Trigger Happy
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why the wonder induced by videogames should not
enjoy a similar motivational power. Early videogame
designers were inspired by imagery from comics, films
and paintings. Now that videogames enjoy a general
popularity and pervasiveness easily comparable to
those media, we should be prepared to discover that,
just as Percy Bysshe Shelley was moved by wonder to
write odes to the forces of nature, so future videogames
might plant seeds of inspiration in people who then
become painters, architects, animators or videogame
designers themselves.
That is the good news, the utopian possible future.
But here is the bad news, the embryonic dystopia: how
videogames might darken our inner lives. As an
industry, videogames will have to choose which side
they’re on. Because videogames’ powerful creative
potential incurs a weighty responsibility too. To
illustrate this, let me tell you one last little story about
the difference between reality and simulation. It is a
theme that we’ve seen in many different contexts:
physics, artistic perspective, Japanese fishing games; it
has been at the heart of some of the major arguments.
But it is not just a nice intellectual puzzle.
