The Production of Culture

Video games are an interactive form of art and storytelling. In Tom Bissell’s article Extra Lives, he explores two different ideas of why video games matter from two different perspectives. I was mostly intrigued by his description of Resident Evil. He compared the video game to a horror film, “Great Horror movies are almost always subterranean in effect. They are the ultimate compulsion–you must watch–and they transubstantiate social anxieties more sensed than felt. The sensed rather than the felt, is the essence of the the horror film.” In video games I feel like the gamer experiences the “felt” part of his anxiety. They are directly connected with experience and emotions that make one so addicted. You are completely immersed in the art and visual aspect of the game that draws you in for the next couple hours of your life.

“But I am fairly sure that no game before Resident Evil allowed such violence to be done to specific limbs. It provided gamers with one of the video-game form’s first laboratories of virtual sadism, and I would be lying if I did not admit that it was, in it’s way, exhilarating. (They were zombies, you were doing them favor.)”

Video games take you through a narrative that is completely different from literature and films. You get a create a perfect world of your own and take yourself through a journey of an “extra life.” You get away from your present real life. I remember when I was younger, I would completely lose myself in Mario Cart and Sims2. I would spend hours and hours trying to solve puzzles and win games and create characters who’s lives I could dominate and control for the rest of my day. 8 hours would go by and I wouldn’t even notice. Where did my day go?