Becoming A Part of Something Bigger Than Ourselves!

I previously stated that gaming is just four defining traits: goals, rules, voluntary participation, and feedback system.  Generally 99% of the time, those four traits are what make a game fun for people to play over and over for long periods of time each day.  But think about this and I really mean think about it, you probably wouldn't be playing this game, digital or not, without someone out there encouraging and supporting you.  Same thing with video games.  There are so many communities out there who have the same interests as you and in reality that one person who got you hooked on the game, just brought you into a community so much bigger than you can even imagine.  Jane McGonigal, author of Reality is Broken, basically described why people enjoy gaming so much and why its worth it.

McGonigal begins off by saying, "Whenever I walk through the front door of my apartment, I enter an alternate reality.  It looks and works just like regular reality, with one major exception: when I want to clean the bathroom, I have to be really sneaky about it." (McGonigal 119)  She does this because her and her husband play a game called Chore Wars and based on what you do earns you points and experience (exp).  "We need to engineer alternate realities: new, more gameful ways of interacting with the real world and living our real files." (McGonigal 115)  So why not?  Compared with games, reality is trivial.  Games make us a part of something bigger and give epic meaning to our actions.  Epic is one of the most important concepts in gamer culture today.  That word is how many people describe their most memorable, gratifying, and craziest experiences that will send a shiver down your spine. (McGonigal 98-99)  That's the number one reason why gamers love epic games.  It's not just that bigger is better, but waht bigger is more "awe-inspiring."

One game I like to play is Clash of Clans or "COC."  In this game you build up your base and train your troops to attack other people to earn money and resources.  You can also join up with other people in what you call clan and have a community of your friends and clan mates battle against another clan for the ultimate reward.

This is my cousins base.

This is my base.

Another game I play is Maplestory.  Maplestory is an Mass Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) where you train solo or together with friends and the maple community.  In this game you do quests to achieve higher ranking and level up to explore new places.  Or you can party up with friends and conquer party mode quests together.  In this game the possibilities are endless.  Just depends on your imagination. 

In this game I am a level 163 Arch Mage (Fire Poison) and I teamed up with my friends and family to conquer different Dimensions.

In League of Legends I've teamed up with some friends at our school and we compete against other high schools.  Together we have team meetings and we talk about who is going to play what position and what our team's strategy is.  We like to bring this game into real life so that we can determine how things are going to play out and how can we as a team dictate the pace the game moves.

In this picture this is my individual rank in the gold division.  I compete within this small community of people to rank up and improve my stats. 

This picture shows my friends and I creating a team to go against other schools in nation wide competitions. 

It all comes down to the fact that video games can help strengthen your social connections with friends and family as well as forge new ones with other people.  Whether you are playing with friends and family or complete strangers you are still apart of a community bigger than you think.  This may sound stupid to you but a lot of people enjoy doing this because of all the excitement and fun.  You may not play video games but I bet a lot of you do sports or other group games and what not.  So tell me, how much of your life is digital and how much of your digital life is brought to the real world?

Merry Christmas and have a Happy New Year!!

Citation: McGonigal, Jane. Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World. New York: Penguin, 2011. Print.