It could have been a beautiful week for computer gaming. It might have been the moment interactive entertainment was taken seriously as an art form. It appeared a whopping two times on Radio 4's Today programme and, for once, the spotlight wasn't on violence and the decay of the social order.
PlayStation Pensioners hit the morning headlines and the nation balked at the idea of Gaming Grannies. Surely it must be damaging their brains. Quick, give them some knitting! Why aren't they watching Are You Being Served?
Instead of making interesting points about lateral thinking, active imaginations and anti-arthritic finger exercise, gaming was again compartmentalised as a repetitive, solitary pursuit that makes addicts of the nation's youth (and now OAPs) and plunges them into inescapable depression and loneliness.
It made a big impression on the BBC switchboards. These things always do. A quick follow-up was scheduled for Saturday morning's show: Is Computer Gaming Art? Well, it could be, if they let it.
The problem is that marketers know their primary audience and aren't interested in spending cash to expand it. Billboards, magazine ads and commercials shout action, war, fast cars and loose women. The players on the periphery - women, businessmen, grandads - simply sigh and keep quiet. They know the hidden depths, the gripping storylines, the mind-bending puzzles, the little mutinies. Unfortunately, no one else does.
It may come as a surprise to the Today folks, but things have moved on in the interactive world since Pac Man and Pong. Even mobile phone games, on the comparative bottom rung of the ladder, have 3D graphics and plots. There are countless genres, from action to adventure to social simulation, which have more in common with listening to the radio, having a conversation or reading a book than sitting on the couch watching a DVD.
Radio and books allow consumers to use their imaginations to fill in sensory blanks. Computer games offer the opportunity to take an active part in what's happening in the game, by using imagination. They take the drama and adventure of traditional media and make it interactive. The player solves the puzzles, explores the space and makes the choices, not the writer, director or producer. Yes, point and click Solitaire is the most widely played computer game, but it's not the only one.
And another thing, contrary to widely publicised research conducted in the late 1990s, computers don't cause loneliness. Subsequent studies have shown that people who play games on the internet enlarge their social circles. Individuals can create real life networks where they learn, communicate and develop skills that have a positive effect on the real world.
If we are to believe Today, then it's a darn shame there are thousands of men and women wasting their energies, artistic talent and up to $10 million a pop on creating silly things that do nothing more than go "bleep" and "blip".
Go on, do her a favour. Buy Grandma a console for Christmas. Chances are, she'll love it.
