I did some investigations into MMORPGs a year or so ago. The average WoW player spends a little more than 35 hours per week online playing the game. That's about as much as a full-time job. The virtual goods industry alone -- that's goods that are purely digital -- is in the billions.
I agree with Jonathan Blow, who said that it's awful that Blizzard doesn't take more responsibility with its games, that WoW's model of gameplay is awful. That said, I think the design of the game itself is of an incredible scope. I don't play WoW, so I'd agree with you that WoW is kind of icky.
Video games aren't big mental exercises. Then again, neither is reading a book in and of itself, or watching a movie, or talking to somebody. You get what you want to out of it.
Most of the things I get out of gaming involve lessons about game design itself. A few exceptions: the video game Passage - available for free online - changed how I looked at life (and also made me a bit weepy); Portal taught me of the incredible values of lateral thinking - that won't show up on test scores, because you can't test creativity, but Portal is the video gaming world's Gordion knot, and it showed me just how imperative it is that you create your own mindset when designing rather than mimicking somebody else's; Half Life 2 (also by Valve, who made Portal) taught me about the impact of small things. When you play a shooter game that starves you for bullets, every shot you fire counts, and you begin to form a bond with the few weapons you have, and you begin looking at the environment around you - the lesson there being to focus on the little details until every little thing is wonderful and worth caring about.
But that's antithetical to the discussion. Listening to Mozart doesn't make you smarter. In fact, Mozart wrote pop - he made easy, distinct, catchy themes. The only genius involved with Mozart is Mozart. There are similar geniuses now working in the world of video gaming, and online. It's not the masses, it's the individual that gains.
"Video games aren't big mental exercises. Then again, neither is reading a book in and of itself, or watching a movie, or talking to somebody. You get what you want to out of it."
Agreed. Also, some books are stimulating, but some are really vapid. Generalizing about any medium as a whole is probably a bad idea, except in relation to the factors shaping it. For example, I think that media which makes money by holding your attention long enough to expose you to ads (some tv and blogs, most magazines) have a strong incentive to produce content that grabs your attention but isn't necessarily deep.
I agree with Jonathan Blow, who said that it's awful that Blizzard doesn't take more responsibility with its games, that WoW's model of gameplay is awful. That said, I think the design of the game itself is of an incredible scope. I don't play WoW, so I'd agree with you that WoW is kind of icky.
Video games aren't big mental exercises. Then again, neither is reading a book in and of itself, or watching a movie, or talking to somebody. You get what you want to out of it.
Most of the things I get out of gaming involve lessons about game design itself. A few exceptions: the video game Passage - available for free online - changed how I looked at life (and also made me a bit weepy); Portal taught me of the incredible values of lateral thinking - that won't show up on test scores, because you can't test creativity, but Portal is the video gaming world's Gordion knot, and it showed me just how imperative it is that you create your own mindset when designing rather than mimicking somebody else's; Half Life 2 (also by Valve, who made Portal) taught me about the impact of small things. When you play a shooter game that starves you for bullets, every shot you fire counts, and you begin to form a bond with the few weapons you have, and you begin looking at the environment around you - the lesson there being to focus on the little details until every little thing is wonderful and worth caring about.
But that's antithetical to the discussion. Listening to Mozart doesn't make you smarter. In fact, Mozart wrote pop - he made easy, distinct, catchy themes. The only genius involved with Mozart is Mozart. There are similar geniuses now working in the world of video gaming, and online. It's not the masses, it's the individual that gains.