Come Together

By Holliday

A couple times a week I push back the musical assault on my ears and tune into a couple of podcasts. One that I’ve been listening to since launch is the PC Gamer Podcast. As the name implies it is from the editors of PC Gamer Magazine and covers the week in PC gaming. The main speakers are the host, a quick shooting Dan Morris, and D.J. Stapleton, the more laidback assistant editor. While it started off pretty diverse the discussions have shifted onto a political plane more often than not. Perhaps it is because there is a lot of “the politics of gaming” events floating around recently, or it might be Morris’s rather evangelical crusade against gaming critics. However, somehow over the past month or so my perception of gaming has been bouncing all over the place.

In a recent podcast Morris reacts to an article in The Toronto Star headlined “Fatal crash linked to videogame”. You guys may have heard about this. A cab driver was killed when he collided with two teenage boys’ Mercedes Benz. A copy of Need For Speed was found in the car. Since Need For Speed is about street racing and the kids were street racing the game apparently caused the crash. But I am not going to go down that road we’ve seen far too many times already.

Morris actually called up the Toronto Star on the podcast to ask about this article. The bulk of the podcast consisted of a conversation between Morris and Norris McDonald about this article and the media’s role in gaming press. The conversation was civil and neither party got really hyped up towards each other but as I was listening I couldn’t help but get a sour feeling in my stomach. It started to remind me of the talk radio my father listens to, Sean Hannity, Rush etc. As I arrived at work (I was listening in the car) and the discussion ended I was thinking “Is this what gaming is becoming?” Are game companies going to have to hire PR people to talk to the press and argue and fight on TV shows about irresoluble topics? I don’t want guys in suits using voice volume tactics to one-up each other about the social merits of GTA7.

Are games just entertainment? Are they worth talking about beyond a hobbyist view? Is it possible to just enjoy them without getting caught up in their ramifications, long term implications and possible scapegoating? My answer came in the form of a noise. I was bartending and the bar was decently crowded. I was just maintaining my supply of glasses and grabbing a fork full of my dinner from the back once everyone’s glass was sufficiently full. Then someone leans across the bar and says to me, “Hey, your codec is going off”. Without even thinking I grabbed my cell phone from the counter and went to check the text messages. Before I read the slop of numbers and letters some of my friends like to call communication it hit me. Sure enough my text ringtone is the codec noise from Metal Gear Solid. I looked up to the phone to see the guy (and surprisingly his date as well) smiling at me.

The rest of the night we talked about Snake, what the hell was going on in Sons of Liberty, and games in general (with a good amount of input from the Mrs. as well). By the time I left the bar my mind was made up. You can tell me what games are doing to my brain, you can tell me their politics, you can try to peg where I stand on the issue, and you can tell me the future for games is bleak and full of repetition. But in end I don’t play your games. I don’t play games to escape, nor do I play games to simulate. I don’t even “play” at all. Instead I experience, and I share that experience much like any other. And to me, that is really all I want out of it and life in general, a good experience.