Built to Play 40: Why Bother?

Built to Play is amping up the disappointment, as we take on failure. That's a failure to play and a failure to learn, starting with why play video games in the first place. From Takeshi's Challenge.We suck at video games, as a species. Yes, some of us are amazing at Street Fighter, and that Chinese team won five million dollars in Dota 2, but on average most of us lose more than we succeed. In Call of Duty, you likely failed more levels than you won. In Super Meat Boy, people come close to throwing their controllers across the room in frustration. Rage-quitting is a word most players recognize and have experienced. So why do we play?Jesper Juul, author of the Art of Failure: An Essay on the Pain of Playing Video Games, says that it comes down enjoying the game's basis, while being able to dismiss it. It's just a game after all. But that's not entirely true either. If people really didn't care about video games, he explains, they wouldn't groan when they lose, or throw the controller across the room after a bad run in Dark Souls. Jesper tells us all about being a sore loser in Starcraft, why the New York Post thinks soccer is a dumb sport, and how games rarely ask us to fail. Starts at 26:30._Actual Sunlight_is about Evan Winters, a 30-ish year old man working in communications. Evan has depression, and continually makes terrible choices. He can't help himself a lot of the time, and ends up stuck in a rut. In Actual Sunlight, you're forced to encounter his decisions, and then succumb to his inability to correct his own mistakes. Evan is in many ways, a failure. Actual Sunlight's designer, Will O'Neill, joins us to talk about how games treat characters who are stuck in their ways, and aren't world-saving heroes. Will tells us about Actual Sunlight's expression of realism, his own experience with loss and depression, and why there's still hope underneath it all. Check in 40:20.**Actual Sunlight is available on Steam and on its website. **This week we used music from the Free Music Archive, including "Spring Solstice" by Podington Bear, "Pause for a Side Change," by L'homme Manete, "Everything is Broken or Not" by Bleak House, "The Beach, The Beach" by Holy Ghost, "Detective" by Krowne, and "The Wrong Way" by Jahzzar. Our opening theme was "Halluzination" by Tozo.Games used: Super Meat Boy, Red Dead Redemption, Actual Sunlight, and Russel Harder's Authentic Trivia.Header Image from the "Atari: Game Over" Documentary Trailer.The show was written by Danielle Rosen and produced and edited by Arman Aghbali.  Special thanks to Jesper Juul, Will O'Neill, Russell Harder and the Cunning Stunts. **If you have any comments, criticism or impressions, let us know.  We'd love to hear your opinions on the show, plus any reviews on iTunes or Stitcher or written in the sky by a biplane help more people find the show. **