For years  I have been an avid gamer. I have owned pretty much every system since the original Playstation. I have devoted countless hours that could have been spent productively jumping up into brick boxes for coins. Recently i began to have a serious discussion with myself on the merits of my hobby. As many gamers have found out the cons most definitly out weigh the pros. My hobby is an expensive one that has cost me and my parents thousands of dollars yearly. My social life is virtually non-existent outside of Call of Duty message boards. I physically resemble a branch on a willow tree. So why do i not hate these soulless reprensentations of human emotion? Why do I find the abstract representation of human appearance so beautiful and spiritual at the same time that I am slightly repulsed by them?

For most people who have asked themselves this question the answer would be because they allow me to be someone else. They allow you to forget about the actual world for a few hours and simply pretend to be a dragon slaying princess saving hero. The problem with that line of thinking is that you can do that much more effectively without ever lifting a controller. In fact until recently that is exactly what the vast majority of people did on a daily basis. They imagined things that they couldn't ever do in real life. You probably do it everyday and don't even think about it. I mean who hasn't sat down at a table to think and looked up five minutes later to find that the clock has somehow skipped twenty minutes and your late to an appointment.

Others would say that the play games because they find the story engrossing. They enjoy taking a character down the linear path of beginning, middle, and end. To them I say look at a movie or read a book because they do it so much better. No videogame has ever told a story that I would say is anywhere near the level of Huckleberry Finn in terms of literary merit. This isn't because it is impossible to tell a good videogame story. It is simply because videogames and traditional storytelling don't match up. Videogames are all about interactivity and the archaic structure of the typical movie or novel is anything but interactive. Some gamers would point to open world games like GTA IV as their example of an interactive storyline. But in GTA IV you are never under the impression that you are changing anything in the story. Every choice you make was scripted there was never any chance of true random scenarios. Same thing for Heavy Rain which only gives you the illusion of choice.

So when I ask myself why don't I hate videogames. I keep coming to the conclusion that  no matter what angle I hit the question from the reason I don't hate videogames will always be  because they are fun.