Texas Is The Surprise Home To A Lot Of Popular Nerd Culture

On a recent phone call with a friend of mine, the topic of Anime came up. How isn't important. What caught my attention was the fact that Texas is home to a mega popular Anime streaming service. I started digging, and got a whole new look at Texas.

Surprisingly, Texas is a very important place when it comes to nerd pop-culture.

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Texas Is Home To Several Video Game Studios

This shouldn't be surprising, but I was caught off guard; especially when I saw the names on the list. Some of my favorite video game studios have a studio in the Lone Star State.

The one that made me whisper "no way" the most enthusiastically was id Software.

This is the company responsible for some of the biggest titles that I played as a kid. They had a huge hand in forming my gaming habits.

Titles like Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Quake. Not only were these games mega-popular during their time, but they paved the way for a lot of what our kids are playing now. Without these, you don't have many modern games.

Devolver Digital was on the list, which is a studio that published several of my irreverent favorites like Hotline Miami and Hatoful Boyfriend.

Bethesda (think Elder Scrolls and Fallout) also has studios in Texas.

Texas Apparently Loves Its Anime. Crunchyroll And Funimation Based In Texas.

Crunchyroll and Funimation are headquartered in Texas. I'll let that sink in for a moment.

I'll admit that even though I live in Texas and should know better, I still get caught up in some of the stereotypes about the Lone Star State. Ask me to describe it, and I'll tell you all about cowboys, frontiersman, the Alamo, oil rigs, and all of the stuff people from out-of-state think about.

That's a tiny piece of the puzzle, apparently.

If you, or your kids, enjoy streaming, or have enjoyed streaming, shows like My Hero Academia, Dragon Ball Z, Demon Slayer, and so on...chances are you can thank Texas in a roundabout way.

You probably streamed it on one of these two services. For us (the kids and I), it was Funimation until the merger between the two companies was announced. Then it was on to trying to get used to Crunchyroll.

If I've learned anything today it's that you should never judge a book by its cover...or a state.