It seems that modern video games are often missing a true taste of reality. Sure we have mystical locales breathing with life and sure we have weapons and stories so vast that anyone can be a hero. But where are the doses of harsh reality that give gamers an accurate sense of life in the real world? I bring you my top additions to the gaming industry that will never happen.
First up is the kid chaos car. Driving games pride themselves not only on their realistic physics but also their picture-perfect interiors. If I were a developer, every driving game includes a family car that is never clean. A glance in the rearview mirror reveals a backseat bursting with Hot Wheels and Poly Pocket accessories long forgotten. Old apple slices and crumbled cookies cascade across the seats while loose DVDs become more scratched with every turn. Naturally the Mini Pop Kids, Justin Bieber and Hanna Montana are pumping through the speakers. Switch it off and a tsunami of high-pitched complaints explodes from the backseat — in 5.1 surround sound of course.
The kid chaos car requires you to stop at a McDonalds during each race and you can’t leave without picking up a barrage of new plastic toys for your young passengers, toys which you know will simply end up on the floor, discarded and long forgotten until the next time you clean the car. And when it comes to cleaning, as you emerge from a wash bay with a clean car or a newly replaced windshield, inevitably along comes a grader truck to bathe you in pebbles, muck and grime, making you wonder why you bothered in the first place. Forget Ferrari, park the Porsche, and leave the Lamborghini. When I'm through with the racing genre, gamers will know what family driving in real life is all about and will be left hunting for a new genre of game.
I am sick of hunting games. I've never understood the appeal of shooting virtual animals. As a developer, I have two takes on the hunting genre. The first is a game entitled Fuzzy Fluffy Bunny Hunter (mostly just to shock my wife). Gamers blaze across grasslands, amassing points for prey depending on various factors. “Fluff Factor”, “Cute-osity”, and “Un-scariness” all get extra point values. Man seems to pride himself on being master of nature. This game will take a nonsensical look at how absurd that dominance truly is.
The second addition to the hunting genre brings a taste of real hunting. This game entails driving four hours north into mountainous forest, sitting half frozen for a seeping eternity in a blind on the off chance that a deer, elk, or moose comes prancing by your small piece of more than five million acres of Alberta hunting land. You inevitably go home cold, wet and horribly disappointed or still cold and wet but with a freezer full of freshly carved meat. Naturally, the full skinning and gutting process — I've never understood why it's called "cleaning" as I can’t see anything clean about it — will support motion-sensing technology, allowing gamers a more immersive slaughtering experience.
As a bonus, all games are rid of zombies. Instead, they’re replaced with digital versions of the writers, designers, animators and artists who have perpetuated this infestation, this plague of the undead upon the video gaming industry. The leitmotif for sequels in the last few years seems to be "Let's do what we did before, but this time ... ready for this? Let's add zombies!"
There’s no king, but instead a boss who hasn't actually worked a day in his life. No sword but a pen with which to send angry, futile letters. No pristine, plastic-perfect princess but a companion who compliments and loves you more for all your imperfections as you love her for hers.
If I were a video game developer, through this farcical swarm of pessimism, I would give a voice to all the little realities that make life real. For now, gamers are safe to enjoy the gift of the wonderfully welcomed fantasy of suspended reality that video games thankfully provide.
When he’s not driving the family car or avoiding hunting, St. Albert Catholic High School alumnus Derek Mitchell spends his free time connected to a video game console.
