Cool Mac Gear

"When thinking differently just isn't different enough."

We Sing of Arms and Heroes
By Kirk Hiner
September 18, 2001

This is the reason I play computer games.

It's the reason I watch the movies I do, it's the reason I read certain books, and it's the reason I write fiction. But most of all, it's the reason I play computer games.

Forgive me, first of all, if it appears I'm trivializing the tragic events of September 11th to the size of a computer game box on a store shelf. This is not my intent, it's simply how I cope. I retreat to a world I can control, or at least put back in the bookcase if I don't like it. Over the past week, I've not been afforded these options. I've had to watch destruction on scale to what I've previously only seen Japanese anime and bad sci-fi, this time hammered repeatedly that it's real. My emotions have been too numerous and feverous to detail, but I will focus on one; helplessness.

At one point last week, I actually found myself wishing I hadn't moved from New York City. I wanted to be there to offer support for my friends, to help the rescue workers, to tell at least one person to get away from the building. I wanted to be on the plane along with those of United Airlines flight 93 to wrestle the controls away from the hijackers. I wanted to be at the airport in Boston where I'd realize something was amiss and, with my crack team of covert operatives, end the tragedy before it began.

I wanted to do all of this because I play computer games, and in computer games, this is what you do. You're presented with a problem—the princess has been kidnapped, the aliens have invaded, the Crown Jewels have been stolen—and you solve it. The task takes days, sometimes even months, but you solve it. You may die countless times, but you restore a saved game and you solve it. You may have to use cheat codes or walkthroughs, but you solve it. You save the day and you move on to the next game. Games make heroes out of us.

In real tragedies, there are countless heroes. If any one aspect of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon were to help me retain my faith in the basic decency of humankind, it'd be the dozens of stories we've heard of people risking their lives to save others. For every one religious freak zealot willing to kill himself so that hundreds of innocent people will die, there are hundreds of regular people willing to risk killing themselves so that one innocent person may live. But for these people, heroism is bittersweet. For them to accomplish great things, horrible things must happen. Yes, they're undoubtedly heroes, but how can they recall their valiant deeds without being reminded of the events that placed them in the situation?

The same goes for the soldiers of many nations who will most likely soon have to fight. We call them heroes for fighting for us. It doesn't matter if they're doing so in retaliation, to protect our freedoms, or even to keep oil costs low, they have to pick up arms and invade foreign lands and kill or be killed upon command. To attempt to stamp out terrorism and save the lives of more innocents, they will have to kill more innocents. And not just innocent civilians; not every enemy soldier with a gun wants to be there. Not all of them want to pull a trigger or release a bomb. As with our heroes, it's a matter of kill or be killed.

In my fantasy computer gaming world, this is not the case. In games, the evil is easily defined and spreads throughout the enemy camp. If it's evil, it attacks, and if it attacks I kill it. Simple. Better yet, after I kill it'll often leave behind a more powerful weapon or a health pack. My retreat. My coping mechanism.

People often complain that video games are too violent. I ask, compared to what? Compared to movies? Compared to books? Compared to real life? What's more dangerous to the minds of our youth, a late night, friendly frag fest of Quake III: Arena or Jerry Falwell (in a statement he later retracted) blaming the tragic events of September 11th on homosexuals, feminists, and the ACLU, among others? Games are a diversion, Falwell is a supposed leader of men and women. So, you can believe me when I say that my children will be allowed to kill computer generated bots all day if it'll keep them away from Falwell's ministries, for there are no heroes there. That type of thinking, strategically retracted or not, is linear to that which led to the terrorist attack in the first place.

Which brings me back to the true heroes. I pulled the title of this article from the coat of arms that once graced the opening panel of Alex Raymond's Sunday comic strip, Flash Gordon. Flash has always been my favorite fictitious super hero because there's nothing special about him. Like the Lone Ranger, Buck Rogers, and Zorro, Flash is, as Queen put it, "...just a man with a man's courage." That has always appealed to me, the thought that a regular man, with no super powers or secret identity, is able to rise above insurmountable odds; to willingly put his life on the line not because it's his destiny, to avenge his past, or because he was asked to, but because it's simply the right thing to do.

This is the same with the firemen, the policemen and the other rescue workers at the disaster sites. It's the same with the doctors and nurses who healed the survivors. It's the same with those who gave blood or donated supplies to those who need it. Not only after the terrorist attack, but every day of every year. Not only at the World Trade Center and Pentagon, throughout the world.

So no, I will no longer retreat to computer games, movies and books to find my heroes. I will vanquish evil in there, and I will turn wrong into right when real life isn't working that way, but as a diversion only. Heroes aren't in games, they're in our neighborhoods and communities, and no terrorist attack, no natural disaster will be able to take that away from us.

To everyone who lifted a piece of rubble, to everyone who applied a bandage, and to everyone who comforted a friend, thank you. To everyone who will be forced to fight so that we can go to work, to church, and to play without fear of being attacked, thank you. Not on behalf of America, but on behalf of humanity. It's you who give us hope for the future of our planet, and that makes you heroes.

Well, that and your thigh-high boots, huge breasts and...no, wait. That's computer games again. Dang, I hope I didn't ruin the moment there. I'm bad like that.

Cool Mac Gear