Chances are you've seen that new Machima video that's floating around the net, the one where the 'World of Warcraft' characters take a break from slaying dragons and the general humdrum of Azeroth life to kill some time playing the amusingly mundane 'World of Workcraft' This isn't a particularly new joke, I'm pretty sure Pratchett did it pretty early in the Diskworld series but it was well made and managed to squeeze a few chuckles out of me but more importantly, it got me thinking.
Escapism is a big part of what draws us to video games and for the past two decades considering the average gamer it's understandable. It's not hard to imagine that fat, neckbearded guy with the B.O and dragon shirt who seems to follow you around Electronics Boutique wanting to pretend to be a muscled barbarian or demon slaying ladies man. Since the advent of the playstation things seem to have shifted, gaming was no longer a niche hobby, or at least that's what the marketing told us and all of a sudden the cool guys at school were talking to you about Gran Turismo.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/frat_boy.jpg]
When the PS1 came out. Gamers started actually looking like the people in the adverts. Which is pretty horrifying in it's own right.
The wii pushed it even further, stretching the term gamer till it covered everyone from Oprah to your grandmother and MMORPG's are now appealing more to your average Joe than your average gamer. In China, after a hard days work in the office, middle aged professionals are dropping into their local PCBANG (a very popular chain of cyber cafe there's even one here in Kelowna.) to spend their free time grinding and questing for loot in Fantasy Westward Journey and they're paying through the god damn nose for it. What's worse is they're playing so much they're putting hardcore gamers to shame.
So as more and more of us pile into MMORPG's. Worlds where success is inevitable providing you invest enough time, we're seeing more and more pressure to succeed in these virtual worlds. As their important to our social lives grows as will the amount of work we need to put in to maintain our social standing. While your dad worked every day god sent to buy a car bigger than the guy next door's you'll be spending every hour god sends murdering Yetis to get your hand on that sword of Ice because you're damned if you're going to be the only person in your guild who doesn't have one.
We've made our haven, the place we go to relax even worse than real life so when the player needs a break from all the pressure, all the stress and all the demands of online gaming, where is he/she going to go? I think we're going to go full circle. Oh yes. We're going to play sports.
Imagine two teenagers. They're outcasts, loners, no guild to speak of and they both feel abandoned by a level up system that doesn't care. They'd turn to drugs but no one sells them anymore because they're too busy farming for force gems on the latest Star Wars MMO. They take to the parks, spending hours moping and talking about how 'TR4GIK M4RTYR' from the server next door was born with a silver warhammer in his mouth.
"Hell" they'll say "I don't even like Universe of Warcraft"
It's at that moment that they discover a round disk, or perhaps it's given to them by an old man, who dissapears soon after. They stare at it stupidly, like the monkey holding the bone in 2001 while the Monolith looms in the background. Then one of them draws back his arm and throws it with all his mouse clicking might.
It flies.
They have rediscovered the frisbee.
[http://doctorpus.wordpress.com/files/2008/08/2001monkey.jpg]
A gamer attempts to rediscover tennis.
Those terrible TV movies they make to encourage housewives and the unemployed to develop Zoloft addictions would take on an entirely new slant. Instead of films that show us the real life horrors of internet porn addictions (apparently clicking on the image search in google is the first step in a bloody journey that ends with you murdering your family) we'd have films about virile young men who fight back against adversity and online gamer elitism.
Jerry is a special young man, he lacks higher brain functions and can barely string two words together but he was born with huge rippling muscles and a thick cranium. The bullies in his virtual school are merciless, mocking him for his badly equipped level 2 shaman and lack of macro skills. His parents don't understand him, his dad just wants him to go into the family necomancy class and his mother is too stoned on gold farming to care. But Jerry has found something. Something that completes him. Something that only he can do. Jerry has found football.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/derrick_ward_605649.jpg]
"Heartwarming" - The New York Times.
They threaten to send him away, they threaten to have him commited. But Jerry fights the power. He joins an underground "Football league' and begins learning all he can from a grizzled old black man who makes him wash his car and catch flies out of the air by body slamming them. In the films gripping finale Jerry must face off not only against the New York Manglers the most evil team on the illegal NFL circuit but he must also deal with his entire hometown coming to hurl bottles and heckle him. But as they watch Jerry as he plays valliantly despite the fact he's had both of his arms broken by cheating, steroid abusing Yankees. They begin to see and respect his sportsman spirit. They begin to see the hero inside.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/p1_long1.jpg]
"I love you son. But I can't let you do this. Football aint' no thing for a man to play. My pa was a Necrogamcner and his Pa was a Necromancer."
"I know you only want the best for me Pa. But I got's to this. The footballs in my blood. Even if it ain't in yours."
"If you do this son. You do it alone"
"If I have to Pa. If I have to."
With only one second to go on the clock Jerry calls a timeout (his coach was killed by a yankee sniper) and delivers a heartwarming Oscar winning speech.
"I jus' want people to accept me for what I am. I want ya' to see you don't have to be level 70 ta be a man, ya don't have to do what ya parents did.I ain't ever goin' ta be a good Necromancer Pa. I aint got the heart for it. I can't read too good and I aint' ever gonna' spec prop for pally but what I can do is crush a man's motherfuckin' spine"
and then he does.
And he wins the game.
Jerry's parents, the people of his town and even the bullies who used to mock him, go crazy and carry a triumphant Jerry off as the credits roll.
Then they're all crushed under his bodyweight because their bodies have atrophied after years of no exercise and poor diet.
Escapism is a big part of what draws us to video games and for the past two decades considering the average gamer it's understandable. It's not hard to imagine that fat, neckbearded guy with the B.O and dragon shirt who seems to follow you around Electronics Boutique wanting to pretend to be a muscled barbarian or demon slaying ladies man. Since the advent of the playstation things seem to have shifted, gaming was no longer a niche hobby, or at least that's what the marketing told us and all of a sudden the cool guys at school were talking to you about Gran Turismo.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/frat_boy.jpg]
When the PS1 came out. Gamers started actually looking like the people in the adverts. Which is pretty horrifying in it's own right.
The wii pushed it even further, stretching the term gamer till it covered everyone from Oprah to your grandmother and MMORPG's are now appealing more to your average Joe than your average gamer. In China, after a hard days work in the office, middle aged professionals are dropping into their local PCBANG (a very popular chain of cyber cafe there's even one here in Kelowna.) to spend their free time grinding and questing for loot in Fantasy Westward Journey and they're paying through the god damn nose for it. What's worse is they're playing so much they're putting hardcore gamers to shame.
So as more and more of us pile into MMORPG's. Worlds where success is inevitable providing you invest enough time, we're seeing more and more pressure to succeed in these virtual worlds. As their important to our social lives grows as will the amount of work we need to put in to maintain our social standing. While your dad worked every day god sent to buy a car bigger than the guy next door's you'll be spending every hour god sends murdering Yetis to get your hand on that sword of Ice because you're damned if you're going to be the only person in your guild who doesn't have one.
We've made our haven, the place we go to relax even worse than real life so when the player needs a break from all the pressure, all the stress and all the demands of online gaming, where is he/she going to go? I think we're going to go full circle. Oh yes. We're going to play sports.
Imagine two teenagers. They're outcasts, loners, no guild to speak of and they both feel abandoned by a level up system that doesn't care. They'd turn to drugs but no one sells them anymore because they're too busy farming for force gems on the latest Star Wars MMO. They take to the parks, spending hours moping and talking about how 'TR4GIK M4RTYR' from the server next door was born with a silver warhammer in his mouth.
"Hell" they'll say "I don't even like Universe of Warcraft"
It's at that moment that they discover a round disk, or perhaps it's given to them by an old man, who dissapears soon after. They stare at it stupidly, like the monkey holding the bone in 2001 while the Monolith looms in the background. Then one of them draws back his arm and throws it with all his mouse clicking might.
It flies.
They have rediscovered the frisbee.
[http://doctorpus.wordpress.com/files/2008/08/2001monkey.jpg]
A gamer attempts to rediscover tennis.
Those terrible TV movies they make to encourage housewives and the unemployed to develop Zoloft addictions would take on an entirely new slant. Instead of films that show us the real life horrors of internet porn addictions (apparently clicking on the image search in google is the first step in a bloody journey that ends with you murdering your family) we'd have films about virile young men who fight back against adversity and online gamer elitism.
Jerry is a special young man, he lacks higher brain functions and can barely string two words together but he was born with huge rippling muscles and a thick cranium. The bullies in his virtual school are merciless, mocking him for his badly equipped level 2 shaman and lack of macro skills. His parents don't understand him, his dad just wants him to go into the family necomancy class and his mother is too stoned on gold farming to care. But Jerry has found something. Something that completes him. Something that only he can do. Jerry has found football.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/derrick_ward_605649.jpg]
"Heartwarming" - The New York Times.
They threaten to send him away, they threaten to have him commited. But Jerry fights the power. He joins an underground "Football league' and begins learning all he can from a grizzled old black man who makes him wash his car and catch flies out of the air by body slamming them. In the films gripping finale Jerry must face off not only against the New York Manglers the most evil team on the illegal NFL circuit but he must also deal with his entire hometown coming to hurl bottles and heckle him. But as they watch Jerry as he plays valliantly despite the fact he's had both of his arms broken by cheating, steroid abusing Yankees. They begin to see and respect his sportsman spirit. They begin to see the hero inside.
[http://doctorpus.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/p1_long1.jpg]
"I love you son. But I can't let you do this. Football aint' no thing for a man to play. My pa was a Necrogamcner and his Pa was a Necromancer."
"I know you only want the best for me Pa. But I got's to this. The footballs in my blood. Even if it ain't in yours."
"If you do this son. You do it alone"
"If I have to Pa. If I have to."
With only one second to go on the clock Jerry calls a timeout (his coach was killed by a yankee sniper) and delivers a heartwarming Oscar winning speech.
"I jus' want people to accept me for what I am. I want ya' to see you don't have to be level 70 ta be a man, ya don't have to do what ya parents did.I ain't ever goin' ta be a good Necromancer Pa. I aint got the heart for it. I can't read too good and I aint' ever gonna' spec prop for pally but what I can do is crush a man's motherfuckin' spine"
and then he does.
And he wins the game.
Jerry's parents, the people of his town and even the bullies who used to mock him, go crazy and carry a triumphant Jerry off as the credits roll.
Then they're all crushed under his bodyweight because their bodies have atrophied after years of no exercise and poor diet.
