I am going to ahead and admit that I think I'm in love with 5 Hour Energy-- I don't think I would be able to get through day without the massive caffeine boost. Plus, as an added bonus, the drink's 8333% of my daily recommended value of Vitamin B12 might help me achieve my lifelong dream of gaining mutant powers and joining the X-Men. While I wait for Professor X's call, I wanted to post a short excerpt from the back and forth exchange between Kevin Kee and Geoffrey Rockwell towards the end of their article/dialogue:
GEOFFREY: ...Without the culture of play a game is just another assignment.
KEVIN: Why can't we create an educational culture of play around serious games?
GEOFFREY: Because the culture of games, especially that of videogames is a counter-culture defined by its resistance to serious culture. It is a time and space of leisure defined, in the sense of delimited, from work...They mutually define games as the line in the sand, the line that separates work and play, adult opinion and its youthful other, what it is to be serious and how to transgress.
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KEVIN: I think game culture is far more resilient and that it is ready to embrace imaginative work, even serious game design. Your problem really lies in your rigid opposition of work and play. There is “work” and there is “play”, but there are moments where “work” becomes “play” and vice versa.
As you could probably guess by now, I am going to have to side with Kevin in this argument, although I do see some merit in Geoffrey's argument. For example, let's look at Blizzard Entertainment's ultra popular Massively Multiplay Online Role Playing Game World of Warcraft. This game is the epitome of a counter-culture resisting serious culture, as it is an online haven that has amazingly created its own type of culture. Players will log in to the game in order to enter a different space-- one where school or work holds no importance, but questing, gaining new gear for your character, massacring the opposing faction in a Battlegrounds, and conquering raids and dungeons are just some of the top priorities the player will have. There have been high profile instances of players becoming so wrapped up in playing that they log ridiculous amounts of hours and neglect all aspects of their real life. Heck there's even a WoW Detox webpage where ex-players can discuss the struggles of their addiction. Examples like these show that there is definitely a line in the sand where play and work/reality must be differentiated from one another, or else disaster can happen.
Despite this, I do believe that Kevin's idea for an educational culture of play around serious games is possible. When I was a Junior in college, I had an assignment to read the book Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, and write a simple reading response. But I ended up absolutely loving the book, and opted to write about this book in numerous assignments even after that class, including my undergraduate thesis. While not exactly the same as playing a video game, people do still take time of their day in order to read books as entertainment. Every time I would read through my favorite scenes in the book again, or read scholarly articles that provided new insight, I was experiencing one of those moments that Kevin says where "work" became "play". I was assigned the task of writing about one of my favorites novels of all time, and I had fun completing the assignment.
The same can be said for video games-- I am playing through Final Fantasy X for the umpteenth time currently, creating save files at key scenes, and jotting down notes in the process, but I am not enjoying playing through the game any less than I had previously. The game still provides me with an escape, a form of play that temporarily removes me from real world troubles, even though I am thinking academically all the while... well most of the time anyway. But film critics do this with movies all the time: Analyzing a movie for its plot, acting, and cinematography, but still are able to genuinely enjoy the story it tells. With the right kinds of games, and positive classroom discussion, I don't see any reason why an educational culture couldn't be created around serious games. I will be exploring this idea in much further detail after I have conducted more research on modern teaching methods utilizing newer technologies.
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