A Carleton-related post made its way to the front page of Reddit Nov. 13 due to the popularity of one entry in the university’s collection of video games.
Carleton has a video game rental service, and has also started a game room in the Discovery Centre, which opened October 2013.
Reddit, a popular social news and entertainment website, allows users to submit content into categories organized by areas of interest, or “subreddits.”
Users can vote “up” or “down” to rank posts made on the site, which determines its position on the site’s page.
Most posts on Reddit’s front page have between 2,000 and 4,000 “up” votes.
This particular post, made by the user DNZe, falls under the “gaming” subreddit. The post consists of a link to a picture of “Zelda II: The Adventure of Link” in gold casing, a video game that is available at Carleton’s library.
The caption reads “My school library rents games. This recently appeared there.” The post has already gained 2,294 “up” votes and lots of attention from many Carleton students.
The video game is an action role-playing game by Nintendo, and is one of many games available to be rented at Carleton’s library.
Carleton’s collection also includes board games and interactive media across a variety of subjects.
Most comments on the post are users expressing shock not only that it is possible to rent video games from Carleton’s library, but also that a Carleton-related post gained enough attention to make it to the front page of the website.
One user stated: “Came here thinking it’d be an alright post. It became amazing once I realized it was my school.”
Another: “Was not expecting CU.”
“I had no idea you could rent games from the school library,” said Jack Meyer, a first-year engineering student and avid gamer living in residence. “I’m definitely going to check it out now. If other people knew about it, I’m sure more people would take advantage.”
Carleton collects games for students enrolled in the game development stream in the bachelor of computer science honours program, and for those enrolled in interactive multimedia and design.
The departments of those programs requested that Carleton collect games, according to the library website. The university started doing so in 2008.
Approximately one in every 20 students who rent items from the library are renting video games, library staffer Neil McFayden said.
He said he has been working at the library for five years.
“Since we started probably about three years ago it has gotten more and more popular,” he said.
