Video-gaming these days seems to lack something of the social element that it used to inherently carry with it. What with the advent of more and more online services and the ease and convenience of “partying” up, this sounds somewhat counter-intuitive. Accessing the internet is now a breeze, and most people have a PC or a console with which they can potentially connect to millions of people at any given time.

Yet while this development brought about several great, new dynamics, it also managed to (in ways) reduce the role of the physical community. Hundreds of faceless gamer tags or screen names, sometimes accompanied by a voice, have replaced a buddy coming over with friends to sit with you and enjoy a game in good company.

“I remember when I used to play the original Halo on the original Xbox with a bunch of friends I barely hear from anymore. I hadn’t really met my PC-gaming buddies who’d later introduce me to a lot of great games I’d never heard of or knew little about, but these were good times just the same. Really good times. We would get our televisions and consoles together in one location, bring food and drink, and play until the break of dawn.

Then Halo 2 came out.. and X-Box Live was available…

Suddenly, none of my friends wanted to get together anymore. Consensus was that, since we could easily party up online, there was no need to go through the “hassle” of organizing a LAN.

Thus my heart was broken.”

There are a lot of gamers out there (us among them) who feel similarly to the above sentiment, and we came to realize that, not only do we care about continuing to experience this brand of community, but we also care to provide it.

There is a kind of energy when you’re in a room full of peers that greatly supplements the experience, even if you’re not playing the exact same thing. Moments of hooting, hollering, hopping out of your chair and jumping for joy because you somehow, somehow managed to get the enemy intelligence just as time was about to run out, and your teammates are right there with you, basking in the awesome.

Those are the kind of moments you want to share with others. Moments of high spirits, comradery, and good cheer. Or, we admit, the occasional sufferance of a gloat session after an unfortunate instance of n00bishness.

Game on.