Re:The Glorious, Profitable, Inescapable Art of Addiction
by inlined on Thursday July 18, 2019 @01:34AM
(#20467012)
But modern games are often much more like casino machines than books. There are countless studies over the last decade to make games more addictive. The key step that I hate most is the intentional use of grinding. Not only does it stretch out gameplay, but doing your “chores” (eg gathering materials for hundreds of hours) makes the reward feel more earned. This makes the virtual sword feel more tangible and feeds into a sunk cost fallacy when we consider quitting.
Re:The Glorious, Profitable, Inescapable Art of Addiction
by cousin_it on Thursday July 18, 2019 @04:47AM
(#20467969)
> Is there a chemical difference between this and the pleasure some get from reading great literary works
Yes, and that difference is the whole point of art vs entertainment. After consuming entertainment, you want more entertainment. But after consuming art - after reading The Great Gatsby - your eyes get yanked back to your own life. You start thinking "what doomed dreams do I have?", not "when will they release Great Gatsby 2?"
Re:The Glorious, Profitable, Inescapable Art of Addiction
by ahaferburg on Friday July 19, 2019 @05:00AM
(#20477137)
Note that the comment didn't say books vs games. A video game can be art, and a book can be entertainment.
Re:The Glorious, Profitable, Inescapable Art of Addiction
by konstmonst on Thursday July 18, 2019 @08:13AM
(#20468936)
I had the same feeling after playing Sekiro (And I read a lot)
A key question on the ethics of it all is - I think - whether there is some externality from the behavior that leads to social utility. Reading literature might make you more understanding and empathetic of others' experiences for example. Gambling in a casino, maybe not so much (though certainly it creates jobs, etc).
I'm excited by the idea that neurochemical feedback loops in gaming could create some positive social utility. Certainly the storytelling in a lot of games is artistic and meaningful, but maybe we'll find even better ways to directly channel those brain cycles, along the lines of protein folding games but with more depth. (Neal Stephenson had some interesting ideas for this in Fall or Reamde - can't remember - where an MMORPG had an API similar to mechanical turk where players were rewarded for cognitive tasks in the real world like airport security)
edit: I guess we shouldn't forget that games are fun too, and doesn't necessarily need to be deeper than that to be good.