How The Game survived after getting shot five times
“I woke up out that coma 2001,” The Game raps, at the start of his Kanye West-produced single ‘Dreams.’ “’Bout the same time Dre dropped 2001.”
This was no empty claim to add a bit of grit to his music. The Game really was forced into a coma after getting shot several times during a bad drug deal. The only inaccuracy is that, while this incident did occur in 2001, Dre’s album was actually released in ’99, despite its title.
Speaking to DJ Vlad on VladTV towards the end of 2024, Game reflected on his near-death experience and the circumstances that led to it. It was a harrowing story. Before his rap career had ever got going, Game was involved in gang-related activities, and that included drug-dealing.
According to the man himself, he had ordinarily been “strategic” when it came to dealing drugs in those days, but, on this fateful night where he got shot, he let himself down. He didn’t follow the right protocols for staying safe, and he paid the price for it.
A key rule for The Game during his drug-dealing days was to never do business after midnight. But, on this occasion, he succumbed to greed. He received a knock at the door late at night, and, because he recognised the person on the other side of the peephole—“this corny ass square n—a that always comes through”—he decided to do a little more business.
“So I’m like, ‘I’ll serve this n—a and then I’mma kill it after this,’” Game recalled. “‘But let me make this little 20, 30, 40, maybe 50 if he wants an eight ball or something like that.’ So I opened the door and as soon as I opened the door two other n—as came behind him with guns drawn and it sort of like blew me back off the door.”
Despite the shock of what had just occurred, The Game retained the clarity of mind to realise he needed to grab a gun here to protect himself. There was one on the kitchen table, so he attempted to reach it—but his attacker went for it, too. A struggle took place, and Game came out of it the worst. He took a bullet to the chest.
“I flew back,” he recalled, “not knowing that I was shot, and I start running down the hallway to get my shotgun, my sawed-off, from the backroom. He shot twice more and I got shot in the ankle and I got shot in the stomach, too.”
There was no way out now, and The Game accepted his fate. Waiting for what he called the “dome shot,” he closed his eyes and waited. “I wasn’t scared,” he told Vlad, explaining that his family life had been so fragmented around this time that he didn’t fear leaving anyone behind.
“I didn’t have no children yet, so I didn’t really have nothing to hold on to,” he said. “Me and my mom’s relationship was strained, me and my pop’s relationship was strained. All I had was my few little chicks and my sidekick that I probably was gon’ miss, but other than that I was about to say my peace with God. I didn’t expect to make it out of that.”
But that final bullet to the head never came. The Game opened his eyes, and he found that his attackers had fled. He was alone and, just about, alive. He managed to take up his phone to call 911 before he passed out. He only woke up again weeks later, having slipped into a coma.
In a social media post in 2019, The Game marked 18 years to the day since his ordeal had taken place, thanking God “for the opportunity to have a second chance.” As he saw it, his younger self, who had felt no real reason to live, had been gifted with another opportunity, and he had taken it.
While he was recovering from his injuries in hospital, The Game decided to try and make it as a rapper—and the rest is history. Within a number of years he had turned himself into a star.