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(Computer): "Program complete. You may enter when ready."

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This video series primarily focuses on film
and television.

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But every once in a while,
I like to check in on the world of video games.

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And there's no better place to get a sense
of what's happening in gaming

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than the Electronic Entertainment Expo,
or E3 for short.

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Every summer, the entire video game industry
descends on the convention center in downtown

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Los Angeles for an extravagant week of video
game announcements and demonstrations.

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The highlight of the expo are the press
conferences, which are put on by each

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of the major video game publishers, during which
they showcase all their latest and greatest titles.

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Dozens of fantastically rendered, breathtaking
worlds are on display.

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And yet somehow, I always walk away from
E3 with a profound sense of disappointment.


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And that's because for all the talented developers,
all the hardware innovation, all the technological

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advancements, and all the new games,
E3 can still feel remarkably uncreative.

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Year after year, the gaming industry seems
to fall back on one underlying theme:

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kill or be killed.

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After a few dozen trailers that all seem to
feature essentially the same style of game play,

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the whole event can turn into a blur of flying
bullets, swinging swords, and fiery explosions.

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And that makes it hard not to feel a little
like Captain Picard on the holodeck.

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(Picard): "What are you here to do. Ask for a refund?" 
(Slade): "Nah, I'm here to kill you!"

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(Picard): "Computer, freeze program.
Computer, this isn't what I wanted at all."

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(Picard): "It's much too violent. I'm here to
relax, not to dodge bullets. Reconfigure."

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Gaming is now a 100 billion dollar a year
industry. And that's billion with a B.

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And in many ways, E3 represents the face
that industry shows to the public.

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As such, the event provides an ideal setting to
analyze overarching patterns in the gaming world.

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So this year, I did a quick statistical
breakdown of all the games featured at

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the major E3 press conferences.

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"Let's see what we've got."

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A total of 133 games were shown during
these events.

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Only 20 of those games didn't include
combat mechanics.

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And 10 of those were sports or racing games.

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A detailed breakdown looks like this:
82% combat, 3% minimal or incidental combat,

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5% sports, 3% racing, 1% for dancing, with
just 7% left over for all other non-combat games.

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The fact that 82% of the games featured
at E3 are combat-focused illustrates a

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pretty serious lack of imagination.

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To see if that ratio holds up over time, I went back
and compared these stats to the numbers from

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previous E3 events, and I found similar results.

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Initially, I had intended to include separate
stats for narrative games, adventure games,

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puzzle games, city building games, and
exploration games.

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But there just weren't enough titles in any of
these genres to justify their own category.

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A couple quick notes about these numbers.

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For these calculations, I focused on combat
rather than on the presence of violence.

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So games in the non-combat category aren't
necessarily non-violent.

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In fact, three of the ten games in that category
are rather violent survival horror experiences.


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I make the distinction between combat and
violence because with combat,

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the player is the one doing the violence.

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Violence is unfortunately part of our
shared human history.

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And so it makes sense that some games
would include it.


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However, when combat is the game's central
focus, it tends to celebrate that violence

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rather than frame it as a tragic last resort.

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(Narrator): "One such perk will award the 
player with a tactical nuke following a 25
player kill streak."

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(Narrator): "This match will get red-hot.
It's on!"

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Of course, not all forms of combat are equal.

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So just out of curiosity, I further broke the stats down by type.

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Of the 108 games focusing on combat in 2017,
20 of them could be classified as cartoon violence.

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For these titles, it's less 'kill or be killed' and more
'squish or be squashed.'

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The violence may be cute, sometimes downright
adorable, but the focus on combat mechanics

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still sets up a hostile game environment
in which players are forced into an antagonistic

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relationship with the game world.

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The interactions may be a lot less bloody,
but the gameplay is still largely restricted

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to some form of 'get them before they get you.'

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In many ways, the gaming industry has backed
itself into this corner.

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For decades, game studios have focused on
combat to such a degree that for many gamers,

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developers, and even publishers, combat has
now become synonymous with game play itself.

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The president of Nintendo of America echoed
this sentiment at E3 this year.

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(Reggie Fils-Aime): "The game is fun.
The game is a battle."

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(Reggie Fils-Aime): "If it's not fun, why
bother. If it's not a battle, where's the fun?"

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That's an extremely narrow definition
of what constitutes a game and frankly,

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an even narrower definition of fun.

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I'd argue that this obsession with violent
combat mechanics is holding the gaming
industry back.

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Let me quickly explain why I say that.

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Game play mechanics are the underlying rules
and methods for engagement within a game.

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Think of mechanics as a set of tools that
players are given with which to interact

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with the game world, its characters, and
other players.

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In many of the games we've been talking about,
combat is the only way to solve problems,

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to resolve conflict, or to overcome obstacles.

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That old saying that 'If all you have is a hammer,
everything looks like a nail' is apropos.

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Except video games are made so that nearly
everything in your path is specifically

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designed to actually BE a nail.

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And if you're given a machine gun as your
primary tool for engagement, that's going

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to determine how you approach the world
and practically everything in it.

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(Cayde-6) This one dude is all "Rah!" so I shot
him PEW and then I shot this other one PEW.

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(Cayde-6) Shot a couple extra guys just to
be safe. PEW DUSH DUSH.

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(Cayde-6) I did a lot of shooting if I'm
being totally honest.

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When games focus so heavily on combat
mechanics, it severely restricts the

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options for both emotional interaction
and creative conflict resolution.

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Don't get me wrong, conflict is, of course, an
important part of story telling.

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But there are many forms of conflict, 
from the interpersonal to the intergalactic.

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Likewise, there are many forms of
conflict resolution.


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And most of them don't leave behind a
pile of bodies.

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I should mention that there do exist a small
handful of games that include diplomatic tactics.

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Players can talk their way out of every
situation in the retro-indie game Undertale.

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But that's a rare exception to the rule.


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Some genres like role playing games
have players doing more than just fighting.

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But most of the other forms of interaction
exist to support the combat.

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You might talk to other characters who
will give you quests: quests which
inevitably involve killing stuff.

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You might buy, sell, or craft new items: 
items that will help you in killing stuff.

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(Narrator): "A few days out in the wasteland,
and it's time to kick back at home. My home."

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You might even be able to build a house:
a house which you'll have to defend

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by killing even more stuff.

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(Todd Howard): "Cuz you do want to build 
defenses, uh, because your settlements can
and will get attacked, uh, by raiders."

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All the other options available to players still

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ultimately revolve around that core combat mechanic.

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This topic is of special concern to me because
my work primarily focuses on the representations

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of men and masculinity in entertainment.

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Everywhere we look in pop culture, we see 
models of manhood that are linked to

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confrontation, aggression, and violence.

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And that's especially true in video games
where male characters are rarely depicted

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solving problems based on deescalation
or compassion.

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(Kratos): "To be effective in combat, a
warrior must not feel for his enemy."

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Things like diplomacy, deescalation, 
negotiation, and compromise all take
a back seat to blunt force trauma.

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And that in turn dramatically limits
the kinds of stories that can be told.

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Now whenever I make these kinds of
observations on social media, someone

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will inevitably respond with a snarky quip
about defeating monsters with hugs


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or dancing or by serving tea and cupcakes.

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They no doubt think these are devastating
burns, but actually those are pretty good

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ideas for innovative mechanics.

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I'd play those games. And I'm willing to bet that
a whole hell of a lot of other people would too.

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Interactive media has an incredible, almost
unlimited, potential to deliver a wide range

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of emotional, deeply human experiences
that deal with love and connection and empathy.

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Imagine an open world game where you take
on the role of an EMT, or a firefighter,

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or a field medic, or a climate activist,
or an intergalactic veterinarian.

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Or how about a farmer who grows food on an
intergenerational space ship.

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Or imagine a game in a post-apocalyptic future...

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(because every other game I saw at E3 
was set in a post-apocalyptic future)

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...but instead of fighting over the scraps,
players cooperate to rebuild a better society.

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Imagine all the stories we're missing out on
because game developers insist on building

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virtual worlds that we experience from behind
the barrel of a gun or the blade of a sword.

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Remember that 7% of non-combat 
focused games?

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Well, every year E3 does play host to a few 
small games that break the mold and 


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give us a glimpse into the medium's potential. 


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TACOMA is one such example. You play as an 
investigator using augmented reality to solve

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a mystery of a missing crew aboard a space station.

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It's these small innovative titles that are blazing
a path forward for interactive storytelling.

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We just need a whole lot more of them.

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If you'd like to see more of these long-form
video essays about the intersections of manhood,

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politics, and entertainment, then please go over to
Patreon and help fund this project.

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Every little bit helps me keep making more videos.

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Next month's video will be about geeky sexism
and The Big Bang Theory.