Video Games that Don't Feel Like Work

Remember when video games used to be fun? When I was seven years old, my piano teacher had a Nintendo at her house that we were allowed to play while we were waiting for our mothers to pick us up. That was my first experience with video games. All week I would look forward to playing Super Mario Bros. I had dreams about little Luigi bopping mushrooms on the head in the sewers.

Seventeen years later, I admit that I still play video games – but they’ve started to feel more like work than fun. I am a huge college football fan and EA Sports’ NCAA Football series is one of the greatest things that has ever happened to me. Who can resist playing football sports as Reggie Bush or creating a super version of yourself to destroy college defenses on your way to the Heisman Trophy? It is particularly appealing for me because I am so uncoordinated and slow in real life.

But these games have huge learning curves. If you don’t know what bump-and-run coverage is, you probably don’t want to play NCAA Football. It’s going to take you hours of practice to play Halo 3 with your friends.

That’s why I’m so enthralled by the Nintendo Wii. Last night, my wife and I had dinner with a married couple. After watching the Office (classic) we busted out the Wii and we played the Wii Sports bowling game, tennis, and boxing. My wife developed a strategy of constantly punching in the boxing game that was basically unstoppable. Even when I tried to replicate it she beat me soundly.

The Wii is a good, old-fashioned arcade game machine. I’m sure it has difficult games that take hours to master, but we picked it up for the first time last night and got super sweaty trying to beat each other over the head in the boxing game. Seventeen years after my first video game experience, Nintendo has come through again.