This past week, I spent a good portion of my time roaming the jungles of the Malay Archipelago in search of my family and friends who had been kidnapped by pirates. In the same week, I also ventured into Colonial America where I used my skills as an assassin to save mankind. And, believe it or not, I even got to use my skills as a soldier to fight the enemy and take victory. Of course, I personally did not actually do any of this. I did not get to do any exploring. I am certainly not a soldier or an assassin in real life. So how did I do all of these things? I sat on my couch for hours on end, living a different life as I controlled characters on a screen to do my bidding.
As far as I know, there is no other entertainment medium that allows you to really feel as if you are someone else, living a different life. For me, and the majority of people I have talked to, this virtual world is just that - virtual. But for others, this virtual world becomes much more than that. By studying gamers, we can learn so much about an entire subculture, one that makes up a large percentage of the world. We can learn how this relatively new medium influences us. Who plays games? Why do they play? And how do they communicate with each other and the world? These are all questions I set out to try and answer.
Infographic Courtesy of the ESRB. View on their site at http://www.esrb.org/about/video-game-industry-statistics.jsp