Video games sometimes get a bad rap. People tend to think of them as a lazy hobby, one which begets slothful character. I disagree with that sentiment, and I’d like to tell you why. When I’m done, I’m sure you’ll agree that video games are not only skilled pursuits, but active and creative hobbies that can be enjoyed by a wide audience.

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Transcript:

Welcome to What Makes You Happy, the show that explores our hobbies and pastimes and how they delight us. This is episode number #25 and today we’re discussing videogames.

It seems today like videogames have always been around, and that they’ve always been a central part of popular culture. But that couldn’t be farther from the truth. In fact, did you know that in the 80’s, the video game industry crashed, and almost ended forever? It’s true! Back then, videogames were seen and usually marketed as idle pastimes, not a serious hobby the way they are today. It really was kind of a fad, the way we think of pogs, fidget spinners, or hoverboards. And once that fad was over, the whole industry imploded, putting many game companies into bankruptcy. But along came Nintendo and released the now famous NES. This one console breathed new life into the dying industry. It really took the world by storm, and shocked the detractors when it became the best selling console of all time. Part of its success was probably due their ingenious marketing. Prior to the release of the NES, marketing for games and gaming systems was entirely different in tone, focusing more on families spending an evening together. Nintendo supplanted this with high energy ads that enticed young boys with masculine figures and games themed around defeating villainous foes. While this wasn’t entirely novel, it was a slightly new tack for the industry. In fact, I believe it’s likely they took a page out of comic books and the marketing themes they had used since World War 1.

Since the reemergence of video games as a powerful media force, some people have criticized the focus video games put on masculine themes of war, and violence. And video games are a powerful media. The industry that was once dead and buried (literally by the way, there are areas of landfill heaped with unsold cartridges) rose from the ashes like a phoenix, and today it is world reknown as a huge economic force. Yearly, the video game industry rakes in more cash than all of the movie and music industries COMBINED. The games being produced today have beautiful graphics, immersive storylines, complex game mechanics, and high skill ceilings. Arenas regularly are filled with fans who come to watch professional gamers in ESports, particularly in countries outside the US.

There is one thing I’d like to touch on for a moment that I find interesting – the criticism that I was mentioning before, about the industry putting undo emphasis on war and violence, blaming toxic masculinity generally, ignores the largest economic sector within videogames. Mobile Games. Since the advent of the iPhone, mobile games have taken a strong foothold in video games, and today are more profitable, and more popular than console or PC games. Even the idea that gamers are predominantly male is an outdated idea. The statistics are fairly clear that the tide has turned, and you simply can’t assume that anymore. Today, it seems that gamers represent a pretty good cross section of humanity. Every country, old, young, men, women, everywhere are enjoying video games, and more than ever. Which raises the question. What’s the appeal? To those of you in the audience who are now thinking about skipping this episode altogether, keep listening.

People like video games today for similar reasons that we enjoy watching TV. It delivers a new, fun experience. Perhaps a more accurate comparison would be books rather than TV or movies. People who prefer books to TV usually cite books being more active than slothfully sitting on a couch and having the story delivered to you. Now imagine actually being involved in the story, such that it won’t move forward if you don’t actively participate. At the very beginning of video games’ history, board games, dice games, or card games were the template. But today, the playstyle is far more open ended. There are RPGs or Role Playing Games, where you play a character in a story. There are building games, which allow you to build like a kid with blocks. There are simulation games, where you have to control large, complex systems, like a city or even a whole civilization. There are even sports games, where you play either a single athlete, or a whole team. And yes, there are those notorious shooting games – which for the record I think of as a kind of sports game. While the subject matter is quite violent, in practice, the gameplay is really more of a sports-like competition.

The point is, video games as a whole are popular because they offer bountiful new and novel experiences. You can play them alone, you can play them with friends – either together on the couch or over the internet. You can get a story, a sense of accomplishment, a thrill, a scare, a real rush, all from the comfort of your own home.

I find that while most gamers have played at least a few styles of video game, they do tend to fall into camps, returning over and over again to the kind of games they enjoy the most. Most obvious are shooter games, like Call of Duty, Halo, or Destiny. Then there are the sports games like Madden, NBA Live, or whatever they’re calling the MLB games these days (I think they rebranded as The Show a few years ago and I didn’t pay attention). There are also platformers like Super Mario, mystery games – Life is Strange comes to mind , thrillers and horror like the Silent Hill franchise, simulation games like Sim City or Flight Simulator, building games like Minecraft, although that game is kind of an outlier for lots of reasons, strategy games like Command and Conquer, racing games like Need for Speed, RPG’s like The Witcher series, and fighting games like Mortal Kombat. The genre list for video games is so long that it’s impractical to list them all. It’s so long that there are trends that come and go such that whole genres will disappear and then reappear over time. One example is adventure games like Escape from Monkey Island which has a story you need to discover by searching and interacting with your environment in a particular way. These games in particular are near and dear to my heart. I’ll talk about them in a moment, and explain why I love them so much.

As you can tell, there’s a lot to discover in video games, which is why so many people stick with it as their main hobby for so long. If you get tired of one kind of game, go find another and it’s a whole new experience. If you get tired of solving puzzles, go looking for games with surprises. If you get tired of shooting games, play a building game. Some people enjoy their games so much, and get so good at them, they turn professional. Yes, they get paid to play games for other people to watch – which seems silly to some people, but is it really more silly than being paid to play football or golf? Instead of training muscular development and footwork, pro gamers are training twitch response, hand eye coordination, and advanced tactics. They have sponsors, fans, and stardom.

Again, people in the world of video games tend to fall into camps. This is true not only for game genre, but also their console. Whether they are playing on PC, a console like the Playstation or XBox or even a Retro console, there often is no cross compatibility between the games, and so some people will staunchly back one or the other. These walls are being broken down in recent years however. With the advent of internet based games, more and more games are offering the ability to play the same game on multiple consoles and more particularly play an online game with people from different consoles. Fortnite is one big example for this. In the game, players must defeat other players in a Battle Royale, but the other players might be playing on a PC, Playstation, or even a phone or tablet. That means there are far more people able to play together than ever before.

I of course have my favorites in the world of video games. I’ve been playing video games since I was a kid. There are pictures of me from the age of 2 or 3 with my hand on the mouse playing on my family’s old Amega in our basement in the 90’s. I am a technology native, as they say, and videogames have sort of just always been there. In more recent years, I’ve been fortunate enough to play games on a Playstation 4, and then more recently on a PC. While PC gaming has definitely been my favorite experience for a lot of reasons, I can see the appeal of the consoles. For me the best games have always been the ones that were more mind than reaction. Minecraft is up there. So is Rollercoaster Tycoon. In these games, sure you can fail, but it’s not like you need to react super quickly – you just need to be smart. To put it into card game terms, think something like Bridge versus Spit.

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Rollercoaster Tycoon 1 and 2 are both personal favorites, and I still return to these games regularly. As much as it’s embarrassing to admit, I’ll actually say that I learned a fair bit about business from these games. In order to succeed, you need to make sacrifices, and investments. No risk, no reward. And while it’s fun to make things pretty, sometimes it’s more important that they work efficiently.

BioShock Infinite is another favorite. It was one of the first shooters I played that had a real story, and I don’t want to ruin it, but the ending to that game really blew my mind. It was such a high concept story, I was literally thinking about it for weeks after I completed the game. But in addition to that, there’s such a fine finish on the game, with beautiful colors, memorable characters, and music that draws you right into the setting. Highly highly highly recommend.

Destiny 2 is a game that I’m playing right now. It’s what is sometimes called a twitch shooter. It’s certainly not for everyone, with it’s futuristic, fantasy aspects, and high flying feats of acrobatics. But if it is, you’ll be addicted. It’s storyline is not nearly as thin as the first edition, the action is just as good, and the online functionality is better. But best of all is the continuing content the studio puts out. They have events that get the whole community to work together to solve really difficult riddles that unlock gear for everyone. They’ve really executed some of this stuff excellently, and it makes you feel like you’re part of a real happening – a piece of video game history.

Grim Fandango is my absolute favorite game of all time. It’s an adventure game from the 90’s. The game follows Manny Calavera, a grim reaper on his journey through the land of the dead to the afterlife. It’s not as dreary as it sounds. In fact the whole game world has a very noir feel to it, with mischievous humor all over the place, amazing thematic music, characters, writing. The whole thing is just so well done. And best of all, it’s an adventure game. So why are adventure games so great? For some people, they’re nostalgic as they’re kind of just a text adventure with graphics. I’m too young for that nostalgia, though I can certainly appreciate text adventures. No for me, I like adventure games because you get to experience all the mystery, all the story, all the danger, without the fear of losing. You see, while it’s not true of all adventure games, typically in an adventure game there is no way to die, no way to lose at all. You just get stuck on a difficult puzzle until you figure out how to get through. This can be frustrating sometimes, but I much prefer that to having to retry a Mario level over and over and over because that stupid goomba just won’t let you pass. In other words, after a hard day at work, when I am physically exhausted, I can relax and just play the game through. Another good pick, although it does lack a bit in graphics, is Myst. I do wish adventure games would come back into the mainstream, they were an excellent style. They actually may come back around, with new entrants like Life is Strange 1 and 2. One thing about adventure games is that even people who don’t like most video games will often get a lot out of them. My wife for example, grew up playing Super Mario on an NES, but isn’t particularly interested in most of the video games she saw me playing. When Grim Fandango was released on the Playstation 4 though, I practically forced her to play it. After the first sit down to play, she was hooked. It’s really excellent.

Can we talk for a moment about Minecraft? It was released over 10 years ago, and today it’s still the most popular video game in the world. Hold up, let me say that one more time, more slowly. Minecraft is the most popular game in the world. And yet, there’s no story, no puzzle, terrible graphics, what’s the appeal here? Well, the answer is really in what people do with Minecraft, or I guess the range of things people do with it. You see, Minecraft is what is known as a sandbox game. While it does have a few game modes, generally, the game has bad graphics because the way it builds the world is procedural, meaning the world is invented not by any single game designer, but by the game itself, using math. Lots of math. Each time you start a new world to build in the game, you’re playing in a brand new, unique game. In order to do this efficiently, the game uses a system of blocks that can be stacked in any arrangement you can think of. People have used these blocks to create sculptures in the game, to create massive structures, art pieces. There are also dangerous foes in the world, which will hunt you down, and so there is a survival element to the game. You can also cultivate crops and animals, so there is a homesteading element as well. Add to that other planes of existence called the Nether (which is like Hell), and the End, which is kind of it’s own thing, and you have the makings of an incredibly open ended game that allows you to do really whatever you want. It’s a playground where you can make your own fun.

Oh one other thing I forgot to mention – there is a system they call Redstone, which is essentially wiring and circuitry. So there are logic gates and moving pieces that people use to create all manner of inventive items. Some people have even gone so far as to recreate an actual, functional computer complete with a CPU, RAM, input device, and a graphics output. And because Mojang, the developer of Minecraft, which was bought by Microsoft, continues to update the game, that $20 something dollars you paid for Minecraft back in 2010 has really paid off. AND IT’S STILL POPULAR! What a game.

Whatever you play, whatever you get out of playing video games, I want to reiterate a point I perhaps didn’t hammer hard enough. It’s a mistake to think of video games as being idle. They are activities that many people invest a lot of time and effort at becoming good at. The skill ceiling for a lot of these games are extremely high, really just as technical as many other pursuits as playing an instrument or perhaps a game like chess. So let’s all stop thinking of video games a s lazy. Or at least, it’s not any lazier than my other hobbies.

This has been What Makes You Happy, the show that explores our hobbies and pastimes and how they delight us. To all of you at home, thanks so much for tuning in. Until next week, remember that happiness is a way of travel, not a destination.

Hosted By: Dovid E.Z. Stern [Ph. (216) 526-6641, Em. dovid@clevelandcreativeoutlet.com, URL www.clevelandcreativeoutlet.com]