Watching Let's Plays as a Kid
I had game consoles growing up, but not too many games.
I had a Wii, but I never had any GameCube games. Games like The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker kind of had a mythical status in my head because I couldn't play it, but REALLY wanted to.
Let's Plays were a way to see games that I had never heard of before, or couldn't play because I didn't have the right console. It was like Saturday morning cartoons, where I would be able to learn about some video game that I had never heard or seen before. Being able to see all sorts of different games really opened up my eyes to how large of a space video games could be.
I've mentioned before how the indie game Zineth is an incredibly influential game for me. It has shaped the ways that I think about video games even today. I was only able to discover and play the game for myself because the YouTube Channel NerdCubed brought the game to my attention.
I've also talked about Modded Minecraft at length previously, and one of the reasons why I love it so much is because I watched YouTube Let's Players like Direwolf20 play and explain the game. It's no secret that YouTube was one of the reasons why Minecraft got as popular as it did.
Overall, it made me realize that there are people behind these games. Games aren't just some magical thing that appear at the store. They were a thing that people spend days, months, and years of their lives creating, and it made me realize that I could do that too.
It also made me realize that there are communities of people that enjoy video games. They weren't just a thing that I enjoyed that my parents and classmates didn't understand. There are countless international communities of diverse people that share a love of video games, just like me.