What is a (video) game? Part 3

"Fozzy, take the next left at the fork in the road."

"A fork in the road."

"I don't believe this."

I have already pointed out that a large number of video games are predominantly single player in nature. Even the multiplayer aspects of most games is an illusion as you are still sitting by yourself playing against other players who are at their own houses…by themselves. This leads to a lot of ME time. Now your average game player falls into one of two categories: student or employee. Students fall into K-12 or college student. Employees are typically married or not. The reality is that work is not easy (God gave men that when Adam fell in Genesis) and school ask a lot of young minds or at least it should. Work, whether it is our education or our occupation, is hard and we people like our diversions. However, as our amusement costs us time our diversions cost us relationships.

Let me put it to you this way. After busy mornings and full days of work we are left with about four hours in the evening. If you choose to play a game what are you diverting yourself from? You might convince yourself that you are blowing off steam from a hard day on the job or a stressful day in class but the reality is you aren’t there anymore. By jumping into a game by yourself and blowing a few people away in order to reach the next level or class you are neglecting someone real. It may be your parents, your siblings, your spouse or your children. It may be the opportunity to meet new people. It might just be spending time with God. None the less you are neglecting real opportunity for a fictional experience. In many ways these are people who you have a limited time to get to know. There are times when I am sad I didn’t get to know my brother and sister better when we were younger. I never feel like I talk to my parents enough. Shamefully, there were several nights in my marriage where I rushed my wife off to bed or encouraged her to read so I could get an hour of Uncharted in. Thankfully, my daughter time is her time and I have come around to being less of a moron about games. Is there a relationship you neglect because of your diversions? Who takes the hit when earning more experience or reaching the next level takes precedence over people who care about you?