I by no means anticipated Love is Blind to make me be ok with video video games in 2025, however right here we’re

What’s your instinctive response when video games are talked about in well-liked tradition? Do you shimmy forwards keen to listen to what individuals need to say, delighted that one thing you take pleasure in is getting air time? Or do you flinch, worrying what stereotypes and detrimental perceptions are about to be perpetuated?

I believe I do know your reply. I believe it is most likely much like mine. And my reply – my intuition – comes from years of video games and players being handled a sure method. But let’s come again to that. The cause I ask in any respect is as a result of, properly there isn’t any hiding it, it is due to Love is Blind. Are there any followers on the market?

That’s not a press release by the best way, should you’re by some means unfamiliar, however the identify of a present. Love is Blind is a Netflix courting present the place women and men meet in small rooms (pods) and might’t see one another due to dividing partitions between them. Therefore, they’ve to determine (or not) relationships based mostly on what they hear. Only after one individual proposes – as in: asks to marry – can they meet one another head to head. Then they go on vacation and stay collectively for a couple of weeks, after which marry. Or not. That’s the present. It’s fascinating.

I point out Love is Blind right here not simply because I would like individuals to speak to about it, however as a result of Eurogamer has an surprising reference to it, with somebody on the present – somebody within the just-ended second UK collection. You know that charming man Kieran who matches with Megan (you most likely do not), who the present labels as a “gaming entrepreneur”?

His full identify is Kieran Holmes-Darby, and Ed interviewed him in 2022 on the Formula E E-Prix occasion at London’s ExCel exhibition centre. Holmes-Darby organised and led the Accelerate eSports racing event there. He’s director of gaming at Formula E. I discovered this out yesterday and it excited me enormously. Why? For a couple of causes. One, as a result of the label “gaming entrepreneur” had been nagging at me and I questioned what Holmes-Darby truly did and whether or not it was an actual job. Two, as a result of I needed to know what Ed considered him (he mentioned Holmes-Darby was very good); and three, which is expounded to 2, Holmes-Darby is my favorite individual on the present.

I’m not alone in feeling this fashion, by the best way. Plenty of individuals have been praising the best way Holmes-Darby has handled tough conditions and communicated and complemented Megan, his match. He looks like a great lad. But what appeals to me extra about him is how Holmes-Darby has represented video games throughout the present, and individuals who play them. It’s his enthusiasm for them, his unapologetic love for them.

There’s one episode the place – and I’m sorry for the slight spoiler – Holmes-Darby exhibits Megan his home and the gaming set-up he has there. This seems like an precise gaming desk – a streamer’s desk, truly – full with microphone, headphones, gaming chair, and so on. All the paraphernalia you may count on. And removed from being embarrassed about having it, Holmes-Darby appears excited to indicate Megan, and let her in on an enormously necessary a part of his life.

I do not suppose I’ve ever seen somebody linked to gaming in a present like this behave on this method earlier than, and I’ve watched a lot of collection of Love is Blind, in addition to the exhibits that orbit it (the Lachey universe). The muscled-up and closely made-up individuals who seem on these exhibits usually are not the sort I count on to play video games severely. They’re the form of individuals I think about wrinkling their noses at individuals who do. Even Megan, Holmes-Darby’s match, says early on that she would not wish to meet a gamer as a result of she thinks there’s one thing immature about it – that is her preconceived notion. And that is the form of prejudice I count on. But then she meets Holmes-Darby and he modifies her thoughts.

This is what I actually like: Holmes-Darby’s impact on her and, I hope, on different individuals watching the present. He would not symbolize everybody who performs video games however he does symbolize individuals who play video games very properly. There’s a nerd in there he is not afraid to set free. And it is that bravery I actually admire. Because I believe I’m, and positively have been, afraid to do the identical.

To come again to the query I requested earlier about your knee-jerk response to gaming when it is referenced in well-liked tradition: I flinch – that is my reply. I’ve been conditioned by years of detrimental gaming stereotypes to really feel that method. I’ve felt the condescension and derision directed in the direction of adults who play video games. So, whereas gaming has been and continues to be an infinite a part of my life, there are events the place I downplay it. I can not seem to assist it.

But Holmes-Darby would not. He overtly loves video games, even throughout the intensely scrutinised world of Netflix actuality courting exhibits. And that is why I like him. He is unashamed – a blast of nerdy daylight radiating from my TV. Holmes-Darby jogs my memory how far we have come.