Videogames are a passion I hold dearly. They are one of my original sins of nerdiness – some of my earliest childhood memories are playing Tekken II on Playstation One with no memory card before eventually graduating to the PS2 and original X-Box. Games are a medium oft-disrespected. Something about the mass production aspect distills the medium in some people's minds to something soulless and unworthy of artistic appreciation or critique. There are definitely cookie-cutter clones in certain genres, but it saddens me that, after all this time, and all the spread influence, their merit as art is still disputed. The frivolity inherent in the term “game” needless to say probably melts some of the sheer off for folks. The dumbing-down which has been associated with the term “video” probably doesn't help either.

But I'm going to argue for the worthiness of videogames in our lives today. Not just for you, dear reader, but also for me. You see, I – Kevin Anthony Fox, Jr. - am the sort of person to feel guilt at the thought of enjoyment. All pleasure brings me pain. Or some such dramatic nonsense. I have to mitigate my own guilt about fun things I do that aren't reading or writing. So here is my explanation of the worthiness of time spent gaming.

Videogames are great for developing hand-eye coordination, critical thinking skills, and developing teamwork and strategic thought. Puzzle games tease your brain just like table puzzles would. You can use your phone to play chess, or poker, or off-brand Scrabble.

Fictional worlds are great ways to commentate on the real one. Grand Theft Auto, beyond its much-maligned violence and sexuality, has been a witty parody of American society since GTA III revolutionized the concept of “open world” games. With every new release they've got another example of sardonic commentary focused on lampooning the obvious perplexities of our world: our obsessions with celebrities, reality television, sweatshop labor, and, yes, violence in media. In each new iteration of the franchise, the in-game talk radio station draws light to government corruption, helicopter parenting, child exploitation, and much more via comedic representation. The games thereby serve as a historical artifact, an electronic representation of what this wild world looks like to game developers.

Games are a great way to learn about actions and consequences. The likes of Bethesda, Bioware, Lionhead, and CD Projekt Red have for years now been developing sprawling open worlds wherein you create and develop individual heroes and send him or her on quests. Along the way you make decisions in these fantasy and sci-fi worlds that have real consequences to the world of that given game and oftentimes its sequels. These role-playing games are interactive literature. In Fallout IIIyou can detonate a nuclear warhead that sits in the middle of a town named for it (“Megaton”) in their post-apocalyptic landscape. In each installment of Mass Effectyou make choices that affect your campaign in future games – which teammates do you sacrifice on suicide missions? Do you save the galactic council or replace them and elevate humanity's station? In Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II, your conversations inform you about the status of the galaxy beyond your character and allow you to gain friends, influence people, and train Jedi.

The fact that so many videogames focus on violence in one fashion or another is a social net positive in many ways. For one thing, it allows people to harmlessly exercise their violent impulses – a sort of neurological purge for an intrinsic unspoken need to create death. There are games like God of Warwhere you fight creatures from Greek myths, or Gears of Warwhere you fight alien monstrosities climbing out of the ground in some post-Earth colonized planet. In fantasy games you fight goblins and trolls like you're living out Tolkien. This is not to say there are no examples of hyper-realistic violence. I personally very often have problems enjoying games like Battlefield III because the contemporary setting makes the violence too real for me, and causes me to ponder the philosophical themes with a wary eye. I used to play some of the WWII shooters, but Battlefield 1's intense recreation of The Great War might be beyond my threshold. That said, I am impressed by the fact that a game could exist such as to give me such pause and experience such moral conundrum. It shows the dedication to craft which exemplifies the ways in which these games prove to be art.

Besides pretending to be a warfighter in real or imagined conflicts, games allow other fantasies to be executed. I have a 0% chance of ever winning the Heisman, but I've done it numerous times on NCAA Football 07. I once took the Raiders to four straight Super Bowl victories in Madden. I won three straight national titles with USC once. Videogames are a large part of how I became so obsessed with American football. Madden and NCAA and ESPN NFL2K5 taught me a lot about the mechanics of the on-field game, as well as offseason and program development concepts like trades and free agency in the NFL, recruiting in the NCAA, and scouting across the board.

Videogames can teach a person things in a very explicit way. I learned who the USSR was because of the alternative history real-time strategy game Command & Conquer: Red Alert, long before communism or the Cold War was ever mentioned to me in school. When we started learning about ratios in math in fifth grade, I recognized them from Pokémon games I'd been playing for years earlier. The reason I read the Catcher in the Rye – never assigned to me in school – was because I read a review of the Rockstar game Bullywhich compared the protagonist to Holden Caulfield.

This is not to say that videogames are without their problems. The basis of controversy tends to be that children can be exposed to themes they ought not be exposed to. However, we have seen that this also applies to movies and books. Frankly, the biggest problem with kids being exposed to inappropriate themes in games is that parents refuse to become literate with the ratings board. They buy the kids what the kids want, dismissing the possible psychological impact because 'games' are seen as frivolous. Then, if they later hear or see something they don't like, the manufacturer and marketing can be blamed rather than taking responsibility. As more people that have grown up with videogames become parents, though, I think this could change.

The major cultural meme of videogame criticism seems to be that they are a waste of time. I think this is wholly false. They are pieces of art with the capacity to engage, enlighten, and inspire. Not every movie is a masterpiece, but we ought not devolve the industry of The Godfather and Star Wars and Pulp Fiction just because the Scary Movie franchise exist. There are bad movies and there are definitely bad games. Some are lazy sequels to incredible first efforts like the second Force Unleashed. Some are poorly-made movie tie-ins like Chicken Little.

Still, some are grand pieces of art which make you reconsider the possibilities of interactive entertainment. The top Dictionary.com definition of “art” is “the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.” There are countless examples that games fit the bill. From the breathtaking spectacles of Icoand Okamiand Shadows of the Colossusto the quirkiness of Katamari Damacyand Destroy All Humans to the expression of war ethics debates in Metal Gear Solid and Splinter Cell, there have been endless times when a game has given its audience something more to consider than they would have had otherwise. One more beautiful thing to see, one more deep thing to ponder, one more priceless art form to explore. The legendary film critic Roger Ebert said that games could never be art. I strongly disagree.