Come Out And Play

Over the past few weeks, we've been working with a few common threads here at SVGL. We talked a lot about what creates our emotional attachment to games, and discovered that a lot of it has to do with why our childhood memories of video games are so strong even though games were much simpler then: imagination.

These days, games like ICO and Portal earn such dear spots in both our hearts and our pop culture because of all the things they've left unsaid; I'd add to the mix the world of BioShock's Rapture, which presents us a living ruin and then leaves so many of the empty spaces up to our roaming imaginations to fill.

Remember our discussion on the Last Guardian trailer and how it created a similar imagination-connection? We noted at the time that the games that are the best at this have something interesting in common: their creators aren't strictly game designers. Fumito Ueda was a student of art before ever taking his gifts to the game industry; the writers of Portal are exactly that -- writers -- and they would have been writing even if not for a video game (and to you designers who say you don't need writers to truly succeed, good luck with that).

I've also gotten an overwhelmingly positive response (thank you guys!) to the video on which I collaborated with the fantastic Daniel Floyd on why a growing female presence both in the games audience and the games industry is essential to the medium's creative development.

All of our recent discussions, then, have one core value in common: Diversity. The most valuable perspectives come from non-traditional creators, and the industry will thrive on being less insular. It's no coincidence, then, that I recently quizzed you guys in the latest SVGL sidebar poll on how you spend your time.

First of all, thanks for making this the best SVGL poll yet with 918 responses. And given that this is a pretty specific kinda video game blog, it's unsurprising that only 1 percent of you said that games are "pretty minor" in your life. About a third of you count games as your main activity in life, at 31 percent, and 53 percent of you say games take the lead among a few other hobbies. Only 12 percent of you would say you have "many" hobbies aside from video games.

I asked you about this because I wanted to find out how diverse you are in terms of your interests. Last weekend I was enjoying the great weather at a wonderful outdoor concert, and, tongue-in-cheek, scolded gamers via Twitter for spending the weekend indoors when there tends to be lots to do in the summer. Of course, I was largely teasing, but I was alarmed at how virulent some of the responses were. As if it were unacceptable, completely out-of-line, for me to imply that there's anything wrong with focusing on video games to the exclusion of all other things.

We're entering an era of cross-media IP (huh? More on that tomorrow), and I think it'll be a good thing for games when they can diversify in terms of who's creating them and in terms of how audiences can access gameworlds. And while we need diversity on the development side, our insularity as players isn't very helpful to the culture of games either.

I spend so much time on music these days that a lot of people ask me, "well, why don't you become a music journalist?" Because I like being a video game journalist -- I just feel that one's experience of any entertainment medium can only be enriched by the lessons and experiences from other entertainment media. Being into music has helped me enjoy games more, and I want to encourage everyone out there to find new ways to enjoy games through other established art. It's good for us!

That's what I had in mind when I wrote my recent Kotaku feature, in which I invited a popular band from the Brooklyn show scene I've been spending a lot of my free time enjoying to come and play Rock Band with me. Was it a successful ambassadorship? Read it and find out!

I'm slowly digging my way out of a backlog to get back to you guys. More polls, more posts, and more fun stuff soon!

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