Sunday, November 23, 2008
Playing games at the library
Christian Trejbal
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From the RoundTable blog
I can scratch rock star off my list of dream jobs. Ricky and Davis, two local teens, all but kicked "newspaper boy" out of the band when he couldn't keep up with the guitar parts of Metallica's "Enter Sandman." I probably should have known better than to pick up the video game Rock Band's faux guitar.
Things got worse when I challenged Tyler, an even younger boy, to a game of Mario Kart on a Wii. He laid the smack down on me while his sister Hannah stood nearby giggling. Fortunately, Italian plumber was never high among my dream jobs.
It was humbling fun at the Christiansburg library last Saturday. The library participated in the first National Gaming Day sponsored by the American Library Association.
A couple dozen people showed up to play video, board and card games, and the generational divide emerged quickly. Young people mostly gravitated toward the video games. Adults, mostly parents, played board games. There was some crossover, but not much.
Sarah Gordon organized the event. She's youth services manager for Montgomery-Floyd Regional Library and a gamer herself. Her favorite game is Mario Kart.
She was ahead of the ALA on gaming. Last Saturday was the first national event and the first at Christiansburg, but gaming sessions take place twice monthly at the Blacksburg library and alternating months at the Meadowbrook and Floyd libraries. Blacksburg's is the most popular, drawing about 30 people typically.
"A lot of those who come out have a Playstation or Wii at home, so a lot of them come out for the social aspect of it," she said.
She chooses games four people can play at the same time to encourage interaction and socializing.
It worked last Saturday. Impromptu, diverse groups of young people picked up the Rock Band guitars and drumsticks to perform.
Joe Pahl, who volunteers at the gaming events, was on hand to help novices. A senior at Radford University, he is studying to be a software engineer and game designer.
"I'm out to prove that gaming can be a social activity," he said. "There are a lot of people still who think games are bad."
He ticked off some of the things gaming teaches: hand-eye coordination, thinking outside the box, organizational skills, working together as a team and learning to share.
For people of a certain age, it is not a hard sell. Adults younger than about 45 grew up with video games. They played Pong, then Pac-Man back in the day. Today, many of them still play for relaxation, entertainment and an excuse to spend time with their kids.
Librarians know they must look for ways to compete in a digital world, and National Gaming Day is a stab at reaching a different audience.
Games attract people who might otherwise never set foot in the library. They show up to play on the Wii. While they are there, though, they might discover everything else the library has to offer.
Video games are just the most recent upgrade for libraries. Once, they were mostly about books. Then they added albums and tapes. Compact discs by hot artists followed. Today, library patrons can check out movies and entire television series on DVD.
Now they embrace gaming.
There is a common thread in that progression. Libraries catalog, archive and share knowledge and artistic expression. Books, music, movies and games all fulfill that mission.
People who have never picked up a gamepad and who don't know what the WASD keys are really for might find it difficult to believe, but games can be as expressive as any music or literature.
The best tell a story, make players think and lend fresh perspective to the world. They are immersive. Players are actors, not just passive observers. They laugh and cry as events unfold.
There are mindless games, to be sure, but that is true of any medium. The works of Stephen King and John Grisham remain on library shelves, as they should. Sometimes people just want to relax and enjoy.
Some libraries -- none around here that I am aware of -- even loan out video games. Gordon said Montgomery-Floyd officials have not discussed that option. With the success of recent gaming sessions, maybe they should.
There was a different vibe at the library last Saturday. It was more alive than I have seen it in a long time.
Trejbal is an editorial writer for The Roanoke Times based in the New River Valley bureau in Christiansburg.
