I have a problem with gamer rage

I’m going to be a bit vulnerable again. If I’m honest it’s not THAT bad compared to some things I’ve seen, but it feels good to share. Thanks to everyone who shared their own stories with me, you’re a brave lot.

It’s the butt of many a meme and internet gif. Short videos of it amass millions of views. It can range from shouting a few choice swear words to hurling heavy objects out of windows. It’s responsible for simmering toxicity in many an online gaming community, causing players to be ostracised. Friendships have dissolved because of it, marriages have died because of it, streamers have been banned over it.

That’s right, it’s:

Oops, no, sorry not Rage the video game.

It’s GAMER RAGE!

Gamer rage: “feeling extreme anger or performing violent acts in response to a video game.”

No video game is immune. Some attract it more than others, but it appears that anything involving winning or losing, success or failure, or trying to place a piece of furniture in the exact right orientation can cause a full-on rage. That said, research shows that violent and competitive games increase the probability of people becoming physically aggressive.1 In a survey conducted by time2play, Xbox players were the most likely to experience extreme anger from gaming at least once a day.2 So if you’re playing Call of Duty online on an Xbox… how’s your blood pressure buddy, you okay?

“… one time I let my rage loose was with a MOBA game, League of Legends… I did a lot of mistakes and misses. So my temper got the best of me and I punched my desk…”

Unsurprisingly, research also shows that losing can increase aggression. Typically, anger impacts cognitive functions and concentration, meaning that if you’re raging because you’re losing, you’re not suddenly going to start winning just because you got angry.3 With the rise of competitive “battle royale” online gaming over the past few years, there’s also a rise in aggression due to loss and toxic behaviours from players. This can even happen when you’re on the same team. Playing with perceived “noobs” or someone having a bad round can get the rage rising in everyone.

Countless female gamers document themselves being called all the names under the sun because they dared play a game, online or not. Many say these experiences make them feel like they don’t belong in the space, or push them to stop playing. Due to the open nature of online competitive gaming, children are also being exposed to adult’s rage and bullying, and often joining in.4

“Uninstalled GTAV in a rage because the voice chat is rampant with misogyny and homophobia and racism.”

Being a woman susceptible to a bit of rage, it’s things like this that mean I avoid online gaming like the plague. It would be like going and kicking a beehive naked, knowing you’re allergic to bee stings.

However, I am open to some couch co-op with friends. But just because you’re sitting next to your team mates or opponents, it doesn’t make you immune to the rage. Overcooked will send me into the red mist. Playing with other people can be difficult, however competent they are. I just want win, I want to succeed, but some of my friends just want to have a laugh and fuck about. I’m yelling at my them, thinking they’re scum when they can’t complete a simple task of putting a tomato in a pot to make soup, fucking imbeciles. In the moment, the boiling pot spills over and I’m yelling obscenities wondering why I’m friends with these idiots. But once the Switch is turned off, it’s forgotten, I couldn’t care less. It almost becomes quite funny to say that I lost my rag to a game where you have to make tomato soup with friends.

Outside factors such as lag, technical issues or interruptions from the outside world can also make you angry. The systems we play on can let us down, by running out of battery, not receiving signals properly, and succumbing to wear and tear, leading to things like “stick drift”. And of course these malfunctions always happen when you’re at a critical point in the game. Like the Game Boy battery dying just as you’re about to beat Pokémon’s Elite Four. Or the internet connection dropping as you’re about to land a snipey headshot in Call of Duty. Or a Bethesda game crashing after you’ve spent several hours exploring without saving.

“… I think I’ve only raged a few times in games, and all those times were related to when I either forgot to save a game and made a ton of progress or lost a save for some reason.”

Our anger can also be directed towards our hardware and any inanimate objects in close proximity. Any item in the immediate vicinity is at risk of being thrown, punched, kicked, yeeted or also bitten. Many of you reported breaking tables, making holes in walls or breaking controllers or keyboards. It’s interesting that rage stemming from a digital world can have drastic adverse effects in reality.

I distinctly remember playing Pokémon Silver and getting to the third gym - it’s Whitney bitch. You know, that vile woman with the Miltank who knows Rollout and absolutely humbles you the first time you challenge her. And the second time, third time, and fourth. I always thought I’d trained enough, but then I lost again. At some point I lost my cool and sank my teeth into the top of my Game Boy Colour in anger. The teethmarks are still there today. Whitney’s not, I beat her ass eventually. But my poor Game Boy still bears the scars of my anger getting the better of me.

“I turned the corner of my Game Boy Advance SP’s screen into a chew toy. Lose a narrow Pokémon battle? CHOMP. Throw an interception to the pixelated secondary in Madden 06? OMNOMNOM. Teeth marks dented and damaged the console that I loved so much, all because I was a little rage monster.”

Growing up I did have a problem with game rage. It started way before video games came into my life. Playing board games with my family, I would get super pissed off if I perceived I hadn’t won because someone else (usually my dad, the joker!) had cheated or wronged me in some way. I was a sore loser as a child, especially when I thought I was really good at something and I didn’t win it.

I still hate things that feel unfair and unwinnable. If I can’t complete a platforming level because the jumps feel impossible, I hate it. If a game doesn’t explain itself properly and I’m super stuck, I hate it. If a boss has a one-hit-kill mechanic, I hate it.

“ [In Shadow of the Colossus] I’m very bad at platforming and very very bad at 3D platforming, and there is ONE JUMP very early in that game… that I simply COULD NOT DO. I tried for almost an hour and my NERF PS2 controller got bounced all over my damn living room.”

This is why I’ve never ventured into games such as Dark Souls and Elden Ring, or competitive online games such as Call of Duty or Fortnite. Some people see these games as a skill challenge to be won. I honestly just see them as a red rag. I already know this is going to piss me off, so I’m not even going to attempt it. I’m sure I’ve missed out on some good gaming experiences because of that view, but as my time capacity for gaming becomes more limited, I actually want to enjoy my time spent on it rather than just swearing and getting stuck. I’ve talked about unfairness in Final Fantasy bosses, and yes, most of those drove me to angry tears because I just didn’t see a way around completing them. One hit KO’s, unavoidable ultimate moves, unfair targeting… they all added up to pure anger.

When I asked for stories about gamer rage, there was another emotion that also stood out: shame. When the red mist fades and your brain drops back into reality, the first emotion that often arises is shame. This “rage state” isn’t our norm, it forces us to do things that we wouldn’t normally do. We break stuff, we say things we don’t mean, we damage our relationships. We realise we have to repair a wall, buy a new keyboard, apologise for an outburst.

“I took my controller and threw it at the living room wall. The controller just stuck in the wall in a comical way. I removed it and there it was, a giant hole in the wall. The embarrassing part of this story isn’t that I was a fully grown adult crying over a FIFA game, it was the fact that the next day my wife questioned the hole and I blamed it on our toddler. Now I do come clean about 2 minutes later but in that moment I actually blamed my son because I was so embarrassed to admit the truth.”

At the end of the day we realise “it’s just a game”. Well, it is and it isn’t. I think that phrase often ignores the time, effort, skill and passion people have for and put into games. I think some gamer rage is pretty well justified. If you were building a large Lego model for 2 hours and someone just smashed it on the floor and you had to start again, that would be pretty rage-inducing right? If you were playing football with friends and they brought our a professional player and it was just too difficult to win against them, that would be pretty frustrating, right?

I think a problem arises when these feelings of frustration get taken out on others. Research has proven time and time again that violent video games do not, on the whole, create violent people. They can serve as an outlet for negative feelings; a lot of people describe using video games as a way to “switch off” after a stressful day. However, online gaming crash outs and cyber-bullying spoils things for everyone, turning the online gaming circuit into a circlejerk of obscenities and every -ism under the sun.

As I’ve grown older, I’ve learned to deal with these feelings a bit better, but that’s been a journey. You know that gambling slogan, “when the fun stops, STOP.” ? I have tried to take that to heart when it comes to games.

When I can feel my heart pounding, my voice raising, the swear words coming thick and fast, and sadly, when my dog comes over to me looking sad like I’m angry at him (sorry boy) then I check myself. If it’s a horrible boss I’m attempting, is it optional, do I care enough to attempt it again? Was I close, or is this never going to happen? If it’s a tricky puzzle, can I look up a solution? Is the rest of the game made up of more of the same? Is this going to piss me off the whole time I’m playing? Should I just give up now and leave it well alone?

It’s good to be able to ask ourselves questions like this when we’re playing games. The most important one should always be: “Am I enjoying myself?” Now that I have much less time to play games, I choose wisely and am much quicker to put something down if I’m not feeling it. Younger me would have ploughed through, getting more and more frustrated before throwing in the towel along with the controller.

Whilst my gamer rage is probably always going to be a part of me, I hope that it’s not an ugly part that puts other people off playing with me or around me. Maybe just watch out if you’re playing Overcooked though. Remember we’re here to make tomato soup and win, not spin in circles with a fire extinguisher (yes Nick that means YOU).

Do you have a rage story, gaming or not? How do you harness your anger when playing video games?

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HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who commented on my Note about gamer rage. I’ve included some quotes here, I didn’t include names in case folks didn’t want to be called out and personally shamed by their rage stories, but feel free to call yourselves out in the comments if you’re feeling brave.