The third option

As I was playing a computer game last night, I wondered, how many game writers are older than 30? I wondered that because all the plot lines wallowed dramatically in either ecstatic delight or tragic despair. There was no third option.

I connected that to the age of the writers because one thing you realize as you age is that very little of life consists of the two extremes. Usually you experience something in the middle that's more mundane. For example:

Relationships. The young writer would have us believe that all love affairs either A. end tragically through death, kidnapping, serial unfaithfulness or because your lover is secretly a sleeper agent of a foreign government who cares only about your total subjugation (or alternately an incubus, succubus or maybe just a bus driver with amnesia and a wife and 12 kids in Toledo) or, B. are a never-ending magic carpet ride of fireworks and love-drunk, euphoric perfection in which you and your soul-mate, completely in sync on all things, romp through life (which always looks like a meadow filled with daisies) hand in hand. The third option: You meet the love of your life, get married, realize that true love hasn't eliminated stinky laundry or dirty dishes, find out that when your spouse gets up three times during the night with a puking kid she looks like death warmed over and has an attitude to match, learn that for a while kids and jobs and housework are going to take your partner's complete attention, and then discover when the nest is empty that this person who weathered the storms and moved the mountains with you is not only extremely competent but also funny, intelligent, attractive and all in all a great life partner.

Conflict. When faced with an adversary, the typical game writer works with only two options: A. Kill it, or B. run awaaaaay! They never explore the third option, which starts with you holding up your hand and saying, "Dude, what's the big problem?" and ends with a benefit waffle breakfast raising funds to get his unjustly-accused son a better lawyer and help with his drug addiction.

Money. In computer games, there are only two levels of income: A. below poverty level, requiring your children to beg and you to sell your plasma and grocery-shop in the dumpster behind the Chinese restaurant or B. astronomical, funding multiple homes, a zeppelin, your successful research into immortality, and your secret life as a super-hero. Unfortunately, most of us live with the third option, which is a progression from "barely enough" through "enough" to "enough to save for retirement."

Of course, the third option doesn't make for great game play. Questgiver: "Well, I was hoping to marry young Bonnie Rae Belle but raiding orcs took her away to cook and eat her, so while I wait for someone new to come along, I'm trying to save a little money. Maybe you could help by hauling my harvest to market." Quest objective: Drive the wagon-load of pumpkins into town. Quest reward: Three dollars and forty cents, everything the Questgiver had in his pocket, plus an offer of more freighting work the next time you pass through.

So you can see why those writers write the way they do -- because that's what young gamers find engaging. If they were writing for me it would be different. A hero my age would figure, hey, a quiet wagon ride wouldn't be so bad, it's a nice day and the leaves are starting to turn, and I can always grab a cup of coffee and some pie when I'm in town. Fighting orcs is a lot of work, plus afterward you have to pay the doctor and clean your weapons, and by the time I got Bonnie Rae back she'd probably have a few bites taken out of her and wouldn't be quite the prize she used to be. And three bucks is three bucks, after all. Plus it gets me home in time for the news.

The problem with only two options, though, is that after operating for a while at the polar extremes of dramatic possibility, everything gets boring. Pretty soon all the distressed damsels start to blur together, killing monsters, even when they come in waves, is just another boring chore, and the imminent destruction of the kingdom occurs with such regularity that you just put "Save kingdom" in your planner for Wednesday afternoons.

You want real drama? Try de-conflicting the holidays with two different families demanding your attendance on Christmas Eve. Try figuring out how to watch Jimmie's AAU game, pick Jennie up from dance class, get enough groceries to put a reasonable dinner on the table, and do it all without leaving work early. In real life, there's not only a third option, there's an infinite pallet of possibilities and hazards, most of which are impervious to even your most potent fire spell.

Maybe that's the attraction of computer games; compared to our real lives, clearing the skeletons out of the citadel seems comfortably easy, low-stress even. Someday, when these writers approach 50, maybe some of that will show up in computer games. Maybe we'll get to ram drivers who steal our parking spots, and toss snotty DMV clerks down the steps.

No, that's probably not a good idea. It's probably better to play the games as they are, and think a little bit about all the ways that worldly problem solving reflects our unwillingness to rely on the One who controls it all. And while we're at it, to reflect on why we think we need so much drama for things to be interesting. After all, our own lives are the greatest drama ever written; there's a cataclysmic supernatural battle going on over our souls, and we're tasked every day to fight and defend and rescue. If we signed up for more of that, maybe we'd have less of an appetite for virtual drama.