...start-try-fail-restart-try-fail-restart....

This long post is about:
• me
• video games
• the violence in entertainment issue
• hobbies/interests/entertainment in private and social contexts
• conversations as social exchanges
• but, in conclusion, mostly about me, how i like games and how i play them and what a sad geek this probably makes me. shh. don't tell anybody. maybe they haven't noticed.

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I’m here to talk about a secret, a pasttime, a hobby (an addiction?).

I can’t talk about it in many social circles, though I can in some more than others. I can’t talk about it at work with colleagues.

If I were a tennis enthusiast, I could say that after work I was looking forward to heading to the courts for a couple of practice games with a friend; that I was excited about the upcoming tournament on TV; that I was saving up for a new specialised racket and so forth. I could share my interest in the game and associated events, activities and points of discussion from that. This would be much in the same way as my colleagues now share their interests and out-of-work activities with me. They will talk about their decorating, about their holiday coming up, about the football games they are involved in; there’s talk about football matches on the TV, or about what’s happing in Eastenders, or about a film they saw. I don't talk about computer games I'm playing, new comics I'm reading, podcasts I've downloaded and am enjoying, nor much about the music I might be currently interested in.

I know there are many things that people can be interested in that they don’t or can’t share in a casual work-chatting environment, or a social gathering. Sometimes those things are difficult life events or problematic home situations, things you can't chit-chat about. However, the kind of things I am talking about here are those which are not shared, not because of the emotional baggage linked with them, but because of the light in which it casts the person talking about them, by associated stereotypes, and the generally held opinions. I am not saying that stereotypes and generally held opinions about certain personal interests are wrong. For example, trainspotting is a fairly ‘uncool’ pursuit and probably a proportion of the trainspotting enthusiasts will be just like the bespeckled anoraks that the term connotes. It wouldn’t be ‘wrong’ for someone to think of trainspotting and just ‘not get it’, to not know why or how that activity could be of interest to someone, and to know it’s certainly not the sort of thing they like. In that case, you can imagine why a trainspotter might choose to keep quiet about what they're going to be getting up to at the weekend.

In conversation, if the interest/hobby you have is not widely popular amongst your audience and is linked to certain prejudices and stereotypes about it and those interested in it, then it is unlikely you will want to mention it unless (a) you don’t care what other people think about you or it or (b) you want to challenge other’s opinions. If (a), then your disinterest in your audience’s opinions and responses means you are not conversing or socially bonding but declaring things about yourself (and it’s not clear why anyone else should or would be interested in what you then had to say (much like a long blog entry, I suppose!)) Or you may make dismissively elitist remarks (“Oh you wouldn’t understand, it’s not your sort of thing”). If (b), then you are no longer engaging in polite conversation with colleagues and friends, but have escalated the exchange into either a debate or challenging discussion, which could be inappropriate or not wanted by an audience looking for an easy, short, friendly exchange. Worst of all, you could abandon all consideration of your friends/colleagues by combining (a) and (b) and having a good old rant or diatribe about how this thing is fantastic, they don't understand and they should all stop being so misguided/stupid/ignorant/prejudiced/'of another opinion'.

Usually, I avoid all of these pitfalls and keep relatively quiet. I focus more upon the other people, them and the things they contribute. I can ask about about and talk around the topic they raise. This appears to usually satisfy most of what other people want to get out of the conversation. They can say what they want, give their opinions and I can be a listener to them and someone who can give agreement, challenge, another perspective or move the conversation along a naturally tangential flow.

One of the things I don't talk about, and what I specifically want to talk about here, is video/computer games (which I'll just refer to as 'games' from now on) and my interest in them - cue the collective audience of maybe 4 who would read this quickly scrolling ahead to see if it's worth even bothering... Me playing games is not a big secret, the secret is in how little I will talk about it contrasted with how much I will be doing it.

Okay, I do talk about games. I talk about them a fair bit with some friends. But I certainly don't talk about them with work colleagues, university postgraduate course mates, or to many people I don't already know well. Even with those I do talk about games with, it's still a cursory talk and not a reflection of the interest and personal investment I can put into them. The point being I can REALLY get into a game.

If you are reading this, and by my mentioning computer games you are putting me and my interest in a frame of juvenilia and a boyish competitiveness and aggression, I'm not surprised. It's true, some games are like that - all fancy colours and sounds, outlandish melodrama, simplistic conflicts, exaggerated violence and competition. And they sure can be fun with their bloodspurts, cutesy fantasy or victories over the bad guys. But that's just the boyish, competitive, violent or whizz-bang spectacle part of some of it. But that is the part of some of it that earns the stereotypes and forms the otherwise uninformed impressions.

I'd like to think that enjoying this fairly stupid part of some of it doesn't make me stupid. It's fun to knowingly be so base; to cheer as you satisfyingly and successfully make your opponent's head explode, or pull of a fantastic stunt or sniper move; to really exaggerate the significance and glory of your win as you pip your opponent to 1st place at the finish line after a long dogged fight. It's all fun and games. What I less like to associate with, and what worries me as much as it does the non-gamer, is when people get really involved in these things and don't step away or look at it for the fantasy, escapism and 'game' that it it; when the thought that violence on screen is cool becomes the thought (or is because of the thought) that violence off screen is cool. Bear in mind that really getting immersed in the experience of a game can be a good thing; it's part of what makes games so enjoyable - by the interactivity of the experience. When people lose that boundary of distinction between fantasy and reality, between what is fun to pretend and what is fun in reality, then those people worry me. They worry me because society is filled with violent entertainment media that glorifies the bad.

I don't intend to turn this into ANOTHER person's take on the violent-media/violent-society interaction. This grants me the slightly unfair advantage of being able to state my opinion without spelling out my argument here. I don't think any fantasy and its expression should be banned or uniformly discouraged - though direct or consequential promotion of such bad-fantasy-is-ok-in-reality should be policed, as should people be protected who are vulnerable to (unintended) influence. Where that line is drawn is the debate that will continue. I'm probably more liberal about the 'dangers' than many others, but I recognise there is a real issue here. I think the entertainment produced, however much it may offend an individual's taste or sensibilities (as long as it is not demonstrably promoting badness to all who experience it), isn't in itself a bad thing that should be banned; it just requires the application of more care to whom can indulge in it when and in what context. For children, there is a parental responsibility as well as a social responsibility to restrict access and to give balanced life education. For adults, the issue becomes VERY complicated, especially when it is acknowledged that there ARE vulnerable and easily influenced adults and to take responsibility away from them is something that is very difficult to argue (if you respect an adult's right to freedom to behave as they wish (within the law) without harming others).

I'm leaving that debate here. My original point was that games have quite a negative stereotype about both their content of violence and their immaturity and this can extend to a stereotype about the kinds of people that want to play games. Although both stereotypes are well founded in SOME instances (as with most stereotypes), it's not the whole picture. As a parallel, movies can be stupid but still lots of fun, some games are like that. Movies can be smart and fascinating, some games are like that. Movies can be shocking, some games are like that. All the emotions you can have as a reaction to a movie, you can find in some game. Games are also experiences that are different from movies, so many don't fit a direct analogy. Lastly, games are a much newer medium for creative expression than movies. Great directors were creating cinematic masterpieces at the time when Space Invaders was cutting-edge. Games creators now have the tools to create experiences that are not bound by simplistic graphics, sound and content storage issues. Now games can almost be movies with interactive elements, or they can be simplistic novelties. There is a broad spectrum of content.

The spectrum of game content has been dominated by the interests and fantasies of young men, since these were the initial audience as well as the creators of games. It's an established market and why so many games are of the war, fighting, racing sports varieties (for the young boy gamers and the now-older boy gamers). Then there's the other major swathe of content that is the kiddy-game. Using children's characters, being a game-version of a children's film, or being something very simple and juvenile in gameplay, they're bought for children by their parents. The parents know children like to play games and that these games are made for them. This restricted spectrum of game types is not a limit of the medium, it's a choice of the content creators for market reasons. Very recently, of course, there's the growing 'casual gamer' market which puts basic content within a context of familiarity and relevance to a traditionally non-gamer audience. Game-creators are now desperate to create games for this market and make a success of it since the audience here is many-times wider than that of traditional gamers. The casual games are versions of the familiar and mainstream (such as adaptations of gameshows or family board games), sports games with simplified/more accessible/novelty gameplay, collections of mini-games (5 minute distractions that can be indulged in at parties), or games with a serious use (that are almost not games at all) such as educational, brain training, or fitness games. These three markets (young (and not-so young) boys, children, and the casual/mainstream) have and will continue to be the markets to which most games are created in a fairly obvious way.

Simple games made for obvious markets can be fun, but they can also be very boring and they add to a stereotype for games being immature. Some games, however, can be very creative, original or crafted with great attention to gameplay, presentation, story, depth, controls. As with any medium, sometimes these are popular, and sometimes they are missed by the masses because they don't fit the market or have been poorly publicised. There's a lot out there, and I'm enjoying exploring some of the more substantial or well-made parts of it.

Of course, despite me saying all this, despite my enthusiasm and my belief in the quality of a large number of games as a mature entertainment medium, I keep quiet about it. I don't tell my colleagues at work, "I can't to get back home to see if I can qualify in another Mario Kart Grand Prix!" And that's one of the most popular games out at the moment. Similarly, despite being so successful as to generate the highest ever first-day revenue by an entertainment product at launch, I wouldn't feel comfortable speaking to non-gamers about my successes with dishing out vigilante justice on the streets of Liberty City in GTA IV. I would be embarrassed because there remains a niggling thought that I shouldn'tbe playing games and that it's not appropriate for a grown up to do so. It's not that other people think this, it's that I don't entirely have faith enough in myself to argue against or stand unfazed by their opinion. So I stay quiet.

This little seed of doubt, however, is only partly due to the stereotype of gamers as varying degrees of children or losers. There's something about me that means I like to play games and play them hard, i.e. to completion. In many games you can play your way through, enjoying the story, scenes, and new strategies as they unfold. With your primary task being to get through to the end, to defeat the final challenge or just to see the story out, games should flow, occasionally slowing as you reach certain stumbling blocks or difficult puzzles, but you work through at a relatively steady pace taking, in the end, somewhere between 1-9 hours depending on the game. This is the way traditional video games are enjoyed that could over time be a seen as one of many normal adult pasttimes. I don't play that way, though.

I play in a way that would be very frustrating and boring to watch. This could all have a little to do with being attentive to detail, looking for alternatives, and being a perfectionist. If the game has a set up where it is obvious that I have to drive the car over the gap in the bridge to progress, I will do that, but not before getting out of the car, scouring my side of the bridge, trying to jump the gap on foot, seeing if I can find a way down under the bridge, or anything that isn't the obvious. This kind of habit has developed for three reasons.

Firstly, games are often made with all kinds of 'secret' areas. These may just be places where items are hidden that will assist your progress such as boosting your health, speed, or whatever, but they may be more exciting things such as equipment that grants you new skills and abilities so you can play in a new way. There may be something hidden that reveals something that adds depth to the story or a subplot, or offer a piece of humour stashed away by the game creators. There may be clues that you will be able to capitalise on later in the game. Secret areas can even be quite expansive, leading to complete 'bonus stages' that again add new gameplay elements or break from the standard format of the game to explore one gameplay element to an extreme. These secret places or items can be direct rewards in themselves or be of benefit to you later. Either way, there is something very satisfying about finding 'treasure' that the less observant or less bothered would have passed by.

The second reason for 'dilly-dallying' is the desire to find unintended shortcuts. I find it very satisfying to find a way around a problem, a lateral solution, rather than doing what has been obviously presented, sometimes skipping the original obstacle altogether. This won't be satisfying if it's just poor game design, i.e. if you can just walk around the obstacle. By being creative and precise with maybe a bit of balancing, running, jumping and timing you can use the environment and your equipment in ways that was not as intended to find another solution. Games designers can play to this too, by giving little hints that there may be something you wouldn't notice straight away. I like not just beating the game, but pushing all the boundaries and trying to find 'smarter' ways through.

The third reason for my being 'thorough' with a game, is that I like to go for the 100% completion or the A ranking. This is where being a perfectionist really takes hold and where most of the work that you can put into a game comes from. Many games can be finished, the credits will role and it's THE END. Usually, though, there is something else. There may be a percentage, or a ranking of your gameplay. So, you may have 'finished' the game, but there are still things in there that you missed or could have done better. Games also add to the temptation to do better by offering different kinds of rewards for doing well. These rewards are often unknown to you or 'secrets' that can be unlocked. Sometimes you will get a different ending sequence to the game, changing the outcome more in your character's favour. Sometimes you will be granted access to bonus stages, extra missions or additional characters to play with, or a new gameplay mode where the original game can be played again but changed somehow to add a new or more difficult challenge. Or maybe you just get a cool star next to your name on the menu screen to show that you've 'mastered' the game. I fall for it every time.

I don't like open-ended successes, it doesn't interest me to just get better and better 'high scores' or faster and faster race times. In real life sports too, your skill is something you improve gradually, but you can never be 'finished', there's no clear goal but that which you make yourself. I like and strive for set goals in games that I can practice and find new strategies to beat; goals that when reached they are done, the challenge has been met, you earn the reward. Playing to completion can multiply the game playing time many times over; often hours can be spent on a single small challenge that requires very precise play that it is very quick and easy to fail at but you have to get it right just the once and you've done it. This is when I turn into the obsessive, all conception of time vanishes and nothing else matters until you've got that goal, made that jump, completed that puzzle. This is the kind of game playing that I don't like to be public about, because it seems difficult to defend as not being a sad waste of time. For some reason, though, I find it great fun (despite the hair-pulling process of start-try-fail-restart-try- fail-restart-try-fail-restart-...-try-SUCCESS! next...)

WARNING: The next paragraph is pure gaming nostalgia. Highly irrelevant as anything beyond that. Skip ahead.
I blame Super Mario World for the SNES and its Star World. Before that I would be happy to pick up a new game, play it through to the end or until I got really stuck and then leave it and move on. Not with Super Mario World, though. That game was huge, and was very well made. The levels were fun to play, environments diverse, and you could use your skills that developed throughout the game in your own way to finish them. These levels also had multiple exits, a regular exit and usually a hidden exit. By going through the normal exit, you could continue on your way to the next level and beyond. By finding the hidden exit, you could open up a new path, possibly to secret other stages, a shortcut, or route to a key or secret switch which would change the way you could play other levels. All this was fun, trying to find the various routes through the game. But then, there was the Star Road. By finding yourself though hidden exits and a few levels off the standard route (which were usually a little more challenging), you could find your way to a star on the map. Go there and you would be transported into space and a giant stone star world. There were five stars as entrances to the points of Star Road. On Star Road there were stages that were extra-challenging or novel in some way and all had two exits. Each Star World was also the place you could collect a special supporting character with powers not found elsewhere in the game. If you made your way though the main game and found all the stars to Star Road, then found each of the hidden exits in the Star Road levels, a new star would appear in the centre of the Star Road map. Go to that star and you were transported to Special Zone. A dark and mysterious world map with levels that revealed themselves one by one with strange surfer slang names like "Groovy" "Tubular" "Gnarly", these levels were even more strange and required great skill and dedicated practice to be able to complete. If you did make your way through, you were presented with YOU ARE A SUPER PLAYER spelled out in coins in the last level. You then found yourself on one last star from which you would be warped back to the start of the whole game but with things all just a little different: colours changed and enemy characters different.

That was it for me, I caught the perfectionist/completist bug. It adds hours on to every game (that I like) that I play. This is frustrating, a huge use of time and effort, but completely satisfying to be able to achieve (and then not tell anyone about, because it's difficult to explain without confessing the effort it took).

Playing games can take over, as I get immersed in the challenge and the experience. Other concerns don't matter as much, they can take hours from seemingly nowhere, and I can't wait to get back stuck in while I'm away doing something else like work or shopping. The worry is that this makes me 'sad', but it's something I really enjoy. I just don't feel confident telling many people about it (this isn't really telling people, whoever's reading this is doing it for themselves, I'm not saying anything ;o) ). I share this experience with many other gamers out there who read games news and issues and comment on them at the websites I look at often (joystiq, 4colorrebellion, gonintendo), and the webcomics that make fun of the medium, the games within it and the strange people that play them (pennyarcade, vgcats). This is the geek way of 'talking about the match with your mates'; and it involves a lot less football, more ranting and sarcasm and about the same amount of fan allegiance (or fanboyism). The 'social' element isn't very mature, but it's fun in it's own stupid way. I don't see a way to socialise the interest and experience with those who aren't already fans, and certainly it's not something, as I began, that I can chat about over coffee at work.

Looking to the future, I see many more games I want to play, many more hours going to be put into them, and a thought that will bother me that I should be doing something else (and sometimes, when it comes to work avoidance, I really REALLY should). It's difficult to change what you want to do, especially when the reason you want to change is mainly so you will fit better with other people's opinions of what you should or shouldn't be doing. This Summer I am looking forward more to getting and playing through Super Mario Galaxy than I am about going to the beach or walking in the park.... though I'd like to do those too. I have geek/(loser?) priorities and I'm not afraid to be secret about it!