<p>So, I've won a game design competition in an online forum for games. It's not really a big thing, although I'm pretty involved in the community and I update my works a lot.</p>
<p>I kind of have a problem with this though. It's actually a forum for playing video games (like xbox, PS3, Wii stuff), and the award is in a section of the site. I don't want to portray myself as a guy who wastes all his time on useless gaming sites; but at the same time, I did win the award, and I wrote it into my UC essay (although I could take it out).</p>
<p>So what should I do? Should I put it as an award? If so, should I explicitly mention the website or not? Or should I just keep it in the activity section since it's nothing really official. I don't want to make it a bigger deal than it is.</p>
<p>Unless you have absolutely nothing else to list in the awards section, I would leave it off, as your fellow students will be listing “national merit this and that” awards and yours might come across meager by comparison.</p>
<p>Okay, I have 4 other awards that are decent-ish, so I’ll leave it at that.</p>
<p>Also, I wrote one of the UC essays on it. It wasn’t so much about the award as it was about the process involved in creating it, and the creative energies and etc etc. Should I keep the “voted 1st place” part at the end, or should I rephrase it so that the game had a decent reception?</p>
<p>I would leave it in your essay, that’s fine, it is silly to avoid saying you won the award for it. And I’d go ahead and put it on your award list, for them at least. It is something fun that you do and you got some kudos for it. It isn’t like you are writing an essay about playing video games, right?</p>
<p>Well, I’m not, but I’ve heard tons of people say that I might come off as the type of person whose entire life is video games. Schools don’t want people who stay in their dorm for 4 years playing lol or wow or whatever (never played those btw).</p>
<p>Put it on, it’s impressive and shows that you’re passionate about something. It’s not illegal to like videogames - hell it can be pretty productive. I’m listening a few mods I’ve made for various games (and their DL numbers) on my app.</p>
<p>All the other students that put National Merit this and that and AP Scholar, many of which sound virtually the same and are “avoiding” sounding anything other than diligent and focused?</p>
<p>Are you looking into designing computer/technology/games in the future? I wouldn’t keep it off unless you feel like you are padding a weak application or legitimately feel that it’s useless. (if you have others, you could put “won design competitions” or something like that as well) If a college won’t distinguish between “designing games” and “playing games”, or feels the need to make assumptions about your personal life, I wouldn’t give them too many looks.</p>
<p>Okay, I’m putting it on then, since it is entirely germane to the field I intend to study.</p>
<p>I’m still a bit worried though. I hear stories of how admissions officers go onto Facebook and find incriminating evidence about applicants. If they go an research the site that I won the awards on, they might associate me wrongly.</p>
<p>Nothing specifically about me I suppose. It’s a game website for a MMORPG that I quit like 4 years ago (also general video game stuff), but the community I’m involved in within it has nothing to do with the game.</p>
<p>I’m pretty sure MMORPG players are the bane of all colleges, since they bring nothing to the school socially or academically, so I don’t want to be lumped into that category of “when I grow up, I’ll be on the US world national team for League of Legends.”</p>
<p>Oh, relax. The rest of your application is for showing that you do other things, there’s nothing wrong with having a hobby involving video games, let alone a productive one that actual translates into a marketable skill. </p>
<p>This kind of attitude is why half of people’s “What are my chances!?!?!” posts look identical.</p>