Hey there, I’m Jason Domican I am the proud creator of the J.D Streams social media and YouTube accounts.

​

I First discovered my love of video games when I was about 4 years old, I remember a few of the first games I ever played but I do not remember the order I played them in but let me try and think.

​

So my first console was a Sega mega drive, I was 4 I think at this point, it was a birthday gift from my mother seeing as I use to always watch my brother for hours play his console. I remember taring back the wrapping paper and seeing the little picture on the box through a rip in the paper….My eyes widened….a Sega mega drive!!! I couldn’t believe my eyes! I opened the gift as fast as I could, WAIT! What is this 2 games have fallen out with it! On the floor lays Donald duck quack shot and a cartridge call mega games that had 3 games built in and I remember them well, Streets of rage, the revenge of shinobi and last but not least Golden axe.

​

I didn’t even bother to open the rest hahaha, I just begged my mum if I could set it up, she walked me to her bedroom as we only had the one telly at the time. I remember those good old retro red white and yellow wires you plugged in to your tv hahaha not no more its all HDMI, but back to the story once it was all set up and ready to go I remember her handing me the pad, it felt amazing…I looked down at my 2 new games in excitement I didn’t know what to play first, after a quick think I picked up Quackshot and pushed in the cartridge firmly and pushed the power button

​

Out of nowhere this gorgeous blue shimmering logo appeared …..SEGA…I was shaking with excitement as the game booted up, I shuffled back on to the bed to get comfortable and I crossed my  legs and focused on the television screen, The theme music started and the intro screen appeared, I pressed the start button and  slowly the screen faded in to the first level, I just remember this colourful vibrant interactive world, it was like watching an episode of Donald Duck but I’m in control of the episode, something in my brain at this very moment changed me forever…..

​

Why watch a movie when I can be the movie…Why read a book when I can be the book…My mind was made up, Gaming is what I wanted to do, As the years went on so did the gaming community and gaming technology was making huge leaps in power and it was quickly becoming extremely popular, consoles become stronger and bigger and more expensive, and at the time I’ll be honest we was struggling back then so I couldn’t afford to keep up with the latest tech plus I was a child so I was stuck in school.

​

The next memory I can recall would have to be getting my first ever Gameboy, I remember this huge chunky brick like device in my hands, no comfort what so ever haha. bad design being honest but what it lacked in comfort, it definitely made up for in fun! This was around the time I got introduced to Mario. I must admit as a child I couldn’t appreciate the Mario games for what they was, I struggled with simple timing tasks and quick thinking, you see in my young years I struggled a lot with my concentration and being able finish a task I had started, I did this for years, I played hundreds of games across loads of consoles I just never completed any of them….this lack of concentration was also effecting me at school, everyone just kept on saying the same thing, “Oh he’s playing to many video games” It felt like I was hearing this every time I made a mistake.

​

I can’t remember exactly when but somewhere along the line I ended up seeing a child psychologist and being diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) I remember the doctors all saying don’t worry you're not any different and to be honest that just made the situation worse, I would sit in the appointments playing on my Game-boy constantly and they started to say that I used gaming as an outlet for stress and anger, but they would tell me not to game because it would make my concentration worse, you see now what really angered me about this was how nobody asked me directly why I game.

​

I played Video games because Life in video games made sense to me, meaning that’s how life should work…Let me explain, well in a game like lets say fable, You make a good choice in fable and you are rewarded, you do a crime your punished, Its that simple, and I spent most of my childhood indoors I wasn’t to interested in going out so this is all I knew, I think this is why now I so strongly believe in karma do good get good….but you see…this isn’t how real life worked, always seeing negative news, Violence in newspapers, and my brother was always in and out of jail at this time and my mother was a single mother of 4 and times was tough my mother’s mental health was suffering and ….well yes, I was always surrounded by negativity, intentional and unintentional.

​

I Played video games to feel…safe, Secure, grounded, It was a lot more simple for me to just come home from school go upstairs close my door and just go to any world I wanted, and If I couldn’t game I would get my action figures and pretend I was making my own video games. I would only like actions figures with knee and elbow joints so I could make them move as realistic as possible and pretend like I was making graphics frame by frame if you get what I mean, I would play for hours trying to find a way to make it look like the toys was realistically climbing up the bed or when the other toy punched him that his neck would realistic throw backwards haha it was so much fun!

​

So after seeing the doctors for a few months I was medicated for my condition and my school work begun to improve and I definitely noticed my focus improving on video games, so now I could play and complete games, I don’t remember the first game I ever completed but I do remember my next big memory, (Deep voice) “RESIDENT EVIL” The voice Echoed through my bedroom as I begun my first ever game of this iconic survival horror, I remember those terrifying fixed camera angles and nearly un killable creatures that roamed the mansion, This was the very first time a video game had ever made me feel fear, I’m talking genuine eyebrow sweating fear, hearing the moans of an enemy somewhere in the area but the fixed camera keeps your anxiety heightened at all times.

​

Something about this horror entrapped me, I was craving more fear more horror, I would sometimes take my old little tv to the basement and set up resident evil down there just to make it a little more scary haha I still do this to this day. So after resident evil I begun to search for a new level of fear and to my luck my brother had just got a PlayStation 2 with…SILENT HILL 2.

​

This was the very first time I had seen a PlayStation 2 and my god the level of detail and the smoothness of the textures where insane! I remember spending hours just wondering the streets of foggy old silent hill just reading all the signs or leaflets on the floors and graffiti on the walls simply because for the first time in gaming history they had the power and resources to add these extra details and I milked it for everything I could, I ended up getting easily over 400 games for my ps2 during its time, I still have them now.

​

So, this triggered my interest in the little details in games, and one game that helped this passion grow was Grand theft auto 3. After being blown out of that prison bus and finding my way to the first safe house, I ignored all missions and just explore this huge open world finding secret upon secret in the many layers of detail hidden within the game. TO BE CONTINUED

​