This past weekend I went to the Starcraft 2 Red Bull BattleGrounds Finals at The Lincoln Theatre in Washington, DC. The event was absolutely incredible; excellent venue, hyped crowd, entertaining casters, and phenomenal games, yet this was all slightly ruined by the smell of excessive body odor. The scent was strongest when sitting or standing near a breeder or in the small three stalled restroom. Yes, I understand the restroom is not going to smell pleasant because that’s where people let it all out but with that being said, there is no reason I should be able to smell your day old sweat nor your armpits. While in the restroom and I was standing approximately 4 feet away from this guy and I could smell the foul odor seeping from underneath his arms and the mustiness of his neck. Without I doubt I knew this guy had not showered the night before, not only from his decaying body smell but because he also had not washed his hands after using the urinal. After I got a waft of that guy and saw that he did not wash hands, that was the moment I knew that I need to inform other games about decent hygiene. I use decent because depending on a person’s living conditions they may not be able to have the best or even good hygiene but decent is better than none.
Now, this was not the first event that I have experienced issue, I also ran into this problem at the MagFest 2013 event. That event was much worse because the event was open 24 hours for 3 days straight, meaning some people did not bathe for 3 days. So can you imagine being in a room full of unshowered, sweaty, musty, greasy faced gamers for 3 days? Sounds like a near death experience, huh? Or dare I say, smell like a near death experience. There was literally a force field and once you walked through force field you were smacked in the face by with hot air and a ridiculous amount of body funk. This is bound to happen during events, but these odors needs to be reduced especially during events that are longer than one day.
My biggest question is why are people not showering during these events? Do they not have access to a shower? Very doubtful, gamers like to travel in packs so it’s more than likely they are splitting a room with a number of friends. I also don’t think people would deny others a shower if they could smell their stench. Do they not smell themselves? Well this shouldn’t matter either because whether or not you can smell your own body odor, you should still take the time to cleanse yourself. Plus, just because you can’t smell yourself doesn’t mean that other can’t smell you, so WASH YO SELF! Honestly the only reason I think people aren’t washing their behinds during these events because they are scared their wristband is going to fall off. That’s I f***king said it. I partly blame the people who are giving out the wristbands and badges, because they should be telling people the band with not rip if they shower. When they tell people, “You need to keep this wristband on for the next (X amount) of days.” Then people think “Well then maybe I shouldn’t shower for this entire event and no one will ever notice.” No, you’re wrong because we do notice and you’re nasty as all hell for that. So if you are one of those people who are lucky enough to hand out bands during events, please info people they can still shower and their band will not rip (unless they pull it off.)
As gamers we should want to better present ourselves since the general population already have us stereotyped. We don’t need to give them anymore reasons to judge us in a negative way. Plus why would you want to want to be dirty , smelly, and sweaty? If it’s because you don’t want people to be near then you shouldn’t be an event in the first place but you could also just tell them you don’t want to talk. I don’t know if most y’all gamers are afraid of water but a shower isn’t like a hammer of dawn or Invoker meteor, it’s not going to kill you. All I’m trying to say is when you go out to a gaming event, please shower at the end of each night. You can call this a rant but I just thought I would inform you, that you need to shower because YOU REEK! GO SHOWER RIGHT NOW!
A Light Skin Video Game Enthusiast 