Exercising the Mind
In my last post I wrote about movies for wellness, and specifically pointed to the MCU series of movies. Here again, I am pointing to some specific games that can profoundly add to your quality of life and health. Yes, I used the word profoundly.
If you are not aware, the U.S. is one of the unhealthiest and unhappiest nations in the world. Across the board, America consistently ranks low in all metrics that attempt to rank happiness and health… some eye opening statistics for you:
- America ranks 55th in infant mortality. Can you even name 54 other countries?!
- America is the only ‘1st World’ country that is getting shorter! For several years now, Americans are shrinking while the rest of the world gets taller.
- America is also the only nation that continues to get fatter.
- America is the only ‘1st World’ country where the lifespan is decreasing! Yes, Americans are dying sooner, and again, these statistics are showing a trend over the last several years. The rest of the world is living longer.
- Diseases are on the rise in America and elsewhere, but more so in America than anywhere else.
So what does gaming have to do with all of this?
Psychological and social factors have an enormous impact on health. We have an entire field of science – PNI (Psychoneuroimmunology), that focuses on how our psychological state affects our immune system. Beyond the psycobable, statistics, and other science, I want to point out two games that have had a significant impact for 20 years now – Warcraft and Starcraft.
Agreed: Playing Chess is Good for You
If I told you that playing chess was good for your child, or for you, I would get no argument. Everyone understands the value of a strategy game, as it keeps the mind sharp and active, and even helps us to engage other people. Tests show that playing chess helps to keep us both mentally and physically younger. So if chess is so good for us, is there a way we can improve upon it? Yes, there is. The age of computers has enabled ‘Real-Time Strategy’ games, or RTS, and the most impactful RTS by far over the last 20 years is Starcraft.
In chess, the Russians are famous for their consistently great players, and we know why – because their government saw the value in it, and subsidized it. It became part of their culture. In Starcraft we have seen a very similar thing happen, but for very different reasons; and it is not Russia, or the U.S. that dominates Starcraft – it is South Korea. And while the gap is finally closing, they are still very dominant. Why has South Korea dominated Starcraft for two decades already? The answer is a social one.
Russia, South Korea… Who’s Next?
When Starcraft was introduced in the 1990s, South Korea had already established a national internet infrastructure, and internet cafes were hugely popular. No other nation in the world had such a robust infrastructure available to its general population – which could not really afford equal equipment at home. As the popularity of Starcraft grew, the Koreans naturally formed teams because they were not playing in private environments. Imagine having a group of people watching over your shoulder during a chess match, and being allowed to help you.
Thus, the Koreans learned from each other, and their culture of teamwork has continued… maintaining teams to this day, even though it is a one versus one strategy game. Few people rise to the top of Starcraft without belonging to a good team. And thus, not only do you have the ‘wellness’ benefits of a strategy game, but you also have the wellness benefits of a rich social experience; and not only for the players, but for fans too, as Starcraft has had such a huge cultural impact that it helped spawn what we now call ‘eSports’ throughout the world. eSports are bigger than Major League Baseball! Gaming and eSports are big business. Following South Korea, Poland has become a mecca for eSports, as it spreads to all corners of the world, top players from every corner of the world.
Indulging in Gratitude & Empathy via Gaming
One-on-one competition does not do a lot to generate gratitude and empathy, ‘massively multiplayer’ online (MMO) games are a different story. At least when it comes to World of Warcraft.
As big and successful as Starcraft has been, it is actually dwarfed by its sibling – Warcraft. These two video games, from the same company, have changed the world of gaming in their respective genres. Warcraft was actually an RTS first, and Starcraft was the evolution of that. Warcraft then went on to become”WoW” – the World of Warcraft, and it brought millions of players together in an online virtual world. In this type of game, known as an MMO (Massively Online Roleplaying Game), each person joins the fantasy world with their own avatar, and interacts with the game, and most importantly, with other players. The level of social interaction is so high, that the game and its active community is used as a simulator for economics, disease control (by the CDC), sociology, and more. You build real relationships in WoW, and countless people have met there and even gotten married in real life.
While playing the game you will often experience feelings of gratitude and empathy, to the point that these emotions and their related actions become habituated. What a wonderful world that must be. These are things that we can only hope will translate over into the real world.
But how? Why? The simplest answer is because it is a dangerous world, and it requires cooperation to survive and thrive. Just as we see in the real world. Most games are too easy; designed to cater to our greed, lust, ego, selfishness, etc., and even WoW evolved into that over 15 years… however, the recent re-release of the original ‘Classic’ has confirmed the magic of that original game – humans are social creatures, and they excel under social conditions.
Not all games are good. But just about any game can have benefits – if played responsibly. Follow the guidelines that I explained for watching movies, and it will greatly improve the chances of gaming adding to your wellness instead of detracting from it.
