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Tonight on the CBC: Gamer Revolution

It’s rather short notice, but I just heard about a cool sounding documentary on the CBC tonight. It’s called Gamer Revolution:

GAMER REVOLUTION explores how computer games are not only a new medium for the 21st century, they are a massive form of change in our world.” says Rachel Low, President, Red Apple Entertainment. “The idea of living inside a computer-generated universe is happening right now. The line between the real world and the virtual world is disappearing. Millions of people feel that they have a life inside these games.”

Of course, I’ll be watching the Canucks spank the Oilers, but I’ll record this badboy for another time.

In unrelated CBC news, Tod Maffin shot a cool video of the master control room at the CBC Vancouver. I saw this room when Tod kindly took us on a tour of the building a couple of years ago.

UPDATE: As I mention in the comments, there’s an article about this documentary in The Tyee today. I liked this quote from the director:

Unlike rock music, to which gaming has a certain comparison, I’d like to see more activism, more political engagement. There’s very little indie spirit. It’s like Hollywood with the blockbuster phenomenon. Who’ll be the Sex Pistols of games? Or the Bob Dylan? Gaming is so apolitical. In certain respects, it has a very conservative worldview.

Amen.

I watched the first 20 minutes of this documentary, and enjoyed it. The America’s Army stuff wasn’t new to me, but I hadn’t fully grapsed how insane Korea for about games and gamers (in particular, Starcraft?).

The documentary also pointed out (I’d like to get a closer look at the research) that 18-34 year old males now watch an average of 27 minutes of TV each day, and play an average of two hours of games. I’ve exceeded my 27 minutes because now I’m watching a tribute to Paul Simon at the Montreal Jazz Festival. Jamie Cullum is a wanker, and Jim Cuddy’s doing a nice job of “Still Crazy After All These Years.” Hmm…five songs and no female performers. Odd.

UPDATE #2: The high point of the tribute by far was Sam Roberts, apparently escaped from an off-Broadway production of Hair, doing a lively version of “You Can Call Me Al”.

This entry was posted in:Games, Television
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Darren Barefoot is an author, speaker and digital strategist. He’s the co-founder of Capulet Communications, and co-author of “Friends With Benefits: A Social Media Marketing Handbook”.

8 comments

  2. I think that Gamer Revolution is a re-run, because I remember hearing about it something similar (identical?) some time back.

    Go Canucks Go!

  4. While watching the show (thanks for the tip) I couldn’t help but wonder, what if “they” all started to play out our wars virually? If we start this way, why not finish this way?

    Everytime someone’s killed, a substanial amount comes out of the nation’s bank account…

    I know, I know, there are holes all over this idea. Just an idealistic thought.

  5. There is a pretty active “indie” scene for games, it just doesn’t get any press. Just recently there was huge brewhaha over the Slamdance indie game awards first encouraging, then disqualifying ‘Super Columbine Massacre RPG’ from their awards. Many other finalists pulled out in protest, and they didn’t give out an award.

    http://www.gametunnel.com is a good site that follows the indie games scene.

  6. Dustin: Yeah, I’m vaguely aware of the indie game scene, though they desperately need some marketing help. In my mind, they’re even worse off than independent film, which occasionally scores a mainstream hit.

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