When I moved to Milan in 2017 for my Master I knew that living alone, in another city, would have meant some sacrifices. I left behind in Florence my football team, my friends and some of my passions, to be fully committed to my college courses.

The Covid-19 pandemic changed our lives deeply, in a sudden and unexpected way. It forced us to change our habits, reinvent our daily routine and seek new hobbies and passions. In this tough period I had finally time to recover an old passion of mine: playing FPS videogames.

I still remember vividly the first time I played an FPS game. The year was 2007, the game was Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, an iconic title. I was almost immediately caputured by Captain Price and his fellow members of the Task Force 141 and I completed the campaign in less than one week. But the best was still yet to come.

I had just bought my brand new Xbox 360 and I was ready to connect it to the Internet to explore the world of online gaming. It was my first console (before I was addicted to PC strategy games) and I had just moved from the 56K modem to the cutting-edge ADSL techonology. That year, in 365 days I spent over 30 days playing. Yes, I was addicted somehow.

In those years I even played some clan wars on Xbox Live and I had fun. Then year after year, title after title my passion started diminshing, until 2017, when I completely stopped playing. The beginning of the pandemic in March 2020 overlapped with the launch of Call of Duty: Warzone, a battle royale game (like the famous Fortnite) settled in the Call of Duty world.

It was tough for me to understand and master the new dynamics of the game, which is far from being similar to the classical CoD multiplayer, but now I reached an acceptable level. Playing videogames in 2021 is totally different from what it was in 2007. Nowadays it is much more common and socially accepted. Platforms like Twitch and Facebook Gaming have exploded, contributing to the rise of videogaming creators, like savyultras90, the Italian Call of Duty champion.

Apart from being a lovely hobby, playing Call of Duty in this period has also a remarkable social value. I can keep in touch with my friends easily, trying to fill the gaps that the pandemic has generated.

Here below you can find the updated summary of my stats on Call of Duty Warzone: