The Curiosity disappointment

Curiosity was an enormous multiplayer mobile game, where all the players tapped on an enormous cube to make smaller cubes disappear, all in a collaborative effort to get to the center. While it sounds like an exercise in wasting time, the first person to reach the center would be awarded a mysterious prize, only revealed to the winner. Once someone broke into the center, it was finally revealed that the winner would become a paid decision-maker for a game called Godus, which sounds like a sweet deal—until developer 22Cans never lived up to its promise, leaving winner Bryan Henderson with neither a prize, nor a new job.

The Mario Kart rescue
In August of 2013, 10-year old Gryffin Sanders saw his grandmother lose consciousness while out driving with him and his brother. Against all odds, Gryffin was able to take the wheel and steer the car to safety without any serious injuries to anyone inside—thanks to Mario Kart, according to the kid himself. Somehow, Gryffin was able to leverage his ability to guide Luigi around a go kart track into navigating an actual road with a real car, and around obstacles even more threatening than stray turtle shells. Things would have turned out differently had he been weaned on Grand Theft Auto.

The Kong kings

There's really no greater documentary about video games influencing lives than The King of Kong. It documents amateur player Steve Wiebe's attempt at scoring the world record in Donkey Kong, much to the chagrin of Billy Mitchell, a professional player who seems stuck in the 1980s, the era in which he scored his life-defining victory. Both players' lives weave around a singular game, and even though both would eventually lose their titles to newer players, it's an emotional view into small-scale competitive gaming and how it affects players.