of them suddenly interested in gaming.

 

[WayneLigon]

Another thing completely off topic: the word 'Cat Piss Man'. I first heard this term in an online comics journal article, Retail: The Wrath of Cat Piss Man.

 

[Desdichado]

Another thing completely off topic: the word 'Cat Piss Man'. I first heard this term in an online comics journal article, Retail: The Wrath of Cat Piss Man.

Heh. Great article. Very funny.

 

[WizarDru]

In which case the argument has come full circle again, and we're back to saying, essentially, that cat piss man is hitting on the chicks in the gamestore, scaring them away. :\ After all, if Vin Diesel were hanging around the game store hitting on chicks, we'd likely see a lot more of them suddenly interested in gaming.

Well, I was more pointing to the fact that the demographics are a little wonky, which might make someone more uncomfortable. There was a cartoon done by a comic artist about some of the local stores in the Philly area, specifically about one of Philly's biggest stores, Fat Jack's Comics (original Fat Jack's Comic Crypt, or maybe it still is, I dunno). Anywho, the comic opined the fact that any female who wandered into the store was a rarity, and an odd experience, since everyone assumed she'd wandered into the wrong store by accident.

But I get your point, and I think I agree. I wonder though, what the ratio of flirting is per female customer in a game store versus those other venues. That is, on average, how often does a woman in a supermarket or video store get hit on versus in a gaming store...hence the demographics I was aluding to. Not that it's inappropriate, just that the frequency might be somewhat skewed.

And my wife wouldn't really go for a Vin Diesel. Now if Hugh Jackman was a gamer, well.....

 

[Desdichado]

And my wife wouldn't really go for a Vin Diesel. Now if Hugh Jackman was a gamer, well.....

Heh. Mine neither. I actually don't know who her current favorite is, oddly enough.