Things we've learned specifically from playing videos games? Either it introduced us to the concept or straight up taught us but mostly of a real world concept.
Here're a few:
Inventory is a word
Carpenter is an occupation
Spetsnaz organization
Tengu Birds
The Book(s) of Goetia
Loyalty and Code of Honor
Quad-Bike/ATV and Jet Packs
Go-Kart
Ocarina is an instrument
Boomerang
"Grind-Rail"
Whip-Sword
Modding and Hacking
Water Aqueducts
Notre Dame
Hook-Shotting
Black Death/Great Plague of London
So there're a few of my little things I've learned. Of course there exists SO much more knowledge obtained from video games but these are more interesting ones I could remember for now. I would love to read whacky things you all have learned from video games!
I hope that was entertaining to read and that everyone will add onto it with their own experiences and stories.
Here're a few:
Inventory is a word
I learned this from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets for Gamecube. I pronounced it as "Invent-tuhree". I was brought up on Silent Hill 3, Resident Evil Remake and Zero on Gamecube (Don't even ask why my parents thought that was appropriate) and in those games, the inventory was where I combine things to receive new things but I have never seen it actually be called that in those games. In the sense of Harry Potter, there were learnable spells and the sort so here's genius me thinking "Oh. So this is the menu we "Invent" things in, then!"Carpenter is an occupation
Thanks to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time's Trading Quest and receiving the "Poacher's Saw", I had no clue what a Carpenter was, nor what all of those guys running around Kakariko village were even doing. Once they built the bridge to Gerudo Valley and I received the Poacher's Saw, it all clicked: Carpentry is an occupation that constructs wood structures and the sort and saws are used to cut that wood.Spetsnaz organization
Playing Resident Evil 3 and scraping files and notes about the various characters has one discovering the use of a word called "Spetsnaz" which refers to millitaristic organizations in Russia. An interesting piece of information that I likely won't ever need but it stuck with me, being that Nicholai G(Z)inovaef was apart of this group before joining UBCS. It might have stuck with me because I never heard a Russian accent speaking English words until that game so I probably wondered why he sounded like that and this was the answer.Tengu Birds
These are mythological Japanese-folklore creatures akin to Medusa of Greece. (Or Greek. Or Rome. Or whatever. Listen, here's another piece of Lore: I know Medusa exists solely because of Castlevania, ok?) I first learned of these creatures from their name being called out in Mini Ninjas, as secondary helper NPCs. I didn't make the connection that these weren't generic names for the birds in that game until I played Dead or Alive Dimensions for Nintendo 3DS and had to go through *that* one challenge requiring me to defeat a mythological demon man named... You guessed it: Tengu.The Book(s) of Goetia
Speaking of Castlevania from above, there's a quintuple of books relating to "Goetia" about demons and the sort. Castlevania's various monstrosities' designs and names are direct references to demons of these books as well as Greek, Japanese and various other Mythologies. The Goetia books, however, are the important ones because I personally had no clue until many years later that all of their demons aren't a combination of being made up, from Geek Mythology or from Japanese Mythology (since Japanese people are generally the writers of Castlevania games) and, instead, a large majority of the demons are from these books. I didn't discover this immediately but it was because of a completely different game called Goetia which I got the day it released on Nintendo Switch. The first major demon you encounter, spoilers spoilers, is "Malphas" whom I immediately recognized from being in Castlevania. I thought it was just another Greek god or demon or whatever that Castlevania used but once I looked up "What is Goetia?" I entered a whole different world of demons and history. So that's that. Now I know the Bloodstained games aren't ripping off Castlevania monster names but are actually just using the same sources as Castlevania. (Not that I thought there was any ripping off happening or anything)Loyalty and Code of Honor
This entire concept was so foreign to me. Why would someone do something so outright WRONG? Why would someone purposely make themselves unhappy and trudge through hardship? In my mind: if it hurts, especially physically, why do it? It's as simple as stop and avoid it. Base Fire concepts, right? Well, it wasn't until I played the Samurai/Dynasty Warriors games did I realize, through text and various in-game interactions, why. Now obviously these games are extremely fiction and dramatized (And sometimes things happen just for the sake of keeping a character alive longer) but characters like Shingen wouldn't kill Kenshin despite Kenshin being by his blade. Then when they speak of the other, they say things like "He is such a just warrior and leader. I can't wait for us to cross blades again!" WHAT!? BUT NO ONE DIED. WHY EVEN FIGHT WITH SWORDS IF YOU AREN'T TRYING TO KILL HIM?! WHY would you beat him and let him walk off and say "I can't wait -[I]for you to get in my way and make my life harder in the future[/I]-"? Worse yet, why are people committing suicide (In this case, Seppuku and the sort) just because they didn't perform admirably at a task or life style? Well, turns out that these games taught me that it isn't always about "winning", isn't always about "the person is in my way or isn't in my way" and isn't always about... Well for the Seppuku thing, just don't kill yourself, alright? Either way, these games made me think about morals, what loyalty means in family and in social positions and how honor is distributed and expressed throughout the different people. Here's a bonus: The 3D-era Mortal Kombat Games (Deadly Alliance/Deception/etc.) had me discover "Hara-kiri" is a word which brought the revelation that Seppuku is a word... So there's that.Quad-Bike/ATV and Jet Packs
I didn't know this was a thing until I'm punching that cheat code in a million times in Grand Theft Auto San Andreas to receive it. As a bonus, I didn't know what a Faggio was, at least the design of such a motorcycle, until Vice City where these disgusting, ugly and slow things are seen everywhere. It made finding a REAL motorcycle that much cooler.Go-Kart
Same as above, who knew what this was? Until Mario Kart, of course.Ocarina is an instrument
I'm not even going to comment on this one.Boomerang
I have never seen a boomerang in my life until I played Ty the Tasmanian Tiger. At least I don't remember it anywhere prior to this game. I found a bright green plastic boomerang in real life one day... Boy was I disappointed."Grind-Rail"
This is something I never heard of before despite how much I should have. Never seen it done on television regarding skate tricks or anything. The first time I heard of this maneuver was in Sonic Adventure 2, where it's REALLY embedded to a point where Sonic's shoes are designed for it. Heck, even Shadow the Hedgehog's shoe design being metal was probably a direct reference to this "Grind-Railing", since this was also the first game he appeared in.Whip-Sword
This weapon, likely much different in real life, was first conceptualized to me in Castlevania Aria of Sorrow. Prior to Aria of Sorrow, the only Soul Calibur/Edge game I've played, which features Ivy with the same weapon, was Soul Blade for Playstation and that game did not have Ivy.Modding and Hacking
For video games, these were brand new to me. This came about from either one of two places and I can't decide which was first. My memory of this was either from looking up cheats for Grand Theft Auto San Andreas and getting cheats but then also discovering weird things like "Mario in GTA SA" or those other crazy conspiracy videos like "How to fly to the moon in GTA SA", "Bigfoot in GTA SA", "Zombies"- etc. all decked out with the X-Files intro music, of course. Out of curiosity, I tried some of those methods. Obviously they did not work and so quickly realized these were all hoaxes but the reality was the same: I had no clue how these videos came into existence since it isn't possible to do in-game and it isn't like an edited image or something: it's footage.
Either THAT or it was during the time when I was looking at videos on how to unlock certain things in The Sims 2 console versions and never knew about a PC version so often times I'd see cheats on websites relating to "typing in a code" which is obviously not possible on, say, a Playstation 2. Then videos of "My Naruto family in The Sims 2" and, unlike what us console players could do such as using the in-game costume pieces to make a Sim closest to who we're trying to mimic, they have ACTUAL Naruto models and textures in the game. I had no idea how this was done but then discovered it was through modding a game... That I did not own only on PC. Again, I'm not sure which of these two scenarios made me realize "Modding" video games was a thing that could be done but it was certainly one of these two.Water Aqueducts
An aqueduct, if you don't know, is a construction to transport water from one location to another. Sometimes it's a pipe, sometimes it's a big hollowed bridge thingy, etc. Either way, in Castlevania Curse of Darkness, there's a location called "Mortvia Aqueduct". This is a watery area so I chalked this one down to Castlevania's fancy naming schemes. "Mortvia (The name of the location) Aqua-place" or something. Meaning this is the water level called Mortvia. Har-har... So much to learn, kid-me. Either way, this was the first time I heard of this word but it wasn't until Assassin's Creed Brotherhood did I truly learn what this is. In that game, there's this ginormous aqueduct. Being this is Assassin's Creed, (At least the earlier ones) they drop a lot of historical lore on such grand structures so then I learned what an aqueduct is. Thanks Rome! -Speaking of Assassin's Creed, I never even heard of a "Borgia Family" until that game. Which leads me to the next one:Notre Dame
Didn't know of this location or that it's a real-word place until a game called Timesplitters 2. You go into the Notre Dame, or whatever version of the building that this game has, to do justice to a certain evil-doer and retrieve the Time Crystals. I thought this was just some fictional name of a place.... And that it was pronounced "Not-chreh Dah-me". It wasn't until Assassin's Creed Unity did I find out that, no: This is a real location in the world. Likely won't care at all for the information but that's knowledge I won't be forgetting.Hook-Shotting
The Legend of Zelda games have Hook-shots as a weapon/item, which is obvious fiction. However, it wasn't until Resident Evil 0 did I realize that a real-life counterpart exists in many forms! It's much more practical and realistic in this game than in The Legend of Zelda but due to the differences did I realize that hook-shots (Maybe without the "Shot" part) is used in real life relating to zip-lines and rock-climbing and the sort. The "Shot" part might be a much longer, safety-ensuring process but it's still a hook shot nonetheless performing the same tasks.Black Death/Great Plague of London
I don't live in London, nowhere near it, nor have I been anywhere near it. MAYBE, JUST MAYBE, is that excuse-enough to never have heard of this historical event. The Black Death is a region-wide European outbreak of what is generally agreed upon as bubonic plague but that's not where we're at. We're in 1665 in London: a specific branch of Black Death called "Great Plague of London" which I also have never heard of. This is basically just a small version of the Black Death event that happened in London a bit after the Black Death. It was the same thing, though, as far as I know. Anyways, I never heard of this entire ordeal until a beautiful game called ZombiU, which details about an historical man named John Dee (That I ALSO have never heard of prior to this game) that predicted the "Great fire of London", which was this exact real-life event with "burning down affected houses and corpses". I'm not sure if the real-life version of John Dee predicted any such event but that's what happened in the game. The big difference here, though, is that the Great Plague of London was a massive conspiratory coverup in the game. They made the world believe it was "Bubonic Plague" (Sounds like our timeline.) since it happened around the same time as the actual Bubonic Plague - Black Death - in Europe but in reality, it was a ZOMBIE plague, which was cleansed by fire (Burning houses and people) and the world forgot about it and ate up the whole "Bubonic Plague" story until modern day when the plague is happening again in London but this time it's much larger scale. That's ZombiU. That entire history was introduced to me, not in schooling education, but in ZombiU.So there're a few of my little things I've learned. Of course there exists SO much more knowledge obtained from video games but these are more interesting ones I could remember for now. I would love to read whacky things you all have learned from video games!
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I hope that was entertaining to read and that everyone will add onto it with their own experiences and stories.
Last edited by Nivium,
