Hi everyone,
I am writing this as a former film major and an avid gamer from the moment I could hold a controller. My early childhood is filled with memories of my sister and I spending hours trying to beat every level in Crash Bandicoot or me regurgitating profanity I had heard from my parents and their friends to Bowser in Super Mario 64.
I carried my passion for video games as I grew through life like a knapsack on a runaway. I grew and experienced a plethora of different areas of the video game culture from almost going pro in Call of Duty MW2 to spending every 4th period in my first semester of my senior year of high school creating in depth courses on Line Rider 2, to meeting someone in my 29 days of play time in Destiny who just asked me to be his best man, to now spending most of my gaming time playing Super Smash Bros Melee competitively.
No matter how hard movies try they will never be able to achieve the things that video games can and here is why:
FREEDOM OF CHOICE
All movies have a set story to tell you. I have never gone to a friend who just saw the same movie as me and when I ask him what he thought of the big fight at the end he tells me it enfolded in a completely different way than what I experienced. But, set one hundred people down to play just the main missions of Skryim and even though the story will be exactly the same, every journey will be vastly different.
We all have those moments where a weird glitch happens and it makes us laugh our ass off, or we accidentally wandered into an enemy way above our skill range and get obliterated, (or maybe your are like me and when you started up Bloodborne you didn't realize you were supposed to go into the house to get a weapon so you spent the first three hours of the game screaming your of frustration about when this game was going to be kind enough to give you a god damn weapon so you didn't have to look like E-Honda Thousand Hand Slapping every fucking wolf you come across). These are the memories you don't forget after them happening one time, where I have to watch movies multiple times to be able to tell you what happened precisely. Movies let you watch heroes and give your dreams while video games let you be anyone you want to be and fulfill those dreams.
ENGAGEMENT.
I have always been a fan of horror movies but no horror movie has ever made a neighbor come and check on me because of screams coming out of my room like playing P.T with surround sound in my dorm room did. I am a huge soccer fan and when I watch soccer I sometimes pace and say the occasional "Oh fuck offff" to the TV. But playing FIFA is a whole different story.
A childhood friend who went to the same college as me and I use to play every night after we went to the Caf and we would have to take days off from seeing each other at times because of how intense the rivalry got between us. Have any of you ever bet $10 on your favorite team winning with a friend and they lost? Yeah that sucks and all.... But have any of you ever bet $10 on a game of FIFA where you are down by 1 goal in the 92nd minute and you get a breakaway and when your take the shot to tie it up it sails beautifully.....into the post and bounces out of bounds, winning your friend the game? It is the most HEART WRENCHING feeling. My chest felt like someone kicked the $10 through me into my friend's wallet...... on top of the fear that strikes my heart as I realize that I just chucked my ps4 controller at the ground.
Let me also mention the polar opposite feeling of elation I felt when my two friends and I joined three random Canadians to do a raid for the first time in Destiny. There is something special about coming together with people who you don't know at all concur a mutual task. I shared laughs, frustration, and loot with these random people who we clicked with immediately and now I have friends I can go stay with in Canada if I ever find myself there. This is why I LOVE (or hate at times) video games. That feeling is unparalleled by anything in movies.
STIMULATION.
When I was a film major I would probably watch a movie if not every day, every other day. Now when I think about spending that much time lying still on my bed, being fed what is enfolding on the screen, I get restless. I often get "Well you play Melee sitting down for two hours straight, what is the difference? The difference is that every single time a character spawns onto the screen we are moving them in what is basically a fast pace, non-turn-based game of chess we are constantly thinking about how many options we can cover to outsmart our opponents with some moves that take literally 1/60th of a second to come out. That is how I can sit still and watch every fight unfolded like a story I have never seen before.
I have never watched a movie that made me feel as many emotions as I did when I played the masterpiece that is The Last of Us. Even though I am sure if they made it as a movie instead it would have been fantastic, the fact that I went through that story playing the characters and feeling the settings and anxiety myself is what really made that story hit me so deep.
These are just a few of the reasons I think that video games are truly the future of entertainment and will surpass movies eventually. With gaming becoming more and more common and E-sports revenue set to double in the next 3 years who knows what lies ahead for us all. Maybe not only movies will be challenged but also major sports.
Thank you for taking the time to read this!