When I was a kid, I was a hardcore gamer. It all started with my very own Sega console under the New Year tree (in Russia, we receive the gift on New Year, not Christmas) and a set of three cartridges: with Alladin, Chip and Dayle and MORTAL COMBAT. Needless to say, after dealing with the first two, Mortal Combat quickly jumped up on the first favourite position in my top-3.

At the time, I was in second grade and my dad away due to his health condition: he got into a car accident when I was five and the treatment required him to be in the Western part of Russia, though our family leaves in the Eastern part of Siberia. When I went to first grade, he and my mom left for Saint-Petersburg to get him a spinal surgery and left me with my aunties for what felt about a whole school year. I missed them dearly, but when they returned, it wasn't for long: my dad still had to leave and continue the treatment and because now he was in a wheelchair, he couldn't get a job, so both due to unemployment and for the sake of his own health he had left me and mom once again, leaving me Sega to kill the boredom -  and it totally worked, though I still missed my dad very much while my mom spent most of her time working at school to provide for us. I was pretty much left to my own devices, so I was only happy in school or while playing games.

After about a year, my family got a personal computer and I got completely lost in playing games: I played Need For Speed, Madagaskar, Harry Potter and a strategy game with the word "crusader" in the name. I was a big fan of the movie 'Sindbad: the Legend of the Seven Seas, so the game based on it was my favourite until I was done with it and my father introduced me to The World of Warcraft II and III.

I and dad would often spend time playing The World of Warcraft III together and he taught me the strategy and explained the story - I was more invested in the story and would often ask him to help me get to the next level because I couldn't do it myself. The point of the game was to build up a base and military and locate the enemy base earlier than they find you. Id you won the battle, you could proceed to the next level. The hardest part was to raise an army and lead them against Undead - they were the hardest to beat.

Due to this, I became extremely game-addicted, so my parents restricted my access to the PC and I can't recall playing games until I graduated school. After this. I only played MMORPGs, but thanks to YouTube Gaming era, I found a lot of letsplayers to entertain me with their playing skills.

Nowadays, I don't play games often and prefer to watch other people play because I know that once I hit Play button, I'll go down the loop until the game is finished. I simply cannot stop myself, so it is safer for me, my wallet and my deadlines to stay away from playing.