14 
If you’re reading this website, you’re very probably some sort of geek. Which is totally not a bad thing! The question is, of course, what kind of geek are you? A gadget geek? An Internet geek? Perhaps an Apple Fanboy Geek? Check out this infographic to find out.
Though the infographic generalises each geektype to a fault, I’m pretty sure I know a person from each kind of geek. To be fair, we’re all probably bits and pieces of geek in one, a little Gadget geek sprinkled with Star Wars knowledge or sports geek mixed with Apple fanboy geek or some geek with another geek. Geek, geek, geek, geek, geek. If anyone is a geek of all these geekdoms, does that make them the king of geeks or just a nerd? Check out the full infographic here. [Best Colleges Online via BuzzFeed]
Took all the way till the Net Geek till one nailed me…shame that the Gamer Geek is wrong. No “Gamer Geek” thinks FFVII is the greatest story…or greatest game for that matter.
Go on then…In your opinion, what’s the stereotypical “Greatest Story” and “Greatest Game” answer for a proper Gamer Geek? (I’m not trying to catch you out or anything…just intrigued…)
Modern warfare by a country mile!
Well usually with these kinda Greatest Games polls it seems to always rank in no particular order – Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Goldeneye 007. Then from there it tends to just vary between any number of GTA games, Half Life, Pokemon, Mario, all the usual big names etc.
I just don’t see many if any at all people who are really into games that act like that. Kinda feels like the kind you would see on a terrible geeky sitcom these days.
Prob a result of me never playing any FF games at the time before trying them at age 25+, but i’m a huge RPG fan but of pretty much everything except the FF series
i’m happily playingn on my fifth replay of lost odyssey for example, but have never got anywhere with a FF game… o.O
It’s more weird when you think the producer of Lost Odyssey was the creator of the FF series.
Tbh the only FF game I can enjoy is XII and thats because the entire fighting system got changed up and I just overall enjoyed it more.
I think the geek-factor comes from the recognition that if there had been no FFVII, there would certainly be no Lost Odyssey. Before FFVII’s FMV and focus on story elements, there was nothing of it’s ilk. The sheer scale of the Production Values compared to contemporary games was astonishing. At the time, it was the gaming equivalent of Avatar, or The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper. Lost Odyssey is in no way as ground-breaking when compared to it’s contemporaries and predecessors as FFVII was in the mid-to-late 90s.
To take it further, you have to look at the genealogy of games. I’d hold up Quintet/Enix’s Soul Blazer, Illusion of Time (Gaia), and Terranigma ‘Trilogy’ as being the greatest RPG/Adventure games for me in terms of their over-arching elemental story and revolutionary game-play. If these games didn’t exist, FFVII would not have been what it was. Equally, if Hironobu Sakaguchi hadn’t had the experience of making Chrono Trigger with Square for the SNES, we’d have no FFVII and by extension, no Lost Odyssey etc. etc.
Another example of this lineage-thinking was my playing of a title called ‘Body Harvest’ on the N64 circa 1998. It was developed by a little company called DMA Design. A few years later, this game (with its open sandbox environments, on-foot + vehicular transportation, plus vehicle commandeering etc.) would evolve into a certain GTA: III that has spawned many a copycat since and redefined popular gaming. (‘DMA Design’ have since become ‘Rockstar North’).
For me, the appreciation of this kind of Gaming History and genealogy is the true mark of a gaming geek. A lot of other people think about music and films in the same way (deciding on a lot of purchases based on Producer/Collaborator’s previous output/Director’s history of films etc.)
If you understand FFVII’s place in the history of the RPG Genre, it stands unrivalled in terms of its critical acclaim and influence, just as Half Life 2 is held up as the greatest FPS, Goldeneye as the greatest Console FPS (despite not being as good as Perfect Dark IMO), and Zelda: Ocarina of Time as the best Action Adventure, GTA: III as the greatest Sandbox game. It’s not about how good the game is, it’s about how good it was at the time. It’s about plucking a watershed moment from a genre’s annals and holding it up as an example of progress and as being worthy of accolade.
In short, FFVII is the greatest story ever told (in the gaming world), by virtue of the fact that until it’s release, nothing even came close to attempting it’s level of cinematic story-telling and FMV Visuals. If you were to play Lost Odyssey and then go back to FFVII, you might very well wonder what all the fuss was about. It may have been bettered since, both graphically and in terms of its story; but you can’t bottle the feeling of experiencing something nobody has ever experienced before.
I think the above qualifies me as both a complete pansy, and a geek.
+1 fellow geek
jesus h. diaz, flynn. you ever considered making your own blog?
I’d do it if I thought there was an audience for it. The above was just me rambling!
aren’t all blogs? it’s something I think you should consider because, even when I disagree with you, the comments are always nice to read enit. ^_^
If everybody agreed with each other all the time, the world would be a very boring place.
PS. Thanks!
maybe not the greatest story but arguably one of the most important video games ever, it was the first really huge budget title, square basically gambled everything on it and it turned out good paving the way for a future of high production budget games. i wouldnt try and pick a single “greatest story” from all games but as far as square games go i think that award would have to go to chrono trigger rather than FF7
Wow, is it unhealthy to score heavily in more than one category? :p
haha
I mean I’m small bits of most, but gadget/gamer/internet geek describes a worryingly large chunk of my life
I can see a few people i know existing in one category only (particularly the apple and film ones)
But for most there’s a large overlap.
I come out as a gadget/gamer/internet geek too
I have one thing from Chic Geek and one thing from Das Ubergeek.
Been a gamer all my life and didn’t get any of the Gamer Geek things.
Well based on that it appears I’m not a geek. Is this good or bad?
Just close the door on the way out, thanks
No, It means the list is a bunch of stupid generalisations, presented for humour rather than as an accurate geek identification system. If you fall into anyone of these categories (based on 3 points of similarity), your not a geek, you’re a cliché.:-)
Same here. I think it means we’re Rebel Geeks – we play by our own rules!
Actually – you, me and Lester_Bangs can all possibly be classified as Google geeks as we are all on G+
What happens if you’re a fan of pretty much everything else Google; but you signed-up for G+, had a look around, saw about 30 acquaintances who had also signed-up, but clearly didn’t actively use the service, and so then walked away?
Are you guys therefore a community of Google geeks brought together by a mutual love of G+? Or are you users of G+ and therefore Google geeks?
I’m sensing both chicken and egg.
I think that makes you the same as bout 98% of the worlds population.
For me, I joined G+ as a business tool, but now personally prefer it to facebook. If only others would sign up to it.
Actually we are a collection of Giz readers who also happen to use Google+ and have thus formed our own circle of like-minded souls where we can go and talk about everyone else behind their backs.
Goodie! Now I feel both excluded and threatened…
You are neither, the Circle of Giz is free for anyone to join (so long as they are on both Giz and G+ obviously) and we don’t REALLY talk about everyone else (well not much)
Anyone who wan’t to join just hunt me down on G+ (easy to spot, same name and avatar) and add a comment to one of my posts ormessage me directly saying you want to join and what your Giz user name is. You will then be added to the circle.
You need to stop calling it the Circle of Giz…
Internet geek, reporting in.
Star Wars/Encyclopedia/Gadget/Internet geek
There’s a whole lotta geek in me
i fall into so many of those categories its not even funny!