Video Games Can Save The Planet, But Only If We Play More

McGonigal defines her version of virtually good as “Good as in motivated to do something that matters. Inspired to collaborate and cooperate.” She uses World of Warcraft examples heavily in her TED talk, noting that players have spent “5.93 million years solving the virtual problems of Azeroth.”

“When we’re in game worlds, I believe that many of us become the best version of ourselves,” McGonigal argued at TED, “the most likely to help at a moments notice, the most likely to stick with a problem as long as it takes, to get up after failure and try again.”

She says video game players are “willing to trust each other on a world-saving mission,” and stresses that “there’s no unemployment in World of Warcraft, there’s no sitting around and wringing your hands.” (She must have raided with some very efficient groups.) But how are games like World of Warcraft helping us? McGonigal says “we’re evolving to be a more collaborative species” through massively multiplayer online games like this, that video gamers are “an unprecedented human resource.”

She says those types of gamers have “extreme self motivation,” “the desire to act immediately and tackle an obstacle” and always believe that an “epic win” is possible.