The Craving for Storylines: A Million-maker

The first video games, such as Pong, lacked a storyline or in most respects, characters. In these scenarios, the object to win overwhelmed all other desires, but eventually the players needed or desired more incentive to save the Princess in Mario Brothers. How do we begin to justify playing a game for our whole day unless our immersion into the game suffices?

The answer becomes quite apparent in video games. Video games have adapted to create not only violent scenes or daring adventures of new worlds, but also to construct story-lines to entice the player. A video game can resemble a continuation of when children play “pretend” games, such as creating storylines for their Barbies or army men. For example, Ken marries Barbie, they drive around in their make-believe car, have babies, and sometimes fight with Kelly, Barbie’s younger sister. Or maybe the scenario in your storyline was completely different. Yet, as children and adults, we crave to become immersed in a story different from our own, such as in Final Fantasy.

When talking to my guy friends about video games, the amount of time they spend playing games with storylines almost equals or exceeds their dedication to sports video games, because the storyline, the characters, the plot, and the heroic actions captivate their attention and consume their time.

Video games are a million dollar industry, but when we look closer, they are only a construction of our deeper desire to become immersed in a story.