Cars, and fireballs, and arrows! Oh my!

   And so the rants begin. Here's to a hopefully successful blog! Now that I got a proper introduction out of the way, time to get to the real meat of things.

   As a teenager, my weekends tend to be quite hectic. I rarely spend any time at home anymore. A majority of it is spent either bowling, doing homework, spending time with family, going to church, or meeting up with friends. It seems with all these activities, however, I seem to have developed habits with all of them. I rarely do my homework, I constantly wonder how I'm still sane when half of my family is almost insane, I feel guilty in church, and a majority of the times I meet up with friends, I go to Gameworks.

   Gameworks, for those of you who may not know, is a restaurant, arcade, and bar all combined in one. I like to call it a restaurcadebar. Granted, my friends and I mainly go for the games, the place has fantastic food. Don't ask me about the alcohol, however. I think if I asked someone how their drink was, I'd just get a bunch of mumbles. Regardless, the main focus of Gameworks is for the games

   These games range from a whole variety of things that seem to attract me and my friends. Shoot zombies and save the world, shoot terrorists and save the world, pretend that you're a street racers, or just beat someone down to a pulp. With all these cliche thrills, how could one stay away? However, these thrills aren't the only reason me and my friends go.

   On the weekends, Gameworks tends to be filled with the diehard fans of games(including my friends and myself). We all have our game of choice we love to beat others at. However, when seeing these people demonstrate their skills, an important question arises in my mind. A good majority of these games that people become incredibly adept at have home versions in some form or another. Instead of paying $1 or $2 a time for these games, these people could just pay one flat price and play the game whenever they desired. However, Gameworks still seems to suck in customers all the time, with me being a victim of the same question I ask myself.

 My personal game of choice is Street Fighter IV. I've played it somewhat competitively, and I enjoy the game greatly. I wouldn't say I'm the absolute best, but I can hold my own against very tough opponents. I own both the original and Super Street Fighter IV at home, and I play both somewhat regularly on my Xbox over the internet. I play opponents that range from all sorts of skill levels, and I get my fix of human interaction. However, I still put tons of money into the machine at Gameworks. Until the today, I really couldn't figure out why I still play the game.

   I had an incredibly close match today with two guys I found playing the machine. I ended up coming out on top by the skin of my teeth, but a win is a win. While I was thanking my opponent for a great match, it finally clicked in my head why I keep coming back. When I play these close matches online, I never get a chance to not only see the reactions of my opponent, but I also never get a chance to really interact with them after the match. They just vanish, anxiously searching for their next opponent to keep them amused. However, when I play on arcade machines against people I can interact with in person, it almost feels as I'm playing the game in a new dimension. I not only see the face and appearance of who I'm fighting, but I can also have a nice and casual talk after the game with them. Also, the real hook of the fighting, there are other to see you and interact as well

   Everyone strives to be well liked by others and the support and reactions you gain from a crowd completely outweigh that of a simple little YouTube comment on a replay of your match or a "Good game" message over Xbox Live. Once you play in person, you can feel the tension of the match as you feel the stares of the onlookers, watching your every move for their entertainment. It's hard to really give a tangible description to the sensations my opponents and I feel, but you get the general idea. If not, give it a try for yourself. You'll soon find out why people like me constantly return to Gameworks to play a game a majority of the people there already own.

   However, this isn't the only reason why people keep coming back. There are certain games at Gameworks which provide cards that save your game data. One such example is Maximum Tune 3. You can buy a card which saves all of your race data, as well as your car. Every time you win a race in Story Mode, you get the ability to upgrade your car, leading to an addictive process of making your car faster and more maneuverable with every race. You may be asking yourself though, "Danny, why would you spend so much money on a game just for one really fast car to use? It seems pointless to invest so much money into one game just so you have a high performance car to use." The simplest way to answer that would be to achieve an emotional high.

   Just like Street Fighter, you can compete with other people. In Maximum Tune, you and 3 others can race against each other on the highways to see who has the fastest car. This again, creates a complex that a majority of the diehard fans have. They want to have that emotional high where they feel respected and feared by the others in the building. They want to develop a reputation for themselves and garner the respect of others while basking in the tensions provided by the game for thrill. This desire for an emotional high creates a habit of investing money into illusions of thrill, excitement, and respect. And coming from personal experience, it's a shockingly successful formula.

   I know not everyone has the same mind that I do, but keep this in mind next time you find yourself asking why people waste so much money on these arcade games. The frivolity of these games begins to appear not so frivolous once you realize the benefits of the game. I may have fallen into this trap of playing games for an emotional high, but the trap just hurts so good.