Many people spend hours a day seated mere feet from a video screen. They are known for living in filth, wasting away or getting fat as they fail to perform even the slightest physical task. Who in his right mind would waste his life living out fantasies in a video game? Based on the long success of video games, most people would.
At midnight on November 10th, at the Olympia mall, there were at least one hundred people in line waiting to pick up reserved copies of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Young and old, people from many cultures and walks of life were there. They all shared an impatience to experience the new game, to the extent that they could not wait until morning. Any one of these people could explain that games are an important part of their lives.
Video games have many benefits. While the concerned mother may only see her son wasting away on the couch, there is more at work than meets the eye. The attention required to play engages the brain, and the controller necessitates hand-eye coordination. Even if there are not explicit puzzles, the problem solving abilities develop as players find ways to overcome difficult challenges. A child who does not know her letters will rapidly learn A, B, X, and Y on a controller. Older people have often found that mental faculties diminish with disuse, but video gaming can keep them sharp for years.
Though it may appear that people are playing alone, they often interact with either virtual personalities programmed to act like people, or actual people via computer networks. The interaction with others develops social skills that can apply to real life as well. The physical requirements of gaming, even on systems that require movement, are far behind those of daily life. The body adaptation to lack of physical activity often results in the appearance of poor health. Students, pilots, and drivers are susceptible to this problem as well.
Any activity, if adopted to the exclusion of all other activities, will have a detrimental affect on the body. Most people play games only when it fits into their busy lives. There are some extremists, but most people treat video games as they would any other form of entertainment. It is just another way to have fun.
That is an interesting take on video games, I never really thought about them in that way. I missed the home video game revolution, I remember as a kid dumping hundreds of quarters into Spy hunter and Joust video game machines in arcades. It was fun and was with friends of similar interests. I like what you said about making one’s mind sharp and helping older people with coordination.
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