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17.09.2006 Video games and gaming as a pastime gets a very odd reaction the from public, the press and especially in political circles. This is predominantly based around the lack of ethical responsibility in gaming these days, which in all fairness is a valid point. On the flip-side we have the games industry pundits espouse that they're making/playing a new art form. The more games I play and the better I get at them, it's clear that there is a more fundamental and defining aspect to gaming. Whilst there are ethical considerations afoot, both parties have misinterpreted the purpose of gaming. To put it simply, gaming is cognitive firmware. There are currently two major veins in psychological research when it comes to gaming. The more publicised research covers the behavioural affects of violent videogames, this being the ethical issue, but the quieter though arguably more prolific research is of its affect on human cognition. Cognition is the psychological term for how our brains work when remembering facts or figures and solving problems, generally it's about how our brains process data. Through interacting with games we have to process lots of complex information, from hand eye co-ordination to higher order problem solving. Almost all the studies conducted in the latter vein conclude that gaming has an obviously positive affect on a person's cognitive capacity. In that, the more games you play and the better you get at them the more data and variation your brain will be able cope with. The interesting thing here is that these results echo the structural premises of gaming throughout human history. Art, music and literature are passive in nature. They serve an emotional and cognitive purpose, a purpose that has become ratified over time and their societal effects are now almost tangible. Gaming is very different by comparison, mainly because games are wholly active in their undertaking. We play games, they aren't in any way a passive experience (nor should they bother to try to emulate one in my opinion). Games that often succeed are normally abstract; this is because they cover a cognitive blindspot that other media cannot reach. Games like Tetris and Chess are successful because they challenge the mind in a way that everyday events don't, we crave the improvement of our mental capacity. To the point that we respond to complex and conceptual problem solving as being ÒfunÓ, even the language we use to describe gaming is tainted with the connotations of juvenile delight. Gaming innovation is no accident, it's a requirement. Both in terms of hardware, with the Nintendo DS' control input being worthy of note (especially considering the system's subsequent global success) and obviously in software as well. The more we innovate gaming the more abstract it is becoming; this is because we need to stimulate our minds in as many ways as possible. The following is a partial tangent, but narrative focused gameplay is also an interesting offshoot. It gives context to gameplay but to define a game by its narration is missing the point somewhat (something that the likes of Roger Ebert stumbled unfortunately into). This is not to say that bad narrative should be condoned but that there are many involving games that happen to have an awful plot and yet succeed massively. This is often because these games still fulfill a cognitive purpose. In some ways it also explains why narrative gaming hasn't really taken a hold of the populace in the same way that more abstract games have. In addition, the desire for a cognitive upgrade explains the runaway success of the DS' brain training software (though whether psychometric testing can be classed as "gaming" is another subject for a far more detailed discussion). The truly striking thing about gaming in relation to cognition is that people dedicate themselves to master wholly conceptual tasks, despite their lack of real world currency. Admittedly, you have competitions that award monetary prizes but beyond that the skill set is useless, unless of course it is affecting our minds in a way that is fundamental to how we perceive and understand everything else we come into contact with. If that's the case then gaming may end up as being more than just a means to nail that high score on Tetris. ***
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