Every day, the ritual is the same for Hamako Mori: this 90-year-old Japanese woman conscientiously stretches her fingers before grabbing her console joystick so as not to lose her dexterity once the game has started. After 40 years of screen and games, this gamer granny was recently named by the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest video game youtuber in the world.
The retiree, who lives with her family in Chiba, on the outskirts of Tokyo, can sometimes play up to eight hours a day. “I am passionate about games,” recognizes the nonagenarian, hair pulled in a ponytail and eyes circled by large golden glasses. She explains how to relieve her stress by killing monsters on a screen.
It was in 1981 that this housewife discovered gaming. She bought her first console, an Epoch Cassette Vision, after seeing children playing there. Since then, it has not stopped. His favorite titles? The Grand Theft Auto or Skyrim series, in which she appreciates “being able to do whatever you want to do, freely”. If she does not like to play on the network, she does share her games with other players via her YouTube channel, “Gamer Grandma”, launched in 2014 and which today has more than 300,000 subscribers. Some of his videos even show up to three million views! “It’s more fun to be watched by lots of people rather than playing alone,” she says.
Hamako Mori hopes to be able to continue playing for as long as possible. His projects? Buy the PlayStation 5, which should be released at the end of 2020. “This really obsesses me. I really want one. ”
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