Gamers

I am not a gamer myself, actually I am pretty sure the most gaming experience I have is probably MarioCart. Needless to say, I do not have a long history dealing with games/gamers. My brother was pretty into games growing up, mainly ones to do with any type of sports. I think that video games are a good thing though because I know for my brother, all the guys in his class would always see who had the new game and they would all go over to that persons place to play it. I think this forms a little network of friendship all based off of similar interest. It also creates a supportive environment because they are always cheering the person on to get to that next level, etc. I do not necessarily agree with McGonigal that gaming can result in so much activism to save our planet. Like we discussed in class, I feel as if a huge thing that these games would be missing is fun. Not only that, as I brought up in class, many times people play video games to get away from the real world and get lost in a world that is not their own. Once you bring reality into it, I do not think as many people would be interested in playing the game. Also, while you may do something in a game, you may not really reflect those same qualities, attributes in real life. Some people can make bold decisions in games because they know that worst case scenario they will die and then come back to life, but with the real world, you do not get extra lives. This pressure may result in gamers being overconfident when trying to apply their gaming skills or not equipped to handling real matters.