Tag Archives: realism in video games

Can Video Games Ever Be “Realistic”?

A lot of gamers like to say they only play “realistic shooters”, “realistic RPGs” or “realistic strategy games”, etc. But can a video game be realistic? Today, we’ll explore that question.

First of all, we have to define what realism is. Realism replicates reality like a video game tries to do. A lot of video games are labeled as simulations because they try to simulate reality and be as close to real life as possible.

But unless we are actually living the experience, it will never be reality. Keep in mind, however, that realistic and reality are two different things. So although a video game can’t be reality, it can be realistic, especially relative to other video games that don’t try at all to be like real life.

At the end of the day, though, whether a game is realistic or not is subjective and unique to each player. I would argue that even an ultra realistic video game can be seem very unrealistic if the player is unable to escape disbelief while playing. Meanwhile, other gamers might escape disbelief while playing a game like Minecraft and therefore it would be realistic for them.

So keeping all this in attention, the answer is there but still unclear, changing from player to player. What do you think? We’d love to hear your opinion. To get in touch, click here.

Bye for now.

PS, check out www.timothyrjeveland.com as a great source for knowledge on realism in fantasy.