Most of the time I’m doing work at home, I’ve been set up on the kitchen table, on counter tops, and on any surface that can accommodate me and a laptop no matter how cramped or uncomfortable. So, as a belated birthday gift, my wife took it upon herself to clear a room, strip the wallpaper, paint and decorate it with my things so that I can have my own space for creativity and relaxation.

Once the room was ready, all of my stuff came out of storage. Tons of anime and gaming artbooks, posters, prints, and other memorabilia finally came into the light of day after a decade in darkness. It was a past I had long shunned. Yet, my wife took great pains and gentle graceful steps to put these long forsaken treasures into places of honor in our house.

I had been very bitter about anime and gaming for nearly a decade and put most of these things away in frustration. Part of the reason why I had become bitter was guilt by association. I spent an egregious amount of money on anime and video games to cope with some of the most difficult and trying times of my life and I found very little return on my investment. But mostly, it was because of youthful arrogance in believing that I was somehow better than the “average” otaku or the “average” gamer and a sense of shame that I was once “one of the masses.”

With otaku and gamers, it is very easy to garner a superiority complex. In almost every new game or animation release, you can find someone with the attitude believing that “I was there when games/anime were good and now they suck.” I believed that. It was part of my motivation for getting into video game design because I know better than you all and can show you through the sheer might of my talent and skill.

I was wrong.

Yet, it took many years of marriage and parenthood to begin to start showing me the error of my ways. (Yes… I am a typical male in that way.)

The first thing to go was my cynicism about games. It is simply impossible to be cynical when seeing the delight and surprise in the eyes of a child. There are many gamers who disdain Nintendo for ruthlessly exploiting their intellectual property year in and year out. Yet, the splendor and wonder in my sons’ eyes reminds me that these games were not meant for me, but for them.

How can I turn up my nose and remain cynical when after a long day of work, I come home to find my non-gamer wife and my two boys jumping and laughing as their mommy tries to get Mario across impossible platforms in his latest title? I can’t help but crack a smile every time I hear my wife say “Oh! How cute!” or laugh at myself for falling off the same platform for the 20th time to be greeted with cheers from my boys saying “Do it again, Daddy!”

In the last couple weeks, I bought a copy of the first season of the Generation 1 Transformers from the 1980s for my eldest son who is almost 5. Watching this old TV series together with him, I was able to pick out the many flaws of the series. There was voices out of sync and with the wrong characters, there was some broken animation and even wrong coloring in places, and I was able to pick out some major plot holes. Yet my son was just entranced by the world of Transformers.

He would laugh at the jokes, cheer at beating the evil Decepticons, and imitate some of the fisticuffs of these giant robots battling evil. Within 2 weeks of introducing Transformers to my son, he can tell me the names of all the Autobots and Decepticons on sight and what their special powers are. He didn’t see the flaws that I saw. He saw a world of possibilities. And this summer, he gets to see his Dad play “The War for Cybertron“, a Transformers game set in the Generation 1 world.

There were two concrete events that happened recently that got me to rethink my whole attitude on games, anime, gamers and otaku.

In 2007, my wife gave birth to our second son only 2 weeks before an anime convention. She was supposed to run the Artist Alley where all the amateur and professional artists gather and sell their wares. But because the baby was so little, I went in her stead and ran the Anime USA Artist Alley. My wife has a stellar reputation of running artist alley, so I was under extra pressure to maintain her high standards.

During the course of the weekend, security was overwhelmed, especially for several of the main events including the concert. Since the Artist Alley was next to the main events area, I took it upon myself to ensure the safety of many of our guests. This included maintaining an orderly waiting line during some of the big events of the weekend.

The problem was that security did not prepare enough space for proper waiting lines so we defaulted to using dangerous fire escapes and stairwells just to keep the crowd under control. I cannot tell you how nervous I was. These were deplorable conditions and if not handled properly could lead to people getting seriously hurt or trampled.

But people were very patient. These “weirdos” wearing strange and often bizarre costumes were incredibly understanding and even grateful despite our the poor planning. When it came time to move the lines, people walked in an orderly manner and no one lost their place. This happened several times throughout the weekend, and each time my staff was greeted with the same joy, gratitude, and patience.

It is so easy to think badly of people when you hear of shopping riots. Or even to think the worse of gamers and otaku who have no qualms of saying the worst about one another on the Internet. But in their physical presence, and in some very trying circumstances, the average person I met was more than happy to be there and were thankful for even the mediocre job we were doing.

It broke my heart. How can I think that I am better than these people?

What sealed the deal for me was the band that played that year: “Back On.” They are relatively unknown except for a couple songs that played as part of an anime soundtrack for Air Gear, but despite the language barriers their music just moved me.

That weekend, after many years of cynicism, I was convinced of the fundamental goodness of the average person. For all their flaws and bad fashion sense, humanity still has that core goodness.

Amongst the music and the dancing lights, I saw the very goodness that God put into man, made in his image and likeness. Man is a tragically flawed character, yet created with an unchangeable nature that seeks and thirsts after the good, the beautiful and the true.

It is this natural drive that brings all these people into packed halls year after year. They come together seeking friendship, meaning, camaraderie, and joy in sharing the stories told to us in games and in animation. It is the inborn desire to be part of something meaningful that brings us together in these strangely dressed halls.

This was the seed that was planted in my heart that year. It only germinated this year when I was confronted with my very own attitude. It was time to break that chain.

America has been going through some trying times which is bringing up a lot of deep issues even amongst friends.  It was only a few days ago, that while debating a friend of mine, he said to me, “We have to agree that the average person doesn’t understand what is even best for them, much less the country.”  This gave me pause.  And in that moment, I saw.

That was me, once.

And it was then I realized why we disagreed…  It is because I believe in the average person.

All of this interest in movies and anime is the average person striving to find meaning in his or her life. I find that this drive to play games as people who are looking to be part of meaningful stories and to be heroes. Heroes are not perfect people or “knights in shining armor.” Heroes will make mistakes and do stupid things. Heroes will have dark pasts and angst. But I believe that deep down, everyone is born with the desire to have done something truly meaningful given the freedom to do so.

And that is why we play games. It is practice and waiting for our time… To be called.

My wife gave me a gift as the final piece to the room: a beautiful statue of Gwendolyn from “Odin Sphere” as the centerpiece.  As I gazed upon her,  I came to realize the largest block to my ability to creating something as beautiful in games and art:

How can I create beauty and meaning for someone I disdain?

For the past 10 years, I’ve believed the lie of my own superiority above the average person.  Yet, it is the average person for whom I will make games and tell stories. I cannot truly create something meaningful or beautiful for them without great humility and love for the common man and his freedom.

That is what so moved me about the TED Talk by the beautiful Jane McGonigal.  She exuded a deep love and awe for gamers when most people just write them off.

I’ve forgotten how to love games and the people who play them.  I’ve forgotten how to love anime, the stories it tries to tell, and the otaku who love them.  This beautiful statue of Gwendolyn is a reminder to me of the things I’ve forgotten.  It is a reminder to me that there is still room to be utterly surprised and delighted by the games people create today – with inspiring beauty, moving stories, and meaningful experiences and a deep love of life and freedom that I wish to give to my fellow man… The common man.

I believe in the future of games.

I believe in the future of anime.

I believe in gamers.

I believe in otaku.

I believe… In the average person…

A hero waiting to be called.

Looks like I have to rethink my calling.

I admit that I’m pretty burnt out after these three long years of pushing through some hellish deadlines.  So I’m more than reveling seeing the fruit of my labor in these GE Healthcare ads. I especially love seeing my Silverlight mapping components (and game-like 3D transforms) put on prominent display as well as the results of my data mining being used to help hospitals.

I still want to do more.