a false sense of reality: part 1

A few weeks ago, there was a giant party at my work--literally hundreds of people, 22 gallons of margaritas, endless buckets of beer, multiple tables of food. For entertainment there was beer-pong, Nintendo Wii, and Rock Band. After the party was over and all was cleaned up, the Rock Band remained in the gym (the multi-purpose room on our lower floor). A large white sheet used as a giant projection screen still hangs on one wall and black lights glow to enhance the rock-star feel. Daily, as the work begins to wane, you can hear the loud rocking music emanating from behind the closed door of the gym. It has become an office-wide obsession.

And rightly so, because playing Rock Band is SO MUCH FUN. Perhaps I enjoy it because Rock Band is the first video game I've taken to successfully, or that I actually play a couple of instruments, or that I not so secretly want to be in a real rock band, but I can't seem to tire of the game (and neither can anyone else). And when I tried to convey my enthusiasm for the game to my friend Sophie, she began to question its popularity. "It's just so fun!" I tried to explain, but at the time couldn't really pinpoint anything much more specific than that. This wasn't a satisfactory answer.

What I was aware of, but too busy fake-drumming to care about, and what Sophie eloquently pointed out to me, was that most of the popular video games of recent years are ones where a person is simulating an activity they might actually be doing if they weren't playing video games. Rock Band and Guitar Hero feel like playing instruments, but it is really nothing like playing a guitar; the sports games on Wii may involve actual physical movement, and though I can bowl strike after strike in the game, I'm hopeless in a real bowling alley. The video games I remember best from my childhood were role-playing games where you ran around as a little Italian man named Mario searching for a princess or Sonic the Hedgehog, trying to collect as many golden rings as possible. Even games that more closely resembled real life activities were controlled by a keypad on a controller--baseball games weren't played by actually motioning the swinging of a bat.

We revel in a false sense of reality. It's not a productive way to spend time--it doesn't necessarily make one more capable of playing music or hitting a tennis ball across the net. My friends and I waste so much of our day pretending to be social by collecting "friends" on Facebook or Myspace and "chatting" on AIM or GChat. And it doesn't seem to matter that these actions are only based in a physical reality. While some people may long for the days of old fashioned human interactions, virtual reality is here to stay. And though a conversation on gchat will never been as satisfying as a conversation in person, perfecting a song on Guitar Hero will never feel as great as being able to play it on a real guitar, and winning a wrestling match on Wii Sports will never get the adrenaline going as pummeling someone to the ground, it can still be a lot of fun. And that's worth something too.