Repost: Michael Jackson and the Music of Sonic 3

This is one of the geekier things I've posted in a while, but as a fan of video games, video game music, and Sonic the Hedgehog in particular, I found this video by GameTrailers fascinating. As you'll see below, the debate about Michael Jackson and Sonic 3 has been raging for years, and it's great to hear some (semi) official words on what went down.

I won't spoil it for you, check out the video below, it's worth the watch. And here is the link to the music-comparison video by Qjimbo they cite.

GameTrailers

Extra Credits' History Lesson is Pure Awesome

This is materialized awesome. Lets get lots more of this, please?

Bioshock Infinite: A Flawed Masterpiece

I recently found myself with time on my hands again, and I decided to use my renewed freedom to play Irrational Games' Bioshock: Infinite. In some ways the game is a remarkable achievement that deserves a lot of the accolades that gaming media have been throwing at it, but it also deserves some serious criticism. Infinite is definitely not the best game of all time, in fact it might not even be the best entry in its own series. However, it is most certainly a game that demands discussion, especially in terms of its narrative, and that's what I intend to do here.

tl;dr: I really enjoyed Infinite but had serious issues with the game's mechanics and their separation from the storytelling, as well as the game's handling of American history. Infinite is less of an odyssey into America's past than it initially appears to be, and more of a sequel to the original Bioshock than expected. Ultimately, Infinite is a step backwards from the original and its predecessors in terms of gameplay and political discussion. What's more, the game both demands that players keep up with its story about stories while at the same time letting that audience off the hook in terms of the racial issues it raises.

I'm structuring my review into three separate but related sections on Infinite's A) gameplay mechanics, B) sci-fi narrative (because, yes, alternate history is science fiction), and C) use of racial politics. There will be spoilers in my second and third sections, but the first should be spoiler free and I'll give another warning before I get to the spoilery stuff.

The Setup, In Brief

For anyone who's reading along without prior knowledge of Bioshock: Infinite, it's a sequel to Bioshock, the "highest rated first-person shooter of all time" and a spiritual successor to the System Shock series. These "Shock" games have each been hailed for their immersive environments, complex narrative themes, interesting villains, and varied game mechanics. Infinite is a narrative-driven shooter set in a fictional version of 1912. The game takes place in the city of Columbia, a city-in-the-sky that seceded from the United States after the Boxer Rebellion. The now independent floating-city-nation is deeply patriotic and religious, seeing itself as a purer form of America -- in every sense -- and worshiping some of the Founding Fathers as saints. The whole society is led by Father Zachary Comstock, a supposed Prophet who makes more than a few comparisons between Columbia and Noah's Ark.

I've described the place as "a jingoistic Laputa," but that got me called-out as a pretentious jerk. I still think it's a pretty apt description, but then so is the pretentious jerk bit.

Anyway, the setup for the game is simple: you play Booker DeWitt, a down-and-out former Pinkerton who's made a deal to have his gambling debts wiped away if he can get a girl from Columbia. Whether he's on a rescue or kidnapping mission is not entirely clear, as his motivation seems to begin and end at solving his own problems. However, as the game progresses it becomes clear that neither Booker, Columbia, nor the mysterious girl, Elizabeth, are what they initially appear to be.

Two Steps Forwards, One Step Back: Infinite's Self-Contradictory Gameplay Mechanics

Infinite doesn't seem to have a clear sense of what kind of game it wants to be. In one sense, Infinite is much more a modern console shooter than any of the "Shock" games before it, as the new game restricts you to having two guns at any given time where the previous games did not. Whatever you find yourself faced with, you'll either have to have the right guns for the situation going in or else hope to find the right tools on the battlefield. Additionally, Irrational has taken a Halo approach to life, giving the player an auto-recharging shield in addition to the persistent life bar from previous "Shock" games. However, in contrast to how regenerating health or stronger regenerating shield encourage experiment and play in other games, Infinite's shield is gone so often and suddenly that you'll be running for cover so it can recharge, and in the likely case that your health has been drained then you'll also want to heal. On top of this, Irrational took an extra step and removed your ability to store healing items for later use this time around, so when you're low you'll be running for the nearest vending machine or trashcan. The net effect is that Infinite emphasizes the scavenger-hunt gameplay of previous "Shock" games by forcing you to constantly be on the lookout for health/mana/currency/ammo even more than in the past. This in turn encourages either conservative or frantic play, especially during battle, as anything you use/lose is gone until you find replacements in the game world.

However, in contrast to this are the new elements Infinite brings to the table: Elizabeth and skylines. The former gives periodic supplies in the midst of battle and opens up new tactical options via "tears" that dynamically change the environment, while the latter presents an unprecedented opportunity for verticality and momentum on the battlefield. There's quite simply nothing like your first fight in one of the skyline arenas, and the joy I felt in the fight immediately following the "Hall of Heroes" section justifies playing the game all on its own. Likewise, having Elizabeth in tow is the exact opposite of the game-long escort mission some people feared. Instead she provides a real sense of partnership and backup that I can't recall experiencing in any game before this one; you genuinely miss her whenever she's gone from your side, as the odds feel distinctly stacked against you alone. These elements just beg for you to push the envelope and try your odds at the new methods of traversal and combat on the battlefield, to change it as you see fit where needed, and to rely on a helping hand from Elizabeth in a pinch. However, this stands in contrast to the conservative impulses brought on by the two-weapon arsenal and strange approach to your lifebar. The possibility of frantic play is there, but the consequence for death of losing money -- and with it the ability to expand the potential of your arsenal and thus the possibilities for experimentation -- reiterates the wisdom of playing it safe.

The cumulative experience of playing through Infinite is equally frustrating and inspiring, as its advances encourage a form of gameplay that its changes to the "Shock" formula betray. The adherence to tropes from two branches of earlier games -- modern shooters and the previous "Shock" games -- feels self-contradictory, as the elements cribbed from both add up to something that isn't quite as fun as either. There's something anachronistic about the combination, it's just not clear which part feels out of place: I kept wanting Infinite to let me be more tactical and experimental, like the original Bioshock, but the game seemed to encourage a pace more in line with something like Halo; at the same time though, the new elements opened up combat possibilities that the health item, scavenger-focused gameplay discouraged me from really diving into. It wasn't constantly a problem, but a few notable points (specifically a few fights with a certain ghost and the climactic shootout) really emphasized the disjunction of Infinite's constitutive elements.

If all this sounds overly negative it's just because the high-points in Infinite are so incredible and unique that you become acutely aware of the parts that otherwise hold it back from being that way all the time. There are moments in Infinite when the team at Irrational capture lightning in a bottle and deliver something that lives up to and exceeds all the hype behind the game, there's also just enough -- if not more -- instances where it feels like they're holding themselves back. Even beyond the promised single-player DLC, I hope this isn't the last time we see combat arenas like Infinite's skyline playgrounds, because there's simply nothing else like them.

I should acknowledge that I played through Infinite on the Hard difficulty after numerous reviews said it was too easy on the default setting. However, now that I've played through the game I'm hearing other people complain of balancing issues on the Hard setting (note: spoilers through that link). In the end it's all just more reason to play through it again, if only to see if the kind of experimentation I hoped for is more possible on the easier settings. But I do feel like Infinite's basic mechanical design tries to go in two distinct and contrary directions at once, and hence fails on a fundamental level where the original Bioshock succeeded by having a more coherent focus.

However, that does make sense given the extent to which the actual gameplay in Infinite is secondary to its narrative as opposed to complementary, which brings me to my next point...

Infinite's Uneven but Brilliant Approach to Alternate Timelines

One of the reasons this review of Infinite is being written in three separate chunks is that "the core gameplay is entirely separate to the narrative," as Jake over at Scripted Sequence points out in his spoiler-filled review. Likewise, Joseph Bernstein at Buzzfeed says "the rules of the [first-person shooter] genre are at odds with the very magnificence of Irrational's game" and concludes that Infinite "is so terrific that it feels diminished by a genre that it is better than." This distinction between Infinite's purpose and its form led Jake to wonder "what would happen if we replaced it with another genre of gameplay. Or even stripped it out entirely?" It's a valid question because, for all of its uniqueness and high-points, the combat in Infinite is entirely secondary to its narrative. Irrational games has something to say and Infinite was the vessel with which they chose to do so, the fact that it's a shooter is frankly incidental to that thesis. Both Jake and Joseph point towards the argument that the game is a shooter just because that genre sells well, and honestly that's probably not even a point of debate at this point. However, that's also beside the point of what I want to say here, which is that Infinite is a fun (albeit lopsided) shooter that's intended to tell a story.

And what a story it is. Spoilers from here on out.

The narrative in Infinite is, on the whole, dazzling. It takes storytelling in games to places it's never gone before and demands a lot more participation and work from gamers than we're used to. Bioshock put forward a challenging and complex political discussion that was unprecedented and justly hailed at its time. Now, Infinite outshines that achievement with a similarly detailed plot that likewise uses the medium to subvert our sense of agency, but creates that revelation from a deconstruction of narrative driven video games.

I'll admit that's kind of a big statement, and in attempting to justify it this post briefly got away from me. For now it's suffice to say that I believe the use of Elizabeth as a guide through Columbia, and a source of power to slip between worlds, is ultimately a symbol for Irrational's imaginative role as the creator of narrative video games. I'm going to follow up this piece with a detailed analysis of Infinite's ending, but here I'd prefer to focus on evaluating Irrational's approach to the fiction.

It should be clear from the foregoing that, overall, I thoroughly enjoyed the narrative in Infinite. My reading of how everything adds up very closely aligns with Tom Phillips' explanation over at Eurogamer. The notion that there are three significant -- or at least relevant -- branches of Booker's history across the infinite worlds makes sense to me: we play through the game as Booker from the timelines in which he attended but rejected the baptism, and was then racked and defined by guilt for his actions at Wounded Knee; Comstock represents the timelines in which Booker attended and accepted the baptism, and hence cast off his guilt and moved on to support Lutece and found Columbia; the game concludes with both these branches being cut off as Elizabeth changes the timelines so that both Bookers drowned at the baptism; finally, the only surviving Booker is from the timelines where he never attended the baptism, and so never became Comstock or gave up Anna (as signaled by the post-credits epilogue). As someone who grew up watching Sliders, this all makes perfect sense to me. Infinite different timelines, sure, I get it. And really, when you put it all down on paper it is a very '90s-esque, Jurassic Park-style chaos theory kind of plot. Infinite's concept is not what makes it succeed, but rather the way that concept it slowly revealed to the player -- and, I intend to argue, how that concept is used to launch a meta-discussion of creating narrative games.

However, all of this is not to say that Irrational is completely successful in their storytelling. On the contrary, Infinite's greatest stumbling point is precisely when the story shifts gears from an escape-narrative to an adventure across multiple worlds: the moment where Elizabeth opens the tear to a world where Chen Li is not dead. In an apparent attempt to keep the player in the dark as to precisely what's going on, Infinite consciously fails to clearly establish the differences between the world that you leave and the one that you enter. Booker himself notes that it's hard to imagine that the only change could be Chen Li remaining alive, and yet we are not given a clear sense of what these differences are. This is in contrast to the section later in the game when you are suddenly brought forward in time to the dystopian future in which Booker never saved Elizabeth; throughout the incredible journey through Comstock House, we are treated to a series of tears and voxophones that provide a clear sense of what qualities make that timeline unique and the consequences thereof -- specifically the old Elizabeth's attack on New York in the 1980s. It's one of the best parts of the game, and the clever way in which Irrational immerses you in an unfamiliar world and then teaches you about it demonstrates how poorly the game handles your first jumps into alternate timelines.

The problem with failing to establish the differences worlds is that your dimension hopping makes Infinite's story feel disjointed and structureless. When you first enter the world where Chen Li is still alive, the narrative thread of Jeremiah Fink's attempts to hire Booker is suddenly cut off; what's more, the Vox Populi suddenly seem to be a more aggressive and successful force. No concrete reasons for these differences are provided, and the player is left to wonder, "What else is different about this new Columbia I'm in now?" This instantly removes our sense of forward momentum through a consequential narrative, and throughout the remaining portion of Fink Manufacturing I felt more like a powerless visitor to Columbia than at any other time in my play-through of Infinite. My actions as Booker seemed to have some effect on Chen Li and his wife, on the people I killed, and on the Vox Populi, but it was never clear what it all meant. To top it off, I suddenly heard Booker telling me that Daisy Fitzroy was just as bad as Comstock, but for no discernible reason besides that she was leading a violent revolution as opposed to simply planning one.

Infinite requires that you accept the notion of different worlds and timelines, each separated by more than mere superficial / minor details, but then demands you find narrative coherency across these disparate timelines without providing sufficient context to do so. The clearest victims of this approach to storytelling are Fitzroy and her Vox Populi, whose revolution suddenly becomes "bad" the moment the bullets start flying.

The Revolution Must Be Violent, Otherwise Who Would You Shoot? - Infinite's Trivialization of American Racial Politics

One of the earliest draws to Infinite was that it seemed poised to examine American political culture with the same critical lens Bioshock turned to objectivism. The very notion of a city in the sky with aggressively patriotic leanings was fascinating, and seemed like the perfect platform to examine American exceptionalism and isolationist politics. Infinite was marketed with this image in mind, with preview videos showing off the Motorized Patriot enemy and a brilliant trailer intentionally set to a song titled "Beast of America." All early accounts seemed to indicate that Infinite's narrative would focus on the history of American politics, following Bioshock with a critical examination of a specific nationalist ideology.

However, this isn't quite the case with the final product. Certainly the advertised elements are present in the foreground during the earlier portion of the game. Infinite is an aesthetic masterpiece, and nowhere is this more evident than in the opening hours when Booker first arrives in Columbia and begins his search for Elizabeth. Through Booker's eyes, we witness a deific approach to America's founding fathers, an unnerving racial hierarchy, and jingoist politics. This focus continues on through the great Hall of Heroes section of the game, where the Boxer Rebellion and the Battle of Wounded Knee are portrayed in jarringly stereotyped images; as Tom Bramwell writes, "Wounded Knee wasn't a famous US victory, it was a massacre of women and children, and the Boxer Rebellion was a politically complex conflict," and Infinite's focus on these events makes good on all its promise to examine American political history.

However, at just about the same moment that the narrative stumbles into its first alternate timeline, Infinite drops its examination of American political culture. From the point when Booker and Elizabeth start trying to save Chen Li from his fate, the game's focus becomes Elizabeth and the nature of her powers. As I've mentioned above, the outcome of this plot is an incredible and unmatched deconstruction of narrative gaming, but it comes at the expense of the a more Bioshock-like critique of American history and ideology. This wouldn't be a problem in and of itself if it weren't for how the elements established earlier in the game are used to inform the narrative in its latter sections, particularly the Vox Populi and their rebellion against Columbia's racial hierarchy.

Although the earlier portions of Infinite present an unsettling vision of race in America's past, these elements ultimately serve as window dressing for its meta-game narrative in a way that trivializes them. The white supremacist ideology that informs Columbia's segregation is more or less relegated to informing our understanding of Booker and Comstock's character arcs. It's also intriguingly hinted that the racial hierarchy is informed by Fink's capitalist pragmatism, but any potential examination of this idea is suddenly cut off by the timeline hopping: as mentioned above, when we step into the first tear Booker's interactions with Fink cease, effectively terminating any direct interaction with the character; more conclusively, Fink and his politics exit the game entirely when Fitzroy executes him. But it's in Fitzroy that Infinite's swept aside examination of racial politics becomes troubling, as her Vox Populi rebellion is transformed in an instant from a desperately needed response to the racism of Columbia's rulers, and becomes simply a bloody excuse for combat.

The transition of Fitzroy -- and by extension the Vox Populi -- from a freedom fighter to a villain is poorly handled, to say the least. In the space of just a few minutes, she goes from being the kind of force that Booker acknowledges is needed to fight back against oppression, specifically "because of people like [him]" (i.e. Pinkertons and other such suppressors of dissent) to being little more than Comstock spelt differently; the only things that changes in all this is that the Vox Populi begin a military assault on Columbia, specifically its institutions of hierarchical power like Fink Manufacturing. The act of simply fighting back against rigid, racial oppression is presented as though it is enough to transform Fitzroy from a hero to a villain, and the Vox Populi from allies to foes to shoot. We're shown nothing to disenchant us with the Vox's revolution beyond possibly an execution of soldiers, and frankly that is not enough to justify the sudden turn. The revolution against Columbia's racial oppression becomes the last vestige of Infinite's political examination, and by immediately discounting it as equivalent to its target institution the game trivializes the motivations behind it. Rather, the ongoing battle throughout Columbia provides little more than an opportunity for new types of guns and enemies to shoot at, an approach that in turn begs the question as to whether or not it was all in service of having the game be a first-person shooter.

Anjin Anhut's article, "Bioshock Infinite - Infinite Privilege," makes a decent argument against the problematic approach to race throughout Infinite. Though I don't entirely agree with their analysis, Anhut makes a very good point in saying:

And even if your white guilt absolving moral play is just meant to be a piece of fiction and the american racism is just a stylish backdrop. Even if Bioshock Infinite is not commentary, not analog to what you think is going down today or has been going down in the past… …how dare you abuse that still relevant conflict, that pain and sacrifice of people still living and still suffering from it… and turn into some sort of joke, like nazi zombies or something?

I agree that, despite how the early parts of Infinite and its marketing focus on the world of Columbia, in the end that setting -- and its contents -- are simply backdrop for the aforementioned sci-fi meta-narrative on storytelling. In one sense that's perfectly fine, as the ultimate outcome is an incredible achievement in its own right. However, it's also disappointing to see the examination of America's past -- and present -- racial issues so pointlessly raised only to be cast aside, and deeply troubling to note that this move seems purely in service of providing typical first-person shooter guns and targets. To put those elements into focus just to then transform their revolution into an excuse for violent gameplay seems downright exploitative, and it's definitely not up to the standard Irrational has set for itself. It's intentionally deceptive, and though that's not inherently wrong, the way it's done trivializes very real struggles with racism and intolerance that continue to this day. The Vox's motivations never disappear, but their sudden recasting as villains renders the meaning of their struggle irrelevant, and for the rest of Infinite they provide little more than resistance in your path towards the game's conclusion.

"It's all a matter of perspective" - My Final Thoughts on Bioshock: Infinite

As per usual, I've managed to critique the hell out of something I sincerely enjoyed. Bioshock: Infinite is an incredible game, one that should be enjoyed by anyone who appreciates good narratives, in video games or otherwise. Granted, there are significant issues with the gameplay, and the handling of American culture and politics is ultimately disappointing, especially in how Infinite casts freedom fighters against racial oppression as villains. However, all of that is not to detract from the game's incredible accomplishments. Infinite is unquestionably an aesthetic masterpiece, and you're likely -- even encouraged -- to just stare at the background and soak in the atmosphere of the world Irrational has created in Columbia. There's just nothing else like it, and it is both beautiful and intellectually stimulating. Moreover, the narrative is an incredible feat for the medium, and clearly takes inspiration from some great works of fiction, both sci-fi and otherwise. The mind-bending ending just adds to the already densely layered and intriguing story that unfolds throughout Infinite, and though I'll be touching on that specifically in my upcoming ending analysis it bears stating that the entire story of Bioshock: Infinite is worthwhile and compelling. With all this positivity in mind, the problems with Infinite don't so much hinder the experience of its best aspects, as much as they beg the question, "Why is Irrational still making first-person shooters?"

The answer is "so they can keep making more," and while there's a whole spectrum of possible debate on that point, that's for another day. For now I'm just going to play through the ending of Bioshock: Infinite again to see if I can glean any new insights for my ending analysis. It's truly a mindbender that just keeps on giving, and though I don't think there's any definitive word to be said on its meaning I do think it's going to be good fun to discuss what it means to me.

Errant Signal - Spec Ops: The Line

Recently, I finally had the chance to play through Spec Ops: The Line. I know I'm pretty late to the party but it hadn't exactly been near the top of my priority list until Sony started giving it away for "free." In any case, I played through it and though I didn't find it to be the Game of the Year contender that some touted it as being, it was definitely one of the more interesting and subversive titles I've ever experienced. You just had to slog through some seriously uninspired mechanics to get to that narrative.

I've been mulling over the game in the back of my head and thinking about writing a post about it. I downloaded Killing Is Harmless by Brendan Keogh, a long-form critical discussion of Spec Ops that I'm interested in if only to see someone take such a significant and serious attempt at criticism of the medium. Once I finish that I may take a stab at writing something about the game if I have anything unique to contribute to the (more or less finished) conversation about its themes.

This morning I came across this great video that pretty much canvasses everything there is to say about Spec Ops brilliantly. It's a fantastic watch and I highly recommend it if you've a) played through Spec Ops, or b) don't expect to ever play through it. This is a rare instance where I feel like the general, non-video game playing public should really check out this video on a game, as it effectively ties the game's internal conversation to a larger, political discussion about war culture.

If you truly feel disinterested in video games then skip ahead to the 16:20 mark in the video and just watch the last two and a half minutes. I'm sure you can spare the time and I promise you it'll be well spent, as it's a great final word about the conversation that a military shooter video game is trying to start.

Reposts: Rock, Paper, Shotgun on Misogyny and Video Games

John Walker over at Rock, Paper, Shotgun -- an outlet I don't read but am constantly hearing good things about -- has written a great piece about combatting misogyny in video games. The website has taken a strong stance speaking out against sexism in games and the gaming industry, and in this latest piece Walker outlines why fighting these issues matters as well as his personal thoughts.

It's his last bit, though, that really struck a chord with me: at the end of the article he outlines a few typical responses in discussions of this subject, and then specifically identifies why they're wrong and unproductive. I'm going to share the section in full because it's a pretty awesome and succinct take-down of some of the most irritatingly obtuse contributions to serious discussions of gender and video games, and it would save the collective populace a lot of energy and grief if more people would take these things to heart. All of these concepts can also be extrapolated outside the video gaming context, and I appreciate any attempts to improve conversations broadly. It's a bit like the Ill Doctrine video that I mentioned last month about how to have serious conversations about race and racism. Anyway, without further ado, here are a few ways you shouldn't respond to discussions of gender and video games, and why not:


“Why are you writing about feminism on a GAMING site?”

This question, like so many objecting to any discussion of the lack of equality in the industry, betrays itself immediately. When a publisher issues financial results and we report on them, we don’t see, “Why are you writing about economics on a GAMING site?” When there’s discussion of the effects of violence on players, we don’t read, “Why are you writing about sociology on a GAMING site?” It’s only when the gaming-related subject is the portrayal or treatment of women do such people become enraged by any post that isn’t literally describing the content of a particular videogame.

And to answer the question: because it’s relevant, and it matters. 50% of gamers are women, and around 20% of “hardcore” gamers are women. While the majority of RPS’s readers are men, that’s not something we’re proud of. (Many gaming sites strive for this, as it performs well with advertisers. We would prefer breadth.) We write for a global audience, and we aim not to presume whom our reader might be. We know that matters affecting women affect our audience, whatever their sex, and we know they affect the games industry we cover. We believe in equality, and when we are aware of inequality in the industry upon which we report, it is relevant for us to cover, and we believe important to highlight.


“What happened to this site? You used to write about GAMES.”

This is obviously one of the more strange responses, yet certainly among the most prolific. At least 95% of the posts on RPS are directly about games themselves, as is obvious to anyone looking at it. Posts related to matters regarding women make up the tiniest percentage of our output, and it’s obviously nonsense to make the claim above.


“You’re just trying to be a white knight/get laid.”

...

This particular response is designed to undermine the writer, not only suggesting that caring about equality is something inherently driven by a desire for sex/validation, but that the very idea of caring at all is so unrealistic. Either the accuser cannot conceive of the notion of caring about another’s rights independently of one’s own gratification, or they are so fearful of the potential of equality that they’re driven to undermine those who argue for it. Either way, if you’re typing the words “white knight”, you’re revealing more about your own peculiar understanding of how humans interact than anything else.


“Why don’t you talk about men’s issues?”

First of all, the question presumes the peculiar notion that writing about women’s issues precludes our writing about men’s. That’s obviously ridiculous. And secondly, sadly the question is generally used dishonestly.

There are issues that affect men, and often men who are the target demographic of gaming. Suicide is an especially serious example, and it’s something RPS has covered, and expressed concern over. Our caring about equality in the games industry, and in the portrayal of women, does not exclude our caring about matters affecting men. Obviously.

However, the question is generally designed to derail. It’s often as relevant as asking, “Why don’t you talk about digital download re-sales?” at the end of an article about the troubles of pre-ordering. Sure, why don’t we? Good thing to talk about. Not really a pertinent question in this instance. And that’s the idea – by asking this broad, presumptive question, the aim is to distort the discussion from the matter at hand, which in turn further leaves the matter at hand undiscussed. By the time you’re having tiresome arguments about whether male characters being shown as successful and strong is harmful to men, you’re no longer discussing the fact that scantily clad women are being used to sell videogames. That’s the ultimate aim of the question.


“I know a girl who thinks X, so you are wrong.”

This angle is generally used to argue against anything that is said to misrepresent women, or to represent women in a bad way. This known girl, fictional or real, likes it, so why does anyone have a problem? The argument oddly presumes that a matter is only of concern if women are exclusively and unanimously against it. Men’s views are irrelevant, and indeed all other views are irrelevant, because there’s this one girl who thinks… This is about as useful an argument as someone’s claiming homoeopathy works, against all abundant evidence, because their mum’s knee felt better.


“People are exaggerating on both sides.”

This, and many variants on it, are all about pretending to want to bring “balance” to the argument, in order to prevent its taking place at all. It’s dishonest, based on unexplained, undefined notions of exaggeration, perhaps if pressed illustrated by a single example that likely only emphasises the faux-diffuser’s prejudice. As and when people exaggerate in any debate, it’s great to call people out on it. People called out the issues in a recent post I put on RPS about gender wage gaps, which one could describe as exaggeration. That’s a good thing to do. It, however, has no bearing on the facts that there are problems that need to be dealt with, and the line is usually employed when trying to ensure nothing is allowed to change.


“It’s just a bit of fun.”

When I undermine you in front of your boss, lie about you behind your back, and play cruel tricks on you, it’s just a bit of fun! Oh, wait, those things aren’t fun because they’re happening to you? Gosh, imagine if such a perspective were available when other things that other people don’t like are happening to them? But no, it’s just a bit of fun, then. They should just get over it.

- - -
'Reposts' are inspired by other articles or blog posts around the Internet. They are used here with accreditation as the basis for short bursts of Max's interests.

A Dramatic Reading of Sexist YouTube Comments

The following video comes in response to that heartwarming story about a dude who hacked the original Donkey Kong arcade game to let his daughter play the game as a girl. Apparently some people took issue with the hack:

I'm torn about this video. On the one hand, it's a visceral reminder of how much people suck. On the other hand, if people are going to be shitty on the Internet then at least we can get funny videos to slightly sweeten the deal. It's a "spoonful of sugar" type deal, because laughing at people for being stupid is more fun than getting angry. Or at least the laughter helps with the anger.

GameTrailers.com: Narrative in Gaming

The folks over at GameTrailers.com have put together a great video on narrative in gaming. It's well-worth a watch if you're interested in the kinds of subjects I've explored here in the past.

GT One-Shot

Also, can I just say that I love where GameTrailers' editorial direction has been moving recently? I'm not going to say it's because Shane Satterfield left, but there has certainly been a dramatic change that's coincided with his departure. Some aspects haven't been ideal (a few of the new, free-form reviews have felt too scattered) but generally there's more varied and interesting content coming out of the site, and all of it feels more earnest and human. For the first time in years the site feels more like a legit source of criticism than a corporate advertisement hub, and it is a fantastic change for viewers.

MovieBob on Tropes vs Women in Video Games

I've spent more hours than I care to admit over the last few days fighting with people on reddit about the Tropes vs Women in Video Games series. I know, I know, it's fighting on the Internet (and reddit specifically) but I just couldn't help myself after reading so many arguments that a) Anita Sarkeesian thinks video games are evil, b) Sarkeesian is a shitty journalist and that's what the backlash against her was about, c) it doesn't matter that the damsel in distress trope reduces women to objects because it's just a simple storytelling device, or d) in fact the trope also objectifies the male hero figure so lets talk about that.

Ugh!

Anyway, after putting so much energy into fighting about shitty responses to Tropes vs Women in Video Games, the prospect of a video on the subject by MovieBob filled me with palpable fear. I really, really like MovieBob. I think he's a great, witty commenter who puts out a prolific amount of amazing content. I do not agree with all of his opinions, both on culture and politics, but generally I enjoy his perspective and look forward to his videos. However, when I saw that he had put out a ten minute long video on Tropes vs Women I was nervous. A few days of fighting about it on reddit had more or les conditioned me to assume that any video on the subject would be frustrating and infuriating, and I wasn't sure if I could take that from someone I admire as much as MovieBob.

Thankfully, my gut reaction was completely misguided. It's like I forgot who MovieBob is, as he's repeatedly demonstrated that he has a solid understanding of gender politics. His video is a great addition to the debate going on right now, and more or less just calls out all the trolls who have been/still are freaking out over this. It's a solid video that does a better job at identifying exactly what Anita Sarkeesian is doing with her videos than anything else I've seen lately. Check it out, enjoy, and if you end up back on his The Game Overthinker website avoid checking out the comments, because man are they ever depressing.

 

Tropes vs Women in Video Games: Damsel in Distress Part 1

The first video in Anita Sarkeesian's Tropes vs Women in Video Games series has been released, and can be viewed below. It's the first part of a discussion of the gaming-incarnation of the "damsel in distress" trope, and is a fascinating watch. This entry effectively canvases the use of the trope in the Zelda and Mario series, as well as the transformation of Rare's Dinosaur Planet into Starfox Adventures. Check it out, it's worth your 25 minutes!

In case you weren't aware of the Tropes vs Women in Video Games series before checking out this video, you should know that the newly-launched series has already been the subject of much controversy (all of which kinda makes a good case for the series' existence). Sarkeesian has been making her Tropes vs Women videos for a while, but for the video games extension of the series she turned to Kickstarter to get funding from fans. For reasons that (frankly) allude elude me, this was seen as some sort of irredeemable transgression on her part, and attracted the collective hatred of misogynistic gamers from the depths of the Internet. Slate's Amanda Marcotte sums it up nicely:

Sarkeesian's story is a doozy, by the way. She started a Kickstarter page to raise money to make a documentary about the tropes used by video game designers to portray female characters. She hadn't expressed an opinion about video games yet, but simply by stating that she would at some point in the future do so, she had to endure an absolute avalanche of misogynist abuse from men who hoped they could silence her before her too-scary-to-be-heard opinion could be voiced. Every access point they could exploit was used to try to get to her, especially her YouTube page. Her Wikipedia page was repeatedly vandalized with lies, links out to porn sites, and pornographic pictures. Eventually, Wikipedia shut it down.

Wow. Sarkeesian asked for a paltry $6,000 from fans to make a series about videos games and the roles of women within them, and just for that she was viciously attacked. Helen Lewis at the New Statesman canvases the harassment and intimidation tactics Sarkeesian was subjected to, and it's a pretty harrowing read. Thankfully the story at least has a happy turn in that Sarkeesian was able to raise over $150,000, and will be putting out follow ups to the video above.

So now we have a solid video series examining gaming with a critical lens that is sorely needed. We also have a moment of shame in the gaming community that can be pointed to as evidence that there is something tangibly wrong with the way (many) gamers think about gender and deal with other people. I'm at a bit of a loss trying to conceive of how anyone thought it would be reasonable to harass anyone the way Sarkeesian was harassed, much less for the mere prospect of having an opinion, but clearly that was the case for a great many people out there. Again, this kind of thinking within the gaming community is precisely the reason why we need these kinds of videos, as the only way to make any sorts of changes to these phenomena is discussion and education.

Racing Game Players Drive Too Fast for "Gentlemen" Competition

In an interesting bit of gaming news, the British GT has banned graduates from Nissan's GT Academy from competing. For those of that aren't car racing/game enthusiasts, there's a lot in that sentence that probably doesn't make much sense, so let me break it down. The British GT Championship is a sports car racing series based (predictably) in the UK. The GT Academy, meanwhile, is an interesting little experiment where the best players of the Gran Turismo games are invited to train/compete in real cars in what essentially amounts to an annual reality television special. It's been going since 2008 and has probably been little more than a PR-stunt, only been notable to those involved/interested. Until now.

Last week the British GT Championship announced that it will not be allowing graduates of the GT Academy to apply for the series' "pro-am" format. By all accounts, this format uses teams that pair a professional driver with a "gentleman driver," AKA a talented amateur who's expected to be good-for-their-experience-level but below the professional level. This difference typically manifests itself in the speed at which both drivers race, with the "gentlemen" amateurs generally coming in at much lower speeds than their professional counterparts. Only last year, GT Academy winner Jann Mardenborough drove at speeds that were on par with his pro-driver partner, Alex Buncombe. The guy who got his start playing Gran Turismo on his Playstation was suddenly driving as fast as the pros.

In response, the British GT Championship has banned this year's GT Academy graduates from competing. British GT series manager Benjamin Franassovici has issued a statement saying,

[GT Academy] has shown itself to be a great way to source raw talent and turn that into real racing talent as we saw in British GT last year with Jann Mardenborough. However Nissan’s ability to find such amazing raw talent means that we cannot accept their full season entry for British GT in 2013. Their new recruits have very little racing experience so they have to be on the lowest performance grade. Their talent, going on Jann’s speed last year, doesn’t reflect this lack of experience so it is not fair to put them up against our Pro/Gentleman grid, the basis of British GT3.

I'm not a fan of racing games, and I don't even care about car racing, but I think this is pretty cool news. Essentially an entire (albeit small) class of video game players have been deemed too talented to compete as amateurs in a real driving competition. That's not only the best marketing that Gran Turismo (subtitled "The Real Racing Simulator") could ever have hoped for, it's an honestly good argument in favour of taking the medium seriously in terms of training potential.

Repost: Why games need colour blind modes

Tyler Wilde at PC Gamer has done a great piece on why games need to incorporate colour-blind modes for visually-impaired gamers. It's well-worth the read so head over there if you've got a moment to spare, and/or check out the video below. It shows the upcoming SimCity reboot (?) with a simulated deuteranopia setting on to demonstrate how colour-blind games see things. It's a very cool and revealing video, and it makes a good case for an argument that has been made many times before: games need to be more accommodating in terms of accessibility so that all gamers can enjoy them.

- - -
'Reposts' are inspired by other articles or blog posts around the Internet. They are used here with accreditation as the basis for short bursts of Max's interests.

Repost: Dead Space 3 Microtransactions Break Internal Logic

Ben Kuchera of the (fantastic) PA Report wrote an interesting post about the recent news that Dead Space 3 will include microtransactions allowing players to purchase materials to craft weapons. The article touches on some of the qualities I most enjoy about the Dead Space series, and so I figured I'd chime in a bit here.

Kuchera notes how the Dead Space games have always been particularly effective at establishing and drawing players into a coherent and self-contained world: the menus appear in the game, all information typically conveyed via a HUD are contained within the game world, etc. The point of all this is to more effectively draw players into the world of the game and hold them there. The most superficial effect of this is to increase players' tension by refusing to allow them to put the action on hold while they access their inventory (as was the convention prior to Dead Space). However, Kuchera argues that this tension is but one symptom of the greater immersion that the game creates by forcing the player to participate in its world in the same way as the fictional characters within it. At no point in the game does the player engage in activity that their fictitious character does not also undertake; in effect the game world is constructed so as to force player immersion by limiting their interactions with the game world to those of their character.

The availability of microtransactions in the upcoming Dead Space 3 breaks this immersion via the deus ex machina availability of crafting materials. When players use a terminal they are told they can access "Downloadable Content" by which "A god-like hand is introduced and drops supplies in the lap of the character." This whole availability breaks the immersion spell that the Dead Space games have so effectively established, and moreover upsets the delicate sense of isolation and desperation that the survival-horror genre is premised upon.

The offending intrusion on Dead Space's fiction.

Kuchera's argument is compelling, and though even he acknowledges the nerdiness of getting hung-up on such a detail, I think it's a significant sacrifice on the part of the developers. A big part of what made Dead Space unique was its uncompromising immersion, forcing them to exist in the game world. It's unfortunate to have that quality diluted for the sake of some extra income and a further attempt at attracting a wider audience by dumbing-down the experience.

Tom Phillips at (the also fantastic) Eurogamer has also chimed in with a counterpoint, arguing that the kind of gamers who will be bothered by this feature are also not the types who are likely to use the it. Rather, Phillips argues, the microtransactions will only be taken advantage of by more casual gamers while more hardcore players will likely ignore them. While I think Phillips is right practically speaking, at the same time I'm more in line with Kuchera in feeling that there's a more significant cost to the sacrifice. I don't think "hardcore gamers" will take advantage of the microtransactions, and while I do feel there's a somewhat legitimate argument to be made against their existence at all I'm perfectly happy to simply ignore them. However the fact that they're implemented in such a way as to break the immersive fiction of the series will bother me if/when I play Dead Space 3. From all accounts the menus make their existence painfully clear so as to attract potential buyers, and that fourth-wall-breaking advertising is necessarily going to take away from the sense of isolation and immersion that the series' horror is based upon.

What do you guys think? Is it too early to tell, is Phillips right and are Kuchera and I just whining EA-haters, or is this a legitimately intrusive dilution of one of Dead Space's most unique qualities?

- - -
'Reposts' are inspired by other articles or blog posts around the Internet. They are used here with accreditation as the basis for short bursts of Max's interests.

Ben Franklin Was a Dirty Dude

The recent release of Assassin's Creed 3 has allowed the less historically inclined to enjoy some of the more offbeat moments of America's past, including the eccentricities of Ben "Founding Father" Franklin. Kotaku has put together a video showing off Franklin's rant about why men should take older women as mistresses, and it should not be missed. None of this should be surprising if you've looked into Franklin's history before, but the accurate depiction in a blockbuster video game is likely to surprise a lot of gamers. Check it out below:

I'll have much more to say about Assassin's Creed 3 soon so check back if you're curious about the game.

Reposts: Destructoid's Top 10 Castlevania Songs

I'm a big fan of classic video game music. It's engaging, energetic, and my history of playing games has conditioned me to feel active and want to accomplish things when I hear it. When I go running I use a mix of 8 and 16-bit era tracks as I find they provide a great impetus to keep going and push yourself harder than you would otherwise. Now Destructoid has put together a list of their all time top 10 songs from the Castlevania series (which is deservedly renowned for its music, among other things), and the list has inspired this post in more ways than one (geddit?).

Their number two pick, "Bloody Tears" from Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest, is my personal favourite. I particularly like the 16-bit remix of the track using instruments from the Mega Man X2 soundtrack, embedded below. The enhanced sound quality of the 16-bit era really brings out the best parts of the song and ups the foreboding quality by highlighting the pipe organ opening. In putting this post together I also stumbled across another great remix of "Bloody Tears" using the instruments from Sonic 3. It takes a few more liberties as a remix by adding a electric guitar-style melody at various points throughout the track, and the addition gives the song a new, '80s hair metal-esque twist.

- - -
'Reposts' are inspired by other articles or blog posts around the Internet. They are used here with accreditation as the basis for short bursts of Max's interests.

The Death of Home Consoles

I just finished watching an engrossing and shocking presentation by Ben Cousins of ngmoco (I'd never heard of him either) that persuasively outlines the impending "death" of videogame consoles as we know them. To be fair he doesn't say they'll disappear completely as much as fade into irrelevance/niche markets, but being compared to arcades is pretty much equivalent in my books.

Check out the presentation for yourself below. It's 26 minutes long but if you have any interest in gaming then trust me it's worth it:

When The Consoles Die, What Comes Next?

 

View another webinar from Ben Cousins

As the video itself makes clear, this is far from the the first time someone has pondered whether the mobile gaming industry might displace home consoles. However, Cousins' presentation is the most tangible and immediate the mobile threat has ever seemed. As someone who grew up with home consoles it's a little saddening to see such sobering evidence that they're going the way of the dinosaur.

I only recently began testing the waters of mobile gaming, and while I've been pleasantly surprised by its depth and quality, I can't help but sense that there are ways in which the mobile platform is fundamentally lacking. It's less immersive by design given that it's portable and public (in the sense that you use it in public, often people can reach you on it, and it's a gateway platform with other functionality). On top of that the controls often create more of a distancing effect, from the perspectives of both users and programmers. All this adds up to the fact that while I thoroughly enjoy mobile gaming I don't and can't get lost in the experience. Maybe that's also a product of age (I have noticed a similar problem with some home console titles lately), but the inherent qualities of the mobile platform don't do it any favours.

(Via Kotaku)

PS: I promise I have some non-videogame related posts in the works!

Quantic Dream's Incredible "Kara" Tech Demo from GDC

In case you missed it, below is the amazing "Kara" tech demo that Quantic Dream's David Cage (of Heavy Rain fame) showed off at last week's Game Developers Conference 2012. It's an outstanding display of the PS3's power and a short but interesting exploration of the nature of artificial intelligence. But don't take my word for it, check out the video below:

What an incredible video. In a scant seven minutes the "Kara" figure manages to raise complex ideas about the manufacturing of artificial intelligence and the responsibilities of their creators; by extension those same concepts trouble conventional notions about the origins and value of sentient life. These are common science fiction tropes that I for one would be excited to see explored in a video game, and especially one by the likes of David Cage. 

Longtime readers (ha) will recall that I was more than a little excited for Heavy Rain.  Although the game didn't necessarily live up to my expectations, it was nevertheless an interesting and unique experiment for the medium. I'm excited to try out David Cage's next game, whatever it ends up being, and this tech demo has increased my curiosity about what that project will explore. If nothing else it shows that he is building upon the foundations he laid in Heavy Rain, both in terms of continuing that game's technological/graphical developments and also improving on its shortcomings. 

One of the most resounding criticisms of Heavy Rain was the fact that it was set in America but voiced (poorly) by French actors, thereby completely breaking any senses of immersion or tension. This demo clearly shows that Cage has heard those critiques and (hopefully) won't make the same mistake twice. The acting on display in the "Kara" demo is profoundly moving, and the mere idea of a game exactly likeHeavy Rain with that caliber of performance is buzz worthy. And I don't believe for a second that Cage would settle for simply Heavy Rain 2. 

Whatever's coming will be as unique and exciting as Cage's previous game was, and will clearly be building upon its strengths and weaknesses alike. It almost feels stupid to get my hopes up all over again, but this demo has me excited despite myself. Fingers crossed whatever we get from this lives up to its potential.

Eurocentrism and the Reveal of Assassin's Creed 3

I don't think I've ever posted about it but I am a huge fan of the Assassin's Creed series of video games. The second game in particular stands as one of my favourite games in this generation of consoles. I'm a major proponent of story-driven games, and the Assassin's Creed series stands as one of the most engrossing and unique narratives in gaming today. Additionally I really enjoy how the developers of the series make a conscious effort to set each game in places and times that are unusual in the gaming community. In what other game could you explore a historically accurate rendition of Renaissance Florence, Third Crusade-era Jerusalem, or Ottoman-era Constantinople? These are only a few of the more superficial and spoiler-free reasons why I love the series, but they make one thing clear: there's simply nothing else like Assassin's Creed out there, in gaming or otherwise.

This week a lot of details were revealed about the next entry in the series, Assassin's Creed 3. Set to be released on October 30, 2012, this new game will take place in Revolutionary War-era America. What's exciting about the setting is that it gives the developers the opportunity to engage with the atrocities committed by both Colonial and Revolutionary forces upon the Native Americans in this time period. The series has never been shy about politics, and indeed one of the most interesting aspects of Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood was the radical political thread that writer Jeffrey Yohalem wove into the narrative. It's honestly my fondest memory of that game, and so I'm eager to see the series get political again. In Assassin's Creed 3 the historical mistreatment of the Native Americans will take the centre stage as the protagonist is said to be a half-English, half-Native American boy who's raised by Mohawks.

As much as possible for a blockbuster (and annualized) video game franchise, the Assassin's Creed games have made a habit of breaking new ground for the medium. Making a new main character in a major entry in the series half-Mohawk continues this tradition. Ubisoft also hasn't given up their dedication to authenticity, as "they've hired Native American actors and recorded whole scenes of dialogue in the actual Mohawk language." Moreover, early reports indicate that the beginning of the game will depict Ratohnhaké:ton/Connor's childhood in a Mohawk village that's later burned down by white colonists, inspiring him to dedicate his life to fighting tyranny and injustice. So not only is the protagonist a sort of Mohawk Batman (!), it also seems that the game will at least touch upon the atrocities inflicted by the Americans/Europeans on the Native Americans. It certainly doesn't seem like Ubisoft is letting up on the franchise's tendency to push gaming to new and unexpected frontiers.

What I want to address in this blog post is the new protagonist's name. At this point the details are a little sketchy, but it seems as though the character actually has two names, Ratohnhaké:ton and Connor. 
The character's relationships with each of these names is still a little unclear, but it seems as though he calls himself Connor. In any case, the Internet has made a pretty clear decision to simply call him Connor. Here's an example from Rabidgames, a site that "calls him Connor because the other name is too long and copy & paste [sic] doesn’t really count as remembering a name."


On the one hand the name Connor is shorter and easier to remember and spell, both for the developers and for most of the people talking about the game online. Additionally, at this point fans seem to be most interested in the gameplay possibilities unlocked by the game's new engine. Any discussion of the narrative potential seems to be restricted to which historical events might be portrayed as opposed to what political stance(s) the game might take with regards to Native Americans. However, all that aside I find it more than a little troubling that the character who was just revealed to be half-Mohawk is already being called exclusively by his English name. I think that's a Eurocentric reaction that implicitly glosses over the most unique (and, in my opinion, interesting) aspect of the new character.

As reddit user AnEagle so aptly put it...

At this point it's not possible to do much more than speculate about Assassin's Creed 3 and its approach to the historical treatment of Native Americans. Without getting into spoilers I will say that the series' lore pretty much requires that the protagonist have at least some European ancestry so it makes sense that he's half-English. Time will tell if the emphasis on that side of his heritage is something the developers have written into the game (though based on everything I mentioned above it sure sounds like they're fully embracing his Mohawk roots). But what is clear is that fans of the series have decided it is at least easier to regard Ratohnhaké:ton/Connor in a more traditional (read: western) fashion. And I think that's unfortunate.


I don't mean to condemn anyone's legitimate excitement about the game but I wish that more of the buzz I'm seeing online was about the unique narrative and political potential in the protagonist's origins. It's disappointing to find that the Assassin's Creed community seems disinterested in this new character's most unique trait and are instead gravitating towards the most familiar aspect of what we know about him so far. One would hope that fans of such a daring series would be eager for it to present new perspectives and ideas, but evidently that's not as exciting as what new multiplayer options will be available. Granted I may be making too much of something as trivial as the use (or lack thereof) of a name, but to me it does seem indicative of an apprehension for an unfamiliar concept (or in this case culture). Ironically the gaming community seems disinterested in the originality it so often pines for, but then that's a subject for another blog post. 


Here's hoping that as October 30 approaches there begins to be more excitement for this promising new evolution in the Assassin's Creed narrative.

Games As Art: PBS Off Book

Just a quick post to share this sweet video that I found over on Kotaku. It's the latest in a series called "Off Book" by PBS Arts, and it features a number of people in the video game industry talking about why they see video games as an artistic medium. They raise some interesting points, particularly about the meaning of interaction and emotional inspiration, that are great contributions to the ongoing debate about games as art. Plus they describe Portal in a way that I completely hadn't considered but that is so interesting it makes me want to go back and play that incredible game all over again for the umpteenth time. That alone would make the video worth posting, but here it's just a minor point in the larger discussion.

One thing in the video I found particularly interesting was the description of the Jason Rohr's game Passage. The basic gist is that the game presents a world that you are free to explore, but only for a short time before your character dies; in that time you can get a partner who explores with you, but eventually dies shortly before you do. The concept and execution are simple and yet the game invites an emotional reaction by emphasizing a sense of the impermanence and unimportance of human existence. This use of interactivity to present an emotional concept is an elegant demonstration of the potential/truth of games as art, and demands further investigation. I'll see if I can get my hands on a copy of Passage, it sounds like a short but worthwhile experience/experiment.

The Ballad of Mike Haggar

Over a month after it was first brought to my attention, the incredible Ballad of Mike Haggar still leaves me speechless after every viewing. I don't care if you're not interested in video games, poetry, or general geekery, everyone should bear witness to this amazing video. And if you just so happen to be very much interested in all those things (and if you're reading this blog then the chances of that are pretty decent) then this awesome epic will quite simply blow you away. The only possible downside is that it might leave you semi-catatonic, but trust me: it's worth it.

Did you watch it yet? Good. Now watch it again.

In other news, let this stand as my second "apology for not posting" post. This fall is gearing up to be among the busiest I've ever had and so my time/energy for posting has been at an all time low. But I have not abandoned this blog! Far from it, I am positively bursting with ideas/opinions/etc, I just need to schedule some time to write them. I should be settling into a routine in the next week or so and then I'll make sure to get this blog back in business.

So if you've stuck with this blog (or even this post) long enough to be reading this then thank you, I promise not to make you wait much longer for some good old Max Rambles-brand pretension and attitude.

Games As (More Than?) Art: Reality Is Broken

This isn't a traditional Games As Art post in that it's not about a video game. Rather I'm writing about a book I recently heard about, Reality Is Broken by Jane McGonigal. The basic premise behind the book is that video games are good for us, they make us better people in our real lives. The website for Reality is Broken describes the book as such:

"Drawing on positive psychology, cognitive science, and sociology, Reality Is Broken uncovers how game designers have hit on core truths about what makes us happy and utilized these discoveries to astonishing effect in virtual environments. Videogames consistently provide the exhilarating rewards, stimulating challenges, and epic victories that are so often lacking in the real world. But why, McGonigal asks, should we use the power of games for escapist entertainment alone? Her research suggests that gamers are expert problem solvers and collaborators because they regularly cooperate with other players to overcome daunting virtual challenges, and she helped pioneer a fast-growing genre of games that aims to turn gameplay to socially positive ends."

In the video below McGonigal explains her premise at a recent TED talk:

Jane McGonigal speaking at TED

I won't talk about McGonigal's ideas too much given that I haven't read Reality is Broken yet, and I don't want to purport authority on something I haven't yet fully considered. A post over at Boing Boing seems to have done a good job of that. However, based on what I'm reading the core premise seems completely plausible, and is indeed confirmed by my own experiences.

Given that my parents had the good sense to buy me edutainment style games like Math Blaster and Treasure Galaxy, it seems trite to say that video games can have a positive effect on players. My problem solving and critical thinking skills were undoubtably improved by my enjoyment of video games, and not exclusively ones that were designed to promote education. There's no doubt in my mind that my gaming habits improved things like my abilities to tackle unfamiliar problems, accept failure, and retry with greater knowledge. The idea that such talents could be more effectively harnessed in the real world in ways that make us happier and solve real problems is exhilarating, nay, intoxicating.

I first heard about McGonigal's book via a recent post by Tycho over at Penny-Arcade, and an accompanying comic. While the specific example might not be the best one possible (my hours playing video games have done nothing for my plumbing skills), the point is exactly right: if I can see and understand a problem, there is a good chance I will feel capable of solving the problem. I have spent a significant proportion of my life facing new problems and solving them with the means available to me. The effect that time has had on me is not negligible, and the potential it has created/expanded is palpable.