The simple truth behind your attitude to games
Let’s say that I am a 35-year-old single man who loves spending his free time playing video games.
What image do you have in mind?
A loser. A person who is incapable of getting “a real job”, connect with other people socially and have friends at no stage of his life. His only escape and the purpose of his life is games and everything about it.
Got it.
What if I also tell you that this person can be very active in his social life, has a fulfilling career and two kids? With whom he actually plays the games in his free place. That’s unusual, right? Probably an exception that confirms the rule, you even say.
And you may be right.
Apparently, people tend to think that the need of playing games and entertain yourself with imagination makes a person childish, irresponsible and weak incapable of performing any “serious” social activities such as work or family. But…
When kids play make-believe, would you say that they just waste their time instead of doing something valuable? Of course not. I even heard that playing make-believe is very good for a kid and even helps them to be creative. Do we learn this skill for nothing? Why do we even play with kids after all when it’s just an insignificant activity they will “get over”?
Games help. To adapt, to live, to socialize. No matter whether you are an adult or a child, modulating scenes and events in your life is crucial to you and your behavior. Playing games is not stupid or useless. It’s essential.
When people realized that games are essential and actually helps, we started having this genre as “educational games”. The one which will help learn but without being too academic. Today you can help your sister, brother or cousin learn the alphabet using your mobile device, showing pictures and supplementing it with sounds instead of just scribbling the letters on the desk or pointing them out in print. We are happy that kids learn with pleasure, but when it comes to adults…
Sure, there is no need for clowns and songs, but there are so many ways you can learn apart from that. Some people do prefer learning through academic books, long lectures, and papers written and rewritten by academics for academic purposes. However, not all of them are capable of it. Which obviously does not make a person a loser.
What I like about gamification is that even though you keep yourself in the frames of the serious real world, but at the same time let yourself to be a bit easy on imagination.
For example, you have filling weekly job reports and send them to the CMS or any other system you have to work with. You have nothing against your job in general, but those reports… You set notifications for yourself and maybe even have a few journals where you jotted down that you have to fill them. And you even keep that in mind. Yet, it’s extremely boring for you and you’d rather not.
I understand you.
What if this process became a game? What if you could see a clip of an explorer climbing to the mountain all the way you fill out the form and you can see him reaching the top because you managed to get your work done? What if this explorer would also unlock an achievement, like “the fastest climber” or “the most through explorer”? You just let yourself to travel for a moment. And to think and relate yourself to this fictional even cartoon character climbing up.
But this distraction would help you accomplish something you really need. Is this bad enough? Are you a bad person that you find boring things to be boring?
So the next time you think of a person playing games, just think of everything you do in your life which involves such an activity. Does this make your life better? And if yes, you obviously should not be judged for doing so.
