Taking Gaming To The Next Level?

CONNECTIONS | by MOLLY MARTIN

IS THERE ANY BENEFIT from all the time spent playing video games these days? Stress reduction? A sweat-free endorphin rush? The illusion of accomplishment?

What if it wasn’t an illusion? What if playing video games could help solve world hunger, poverty, climate change and global conflict?

Games developer and researcher Jane McGonigal argued just that at this year’s TED Conference. Rather than fueling guilt for the 3 billion hours a week people play online games (not to mention the offline ones!), McGonigal said we should aim to increase that to 21 billion, expanding the skills learned in such games so we can apply them to the real world’s big problems.

Playing online games makes us good at four things, McGonigal said:

• Maintaining a feeling of urgent optimism: We’re game to tackle an obstacle because we believe there’s a reasonable chance of success.
• Weaving tight social relationships: We like and trust folks more when we play games with them.
• Feeling blissful in productivity: We’re happier when we work hard (even in the virtual world) and get things done.
• Aiming for epic meaning: We believe we can change the world because we have super powers and take on awe-inspiring missions.

McGonigal has created three games so far as examples:

• World Without Oil simulated the first 32 weeks of a global oil crisis.
• SuperStruct invited players to chronicle the world in the year 2019, and imagine how to solve the problems we’ll face.
• Evoke, launched this spring, is a social-network game that aims to empower young people all over the world, especially in Africa, to come up with creative solutions to our most urgent social problems.

I’m not quite sure how the Bejeweled game on my iPhone fits in there, but I’m hoping for the best.