It was early one lazy afternoon and I found myself picking up my iPhone for some light entertainment, as I am oft tempted to do on such days. This was primarily because my cat had also decided it was a lazy afternoon and settled down for a long sleep in my lap, trapping me in my rather uncomfortable chair with only the iPhone in reach.
I swiped aimlessly left and right through my screens of apps, and it occurred to me that I had rather a large number of games on my phone. It prompted me to question whether this was a proper use of my time and money. After all, my to-do list is long indeed. Wasn't there something more important I should be doing instead?
I briefly became frightened by the idea that I had been chucking away valuable playing time on these worthless little time-wasting morsels. When did I decide it would be a good idea to purchase so many of these things? Aren't they just so much junk food cluttering up what should be the gourmet meal of my gaming feast?
After a little thinking, and a little gaming, I decided that my fears were unfounded.
First off there's the argument that the iPhone is a perfectly legitimate gaming platform that really can do more than just provide mobile versions of trashy Internet Flash games. While this is certainly true, the game I was playing when the troubled thoughts began to cross my mind was not what one would call the height of iPhone gaming achievement, so this argument is a little beside the point.
No, the real issue here is what gaming is truly all about: fun.
It is remarkably easy to forget that sometimes. I frequently drown myself in conversations of games as art and storytelling through interactive media and other such nonsense and I develop an aversion to these simpler pleasures.
Well, if not an aversion then at least a hefty sense of guilt when I allow myself to partake in them.
But these little bite-sized chunks of gaming on the go have reminded me that it's healthy to let all that haughty stuff go every once in a while. No, of course I don't want them to devour all of my time, but the same can be said for heavier fare. Moderation is a virtue.
Just because I'm guiding a rollercoaster around a track by tilting my phone instead of guiding my protagonist to his ultimate destiny by immersing myself in a vast fictional world doesn't mean I should feel bad about it.
It's true I won't even play some of these casual time-wasters more than once or twice. Forgettable? Perhaps. But so is a stick of gum and a pack of that costs just barely less than some of these games.
As for the more expensive ones, I'm sure I spent more than their price of admission on equally forgettable and useless arcade games, back in that magical time when those used to actually exist.
I have decided that my protagonist isn't going anywhere. I can get back to him later. Right now I have some people that would very much like to go around a loop really fast.