At the beginning of the TED talk by Jane Mcgonigal on Gaming can make a better world she states that, “if we want to solve problems like hunger, poverty climate change, global conflict, obesity, I believe that we need to aspire to play games online for at least 21 billion hours a week by the end of the next decade.” When first hearing this I was shocked and thought that this idea was a little bit crazy, but during her talk I believe she brought up some good points that could support this idea. McGonigal says that gamers look for the epic win, when they do something in a game that they had no idea they were capable of it. This is an interesting point because sometimes in life we accomplish things that we had no idea we were capable of, but I feel it happens a lot less in life, but then again I am not a gamer so I could be wrong. I believe McGonigal’s mindset is good and she gives a lot of evidence to support how gaming is a powerful platform for change, but I just do not see how actually playing a game will be transformed into the real world. I think the ideas are all there, but people escape the real world in video games because they know it’s not real. Where does the jump to reality come into play and how will what is learned in the gaming world be applied and enforced in the real world?
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I 100% agree with your argument. I see a lot of TED talks as various speakers coming in with their specific niche and trying to apply it to some bigger picture. She shocked me at first, and sort of had me hooked when she talked about gamers becoming the best possible version of themselves. This is something I can relate to. I don’t play a whole lot of video games, but my roommates and I will have rivalries down to things as stupid as Flappy Bird and even create leader-boards in our living room. When one of us is dead last, we will do everything in our power to climb back up and reclaim the throne. When I realized this, I started to see some serious resonance with the speaker’s argument. But she failed to explain how we would bring these skills to the real world, which is where she lost me. Otherwise, I found it to be a powerful speech.
I also was shocked when Jane Mcgonigal said that she believes that the answer to the world’s biggest problems is video games. I was and to a certain extent still am skeptical about how much a single video game can do to solve problems such as poverty, climate change and obesity, but have to admit that Mcgonigal has presented an ideal simple solution and her reasons for believing these problems can be solved through video games. Your question about not being able to “see how actually playing a game will be transformed into the real world,” was addressed about 17 minutes into the TED talk when Mcgonigal mentioned that “most of our players have kept up the habits they learned in this game” referring to players who participated in a game she created called “World Without Oil.” This would imply that the “jump into reality” that you were wondering about occurred for some individuals when they were addressed with a virtual reality that was facing a very plausible problem of running out of oil and have chosen to change their real-life habits to ensure that the reality they faced during the videogame does not become the world’s reality.
I agree with the idea which you write. I think that in a talk, people want to make strong argument to make it believe. It is so hard to get truth from a talk. In the TED lecture, she said that “if we want to solve problems like hunger, poverty climate change, global conflict, obesity, I believe that we need to aspire to play games online for at least 21 billion hours a week by the end of the next decade.” I understand the the idea which she gives. It just like a experiment. If we do experiment, we can do better in the future, so we need to play games. However, the games she talks are different from the games which most people play. So there are some conflict. But, I still think playing game is not all bad thing, it really depend how you play it. There is no bad food in the world, if really depend how you eat it.
I understand how certain video games can have a real life impact. For instance, a flight simulator is similar to a video game. This is benefical to pilots as it provides them with real life situations and they are able to make manuevers like real life flying would ential. Howver, I do not see the connection that some video games could create that would help create solutions to other real world problems. Looking for the “epic win” in Grand Theft Auto will not provide any real world skills that are beneficial to society. I think there are certain games that require a special set of thinking skills, but overall a game is just a game. NHL 14 is not going to help solve world peace.