Junior girl breaks stereotypes regarding “guy-ish” video games

Footsteps echo through her wireless headset as she scans each corridor for easy points. With her AUG assault rifle at the hip, junior Sarah Frankola tosses a couple of flashbang grenades into the next room, blinding a pair of campers. They stand dazed and blinded, firing aimlessly into the surrounding walls as Sarah unleashes a round of bullets, winning the round. She laughs. It was all just too easy.

Frankola, like many high school students, loves to play video games. But not every high school girl plays “Red Dead Redemption,” “Call of Duty,” or her personal favorite, “Mass Effect” religiously.

“The first game that got me into the more guy-ish video game world was “Super Smash Bros: Melee” on the Game Cube when it first came out. Ever since then it’s been a progression to other games,” Frankola said.

Junior Jason Seo has played online with Frankola in numerous first person shooters that normally are categorized as “guy-ish,” violent, first-person shooting videogames. These include the likes of “Borderlands,” “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2” and “Call of Duty: Black Ops.”

“Most everyone thinks it’s pretty cool that she plays games, and others tend to be surprised that a girl would even touch a controller,” Seo said.

Seo also enjoys playing with and against Frankola in online battles.

“Depending on if she tries hard, she can do really well. Other than when she is fooling around, she is a pretty good player,” Seo said.

Given the fact that Frankola is a girl playing online in a virtual world filled with teenage guys, communicating online with other players can be a tough task at times. But Frankola learns to take it light-heartedly and enjoy her gaming experience.

“There is a lot of talk back. There are a couple of creepy comments made and a couple of kitchen jokes here and there. [Sometimes] it’s actually quite humorous,” Frankola said.

In the gaming world, there are two types of gamers. There are the “try hards” who strive to win and don’t necessarily enjoy the game if they do not come out on top. And there are the relaxed gamers who simply have fun no matter what the outcome. According to Seo, Frankola is certainly fits the latter definition.

“She is definitely more of a ‘so long as I have fun, I don’t really care’ type of gamer,” Seo said.

In a society where stereotypes often cause people not to venture out and try new things, Frankola breaks through these boundaries with guns ablazing.