I’d love to hear your stories of when you had a “gaming encounter” moment unexpectedly while not gaming. I’ll start with one of mine…
A few years ago, I was attending a regular season NFL game. At halftime, a choir took the field to perform a few songs, and in a complete surprise, their first song was Baba Yetu from Civilization IV. At that moment, it felt like I was the only person in the stadium who knew the song and was gladly singing along with them while everyone else was either confused by the show (there were a few boos heard) or using halftime to buy concessions or take bathroom breaks.
23 Comments
I met Gabe Newell at Pike Place Market on a family vacation to Seattle back in 2005. Absolute gentleman who took the time to talk to a teenager who was just happy to meet the creator of one of his favorite games of all time.
I was in South Korea and they happened to have the annual international fireworks festival. When it was Japan’s turn, they played Dragon Quest theme.
I’ve been out at bars/shows and counterstrike has come up during small talk. Multiple times I have met people randomly in public and we recognized each other’s names from competitive CS after some time. One guy even admitted he used to not like me rofl
I was walking in the city of Portland and passed by the Louis Vuitton store and saw lightning from Final Fantasy 13 as a model on poster for their products.
I Love that song! Would love to hear it performed.
One of my drill instructors in boot camp was the older brother of one of my gaming buddies in another state
Can’t remember the year off the top of my head but OSU’s band did a video game music halftime show. Highlight for me was when the Halo theme started, such an amazing moment hear that play in such a massive stadium
I was in jail and watching the most recent Olympics (Tokyo I believe) and when they were doing the walkouts for each country I noticed MANY of the songs were Final Fantasy themes from a variety of different games. I was so excited and also was the only one that knew.
I met my best friend in college because she was wearing a Legend of Zelda T-shirt in line at the bookstore.
I’ve had similar encounters with Baba Yetu in the wild – apparently it’s just become a fairly common choir song? I was in a discord call and this girl started randomly humming it and when I asked she had no idea what Civ was but had sung it in elementary school.
During my daughters birthday we had marvel vs Capcom playing in the little room for my little cousins. Out of nowhere I see my older aunts and wife playing lol.
When Song of the Ancients played at the 2020 Olympics I couldn’t help but smile.
I provide these moments at my work. I’ve got a playlist of video game music, ranging from Stardew Valley/Super Mario World to Tekken/Metal Gear Rising, plus whatever else in between. A couple of times a day, someone will come into the store and perk their ears up before going, “Is this *insert game here*?”
Wandering through Dundee train station. They have a full size piano upstairs and some legend was belting out Song of Storms from OoT. He was really good too.
Walking through Kabukicho in Tokyo and accidentally bumped into this older guy in a grey suit, red shirt, cool hair and a soul patch. He proceeded to beat the absolute dog shit out of me while his daughter watched.
My wife is a choir teacher and has Baba Yetu in her rotation. The students love singing it, it’s a great piece that’s usually a crowd pleaser. Surprised people would boo it but there’s no accounting for taste.
I have a Fallout bobble head on my car dash. During heavy traffic, some guy in the next lane starting yelling at me HEY! You into Fallout!? I yell back YEAH! He’s like I love that game! Nice bobblehead! That’s from the game! I’m like Thanks!
I once was at a grocery store and noticed Ilkka Villi (Alan Wake) was there too.
Met a girl I played wow with for years. Had sex. It was cool.
At a friends wedding reception, the live band played “Aquatic Ambiance” at some point. I looked at my friend, the groom, to see if this was his doing, as I know he never has played videogames, but he didn’t even acknowledged the song. Turned out it was the bands’ doing. I think one of the waiters recognized the theme, too
I was moving overseas, and one of the movers said “see you in Cyrodiil.” It turns out that he had recognized my Molag Bal statue that I got for buying the Elder Scrolls Online special edition. He even labeled the box “Molag Bal.”
I once got wrangled into a couples fight over video games.
I don’t know the full context, but I guess the dude was making reference to video game troupes in real life, and she was arguing that he was an idiot and no one did that.
So there I am, just minding my own business and eating my ice cream with my dog when they both came over to me, and the dude asks me “Sir, if you saw a red barrel… like an oil drum, but red, what would you think?”
I started to answer with “well, if video games have taught me any-” The dude cut me off and was like “see! I fucking told you!!” And then he did what I can only assume was his version of a victory dance while she rolled her eyes ands walked off.
Hey OP. If you loved Baba Yetu, [listen to this from the same composer](https://youtu.be/XH6IT_tsSUI?si=NsFAqynTEXOMosMH).
It is unironically one of my favourite bits of music ever. I hope you love it too!