Why
Video Games?
By
Jacob Malewitz
Stories
move the world … while video games blow it up. I am currently
working on a big project of game review articles. Ugh. It’s dark
and it’s cold outside, and I got a huge assignment that will take
me forever. But enough about me.
Why
video games?
What
the heck are they? You shoot people, don’t get arrested. You rob a
guy … you conquer the world … you kill a zombie … you blow up
Washington DC … you steal a car … you kill thousands of aliens.
But,
Why video games?
Because
gaming is entangled in our society. Kids—I was once one, several
centuries ago—love playing video games. The rush of
creating a story as you go is one of the chief reasons for gaming
addiction. Then there is action and mayhem, pretty girls (or
dudes), and all the ways you can break the law.
The
purpose of the video game is escapism. Escaping to video games is
quite like escaping into a film. It’s not quite a novel, less work.
It’s more hands-on. You write the world … by clicking a button.
Let’s
begin with the first person shooter, FPS as it’s called.
FPS:
Ever
heard of Halo? No? Still thinking? Halo: Combat Evolved is my
favorite first person shooter of all time, and a favorite for
millions of fans. The original, Halo: Combat Evolved sold
over 5 million copies. An X-Box game, it has two sequels, a graphic
novel, a series of novels, possibilities for a film, and a slew of
fans from across the world. If you never heard of it, grab some kid
and have him explain it to you.
The
FPS is a gaming way of saying “Big guns do work.” From Doom to
Halo, the rise of the FPS has been chronicled across online and print
media. It’s just another form of escapism—and one that figures to
be around for quite some time. No more monopoly, kids, because gamers
want to shoot stuff.
Strategy
Games:
So
what are strategy games? Well, it’s all about, more often than not,
conquering the world, or at least the map you’re playing on. My
first gaming experiences, over a decade ago, or a few centuries, was
Civilization. This franchise sold a few million copies
itself. Civilization is perhaps the most replayable strategy
game of all time. And, surprisingly, the sequel Civilization
2 is even better. Then the series got muddled in trying to improve
graphics and gameplay. The originals were genius, don’t play
anything but Civilization 1 and 2. You can get them on the cheap.
But
there are tons of other strategy games. The two most common strategy
games are the turn based game and the real time game. In a turn based
game, like Civilization, you take, one turn at a time. Want to move
this unit forward ten spaces? Gotta do it over ten turns, while
waiting for your opponents to take turns. If you don’t like that,
if it sounds too much like chess, try the real time strategy game. In
this format, everything is real time. You can send a soldier across
the map with one order, watch him do it, and run into a legion of bad
guys. For example, Warcraft 1 and 2 were real time strategy games, as
were Command & Conquer and Age of Empires.
My
personal favorites are Warcraft 2 and Age of Empires 2. These are
both online capable games, though I believe Age of Empires costs
money to play, while Warcraft is free.
It
doesn’t get much better for real time strategy games.
RPG?
Millions
are playing World of Warcraft or some other MMORPG, games with high
end graphics and addictive replay. There are plenty of options. If
you like Dungeons & Dragons type stuff, or more detailed, first
person adventures, an MMORPG is the way to go.
In
the End …
They’re
just games, sure. We still have to work and eat. It can be addictive,
playing Civilization or Warcraft late into the night, or shooting
monsters in the FPS classic Doom. But what do you get out of it? I
love games, yes, but they’re just games, not worth spending
hundreds of dollars. Yet they are perfect escapism, and they keep
getting better.
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