Clans. Mods. Hacks. LANs. These are some of the buzzwords of the online multiplayer computer gaming community... and in particular, the community that has grown up around one game in particular: Counter-Strike. Beginning as an amateur, just-for-fun revision of the popular action game Half-Life, Counter-Strike soon spawned an enthusiastic fan base of dedicated players all around the world, eager to play this game that blended action and team tactics in a terrorist vs. counter-terrorist scenario. Gamers: A Documentary is their story: a look into this curious world of gamers, from dedicated (even obsessive) players to recreational ones, from those who play for the social aspect of the game to those who compete for large cash prizes.

Although the title of the film suggests a broader topic, Gamers: A Documentary is tightly focused on only one community of gamers: those who play Counter-Strike. This makes a lot more sense than it might seem at first: "computer gamers" are far from a homogeneous bunch. Fans of relationship-based games like The Sims are going to be very differently motivated than those who play strategy games or tactical "shooters" like Counter-Strike. (Viewers can take a look at another interesting documentary, Avatars Offline, to get a glimpse of the type of gamer who plays massively multiplayer online games like Everquest.)

It's quite interesting overall, with interviews from a variety of different people involved in different aspects of the game, from the editors of online game news sites like Gamespot and Adrenaline Vault, to the development team of Half-Life (the game that the Counter-Strike mod is based on), to the gamers themselves. The structure is very loose, with its material organized roughly into themed sections, each preceded by a title screen providing a fact about Counter-Strike or defining a computer gaming term. The only topic that is really developed over the course of the hour and fifteen-minute film is that of competitive Counter-Strike play; we get to meet some of the most dedicated players and follow them to regional and then a national competition. But the film isn't really trying to make a point, or develop an idea: Gamers: A Documentary is really a look into a lifestyle, showing you around and letting you get to know the people involved. As such, the loose structure is perfectly satisfactory.

Gamers: A Documentary strikes a good balance in presenting its material to the audience. Viewers who aren't familiar with computer games will likely find the content both surprising and intriguing, while those who are gamers themselves will be interested in seeing interviews with some of the "big shots" of the field. As I play computer games myself (although I'm not a fan of the first-person shooter genre that Counter-Strike falls into), I found Gamers: A Documentary quite interesting in its exploration in depth of a phenomenon that I was only glancingly aware of. Of course, this also put me in the position of knowing enough about the game and its origins to find some flaws in how it's presented here. The film doesn't really place Counter-Strike in its context among other games; it is presented as if it were the first "mod" (modification) of an online multiplayer game, or the first to use realistic physics and damage, or the first to have team-based tactics. It's none of these; just one of the most popular of them. Ideally, I'd have liked some acknowledgment of this, and some exploration of why Counter-Strike in particular has developed such an enthusiastic fan base. But even without exploring this aspect of the topic, Gamers: A Documentary does a solid job of showing an interesting slice of life from a particular gaming community.

The DVD

Video

Gamers: A Documentary is presented in its original 1.33:1 aspect ratio. This isn't a film that really demands top-notch image quality, and what we get is satisfactory. The interview shots are generally clear and clean, and look natural; some of the material is a little grainy, but that's no surprise given that it was live footage of gamers playing, often in poor lighting conditions. One disappointment is that some of the screenshots of the game don't look as good as they should, as the computer running the game didn't have hardware acceleration turned on (a feature that makes the on-screen image look better). Overall, though, Gamers: A Documentary looks fine.

Audio

Like the video transfer, the 2.0 soundtrack of Gamers: A Documentary is about as good as it needs to be. The various interview subjects come across reasonably clearly, and the track as a whole sounds clean. In some of the more challenging audio environments (as in material recorded in a crowded, noisy conference hall), the film considerately adds text subtitles to the image.

Extras

Gamers: A Documentary forces me to re-define my definition of "bare-bones DVD." You don't get any barer than this: not only are there no special features at all (the menu features a single choice: "play") but the back of the DVD case is blank, and even the disc itself says only "Gamers." No information about the film, not even its running time (1 hour 15 minutes, as it turns out.)

Final thoughts

Gamers: A Documentary is definitely worth seeing; I've suggested it as a rental rather than a purchase for the simple reason that it doesn't have much repeat viewing value. It's interesting to watch, but having seen it once, you've seen all there is to offer, and there are no special features to add value. It might be worth a purchase if you're a particular fan of online action gaming (or Counter-Strike in particular) or as a gift  for someone who is.