{"id":51,"date":"2025-03-15T15:34:32","date_gmt":"2025-03-15T15:34:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/chapter\/what-are-games\/"},"modified":"2025-03-19T20:53:52","modified_gmt":"2025-03-19T20:53:52","slug":"what-are-games","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/chapter\/what-are-games\/","title":{"raw":"What are Games?","rendered":"What are Games?"},"content":{"raw":"Start by asking students how many of them play video games. (Make sure to define \u201cvideo games\u201d broadly, so that it includes virtual worlds and short casual games or apps that might be played on a smartphone.) Ask students to name some of the video games that they play, in particular their favourite ones, and write them on the board.\r\n\r\n&nbsp;\r\n<div class=\"textbox shaded\">\r\n\r\n&nbsp;\r\n\r\nNow ask students which of the games on the list they are familiar with. Try to identify five games that most of the students are familiar with, and ensure that every student is familiar with at least <strong>one<\/strong> of those five games.\r\n\r\n&nbsp;\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n&nbsp;\r\n\r\nExplain to students that one way that video games are different from other media is because they are interactive: unlike in media such as movies, TV or comics, games let you do things and make choices about what happens. (There are some exceptions, such as \u201cChoose Your Own Adventure\u201d books and interactive videos on streaming services like Netflix, but these are unusual, whereas a game where you can\u2019t make choices wouldn\u2019t really be considered a game.)","rendered":"<p>Start by asking students how many of them play video games. (Make sure to define \u201cvideo games\u201d broadly, so that it includes virtual worlds and short casual games or apps that might be played on a smartphone.) Ask students to name some of the video games that they play, in particular their favourite ones, and write them on the board.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox shaded\">\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Now ask students which of the games on the list they are familiar with. Try to identify five games that most of the students are familiar with, and ensure that every student is familiar with at least <strong>one<\/strong> of those five games.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Explain to students that one way that video games are different from other media is because they are interactive: unlike in media such as movies, TV or comics, games let you do things and make choices about what happens. (There are some exceptions, such as \u201cChoose Your Own Adventure\u201d books and interactive videos on streaming services like Netflix, but these are unusual, whereas a game where you can\u2019t make choices wouldn\u2019t really be considered a game.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"menu_order":2,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-51","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":49,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/51","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/51\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":311,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/51\/revisions\/311"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/49"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/51\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/textbook.mediasmarts.ca\/exploring\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}