EDVGT III

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Joan: It makes the game feel more immersive, you know, more real.

Balere: But it is real!

Joan: Okay, sure, there really is data inside this machine, data that correlates to what I see and hear from the computer as well as my input, but there isn't really this mansion peopled by terrorists and hostages, is there?

Balere: Now you see, for my ears there is a contradiction in what you say. Here have we sat for several hours working together in this game, both very obviously operating on the assumtion that the things we're working with are real! I have heard you refer to these terrorists and hostages and mansions plainly, as we communicate while playing. Were these fictional things that you referred to?

Faysal: I don't see how they aren't fictional.

Balere: Of course you don't, but take leave of your narrative stance just so that you can entertain my argument-

Joan: -as Aristotle says, “The mark of an educated mind-”

Balere: - to entertain an idea without accepting it, yes, right, please don't interrupt.

Joan: Sorry.

Balere: As I was saying, they are real on their own terms. The mansion of this game does not behave in the same way nor adheres to the same rules as a “real” mansion, and the same can be said for everything else that is a similar representation – the terrain, the guns and equipment, the human bodies, etc. But they are simply different real things, behaving differently, following different rules. They will still do so in a way that is explainable – even if something happens that should be impossible, it can be connected to a bug or glitch, an identifiable computer error. Data is, after all, what these real things in the game are composed of.

Faysal: If that's your stance, then let's clarify what we mean by “real.” Would you say that something can be “real” if its behaviors or properties are not arbitrary?

Balere: Are you suggesting that the world is an arbitrary place?

Faysal: I think what I'm pointing to rests on this: while it's clear that the game is meant to simulate “real life,” it can never represent it accurately. (Permit me to continue to use terms like “real life” and “reality;” under your theory they may serve as useful terms not meant to be taken literally.) There are so many factors affecting the physics of objects like guns and bullets, biologically unique individuals running around in armor in buildings of all kinds, it would be beyond the scope of all the world's game designers just to make a physics engine that represents it accurately. Ultimately the problem lies with the interconnectedness of things, and this is more than simply a cliché: one simply cannot accurately recreate one part of the world without creating the rest of the world it interacts with.

Balere: I think this much can be agreed upon without more words, but what's your point?

Faysal: My point is, at some point the designers have to break from reality and make anti-realistic decisions about the game. To some extent, every game tries to simulate reality, but this is cannot form the whole of decisions made about the game, no matter what. There are other goals: sometimes to make the game more commercially successful, or more entertaining. There are concerns with “balance” in some games; other games try to pioneer new ideas. Some games aim to appeal to a particular, "niche" taste. So, considering that some parts of the game's world were decided in this way, by human beings external to the game's world, does it still meet your idea of “real?”

Joan: I'm sorry, I think you completely lost me.

Faysal: Where at?

Joan: Well, I think I gather this from what you say: game designers make decisions about the behavior and properties of a game's world, and everything in it. Because it is impossible to perfectly simulate reality, and because that isn't the only reason we make games, some of these decisions must have a purpose other than “to simulate reality.” You want to know if Balere is willing to call a game “real,” acknowledging that some parts of the game world have transparent intent.

Faysal: So where did I lose you?

Joan: Why does it matter if there's an anti-realistic purpose to some parts of a game? How does that challenge its reality?

Faysal: What I'm getting at is that it's, in some ways, very obviously and uncontroversially true that a game is "real." A picture of a wormhole - a science-fiction idea that scientists don't believe could possibly exist - is a real picture of a wormhole, but that doesn't mean it's a wormhole, if we define wormholes as necessarily being sort of time-space highways connecting distant parts of the galaxy. The picture definitely doesn't do such a thing.

Balere: But, if that picture shows a galaxy, and the wormhole connecting two parts of that "fictional" galaxy, and that picture is part of a game in which the wormhole can be used, then it has its own kind of reality. But I think I can say you're right - this kind of "reality" I'm speaking of doesn't mean that things which bear the same names as the "real-world" items they simulate
are, in fact, exactly like those real-world items. I can see that a picture of a wormhole, for example, is a two-dimensional image, and I know that's because of the limitations of the two-dimensional image's media - canvas, computer screens, walls, etc. I suppose I consider it "real" because I think the world is not arbitrary, but has a purpose.

Faysal: Fair enough - I think that's a disagreement we can leave for another time. But nevertheless, you acknowledge this fallacy: of assuming that because games are "real" in some sense, that they can teach us about the things they simulate.

Balere: I don't think that's true at all.

Faysal: No?

Balere: Just because they're different from the "real world" doesn't mean they can't teach us - in fact, because they are different from "reality," they allow us to see alternative possibilities, and understand how things might be.

Faysal: A very philosophical idea, but tell me, do you think that a man who plays a roleplaying game on the internet with a female character will learn what it is like to be a woman?

Joan: Definitely! Guys always give gifts to girl characters, even complete strangers, and are a lot more likely to help them out with quests or missions or whatever the online game is about. Trust me, I know. It's a little bit obnoxious, but for the most part it's pretty funny.

Balere: Unfortunately, I know exactly what you're talking about.

Faysal: Alright, so in your experience, women are treated differently from men in online games. But Joan, you say it's "a little bit obnoxious, but for the most part it's pretty funny." How would you feel in real life if complete strangers were to give you gifts, or help you with things, for no apparent reason other than that you're a woman?

Joan: Well, I think that's a little weird and sexist. But not everyone agrees with that; some women like "chivalry."

Balere: I'm a traditionalist myself.

Joan: Blech.

Faysal: Maybe that's not the best example, but what struck me about your saying it's "obnoxious and funny" in video games was a certain similarity to another woman's reaction after an event in a MUD. She was at once mildly annoyed at a breach in "civility," and also extremely upset about what had happened; someone had hacked the game and effectively "raped" her character. It was a completely text-based rape, with no physical component or coercion of the victim's attention (one can always turn off the computer). I'm not saying it was okay, or a harmless act, but it certainly was nothing like real rape. So no one who is "raped" in a video game could ever claim to know what it's like to be physically raped. I'm basically echoing the arguments of this professor from MIT, Sherry Turkle.

Joan: So, returning to the idea of a man playing a female character online, no man can really understand the lived experience of being a woman just by playing a game.

Balere: Never fully, but I never claimed that games can provide us with a full, comprehensive understanding of what they simulate. Nevertheless, the difference in how male and female characters are treated can certainly provide a man with some insight into what it's like to be a woman - he at least knows something about the way people tend to treat both male and female characters. There's no way to do that in real life without...well...

Joan: Yeah, that might be a little weird.

Faysal: There's nothing wrong with cross-dressing.

Balere: Anyway, you see what I'm saying. Games aren't completely without some educational value.

Faysal: Certainly it's a very philosophical idea, trying to explore alternative possibilities, "stepping outside the cave" in a sense.

Joan: A lot of games have a cave-style plot, if you know what I mean. Bioware likes to do it in some of theirs; it's kind of a form-fits-content plot for a video game. The main character is submerged in an enveloping, environmental lie - real kind of Matrix, or Truman Show kind of stuff. And of course, those are both dug right up out of Plato's Cave, no pun intended.

Faysal: Well, I don't think I see as much potential as you seem to, Balere, but I'll acknowledge that some small insight can be gleaned from video games.