The Game of Life

Taking a procedurally demarcated perspective on video games is an interesting way of opening up the idea of games, turning it into a more abstract concept. Even the word itself, games, invokes images of non-productivity and wasted time. Instead, shifting the definition into an open, rhetorically defined conceptual framework, allows for the understanding of games to take in a wider dimension of meaning. Games such as SimCity are in some ways certainly videogames, but in other ways can be seen as instructive templates for an understanding of our world. Growing up, I would lose dozens of hours designing my metropolis. As soon as my expansion seemed to be nearing completion, I found myself grappling with old power plants, griping overtaxed citizens and special interest groups all with an ax to grind. Although in many ways the financial advisor in the game such as SimCity does not model reality, in some very important ways it does. Creating a balanced budget is an important concept to grasp.

The potential of video games to be used as a learning tool is often overlooked. The association with gaming is one of children with nothing better to do and antisocial computer programmers. Perhaps these generalizations are representative of the gaming population to a large degree, but that does not necessarily have to be so. Remodeling a game such as SimCity, Animal Crossing or even World of Warcraft to incorporate more realistic lessons can potentially prove useful to society in general. There isn’t a reason in the world that in a developed country where everyone has a computer we can’t have basic mathematical concepts, economic drives and constraints, and the basics of barter and trade taught through an interactive game. The market trading system and World of Warcraft is an example of something approaching a decent analogy to the stock market. Putting aside for the moment whether or not one believes in the validity of the trading of stocks or the companies behind them, the idea of a free market of the items traded between individuals and controlled by supply and demand, is an interesting one to study.

The procedural rhetoric of video games can be defined in any way suitable to the purpose of the game designer. This creates an open field for exploration and new media. From games detailing political policy such as Take Back Illinois, to detailed trainings of military ethics in combat, the groundwork is already being laid for increasingly revolutionary hybridization between learning and gaming. Breaking games out of the confines of the stigmas associated with them is a necessary step in redefining the relationship between the idea of games and the education of society.