Old-School Gaming

David Trilling

Young men play video games at a small parlor in Nokhur, in the mountains along the Iranian border about 150 kilometers west of Ashgabat. Though Internet penetration is rapidly increasing in Turkmenistan - including the introduction of 3G wireless networks in the past year - the Net has not yet reached Nokhur. These games are played on offline consoles connected directly to old televisions.

David Trilling is EurasiaNet's Central Asia editor.