The topic of the essay “Games” by Steven Johnson is video games and how they have been unfairly criticized. Though Johnson is aiming for us to remain avid readers and not just learn from video games, he suggests that video games may have more benefits than are conventionally understood. He claims that although playing video games improve visual intelligence and hand-eye coordination, they don’t do justice to the imaginative experience of reading a book. At the same time, the increasing complexity and sophistication of modern video games has been distorted. Johnson cites parenting expert Dr. Spock and Andrew Solomon to support his claims. Johnson’s essay shows how the increasing penetration of electronic media into every aspect of our lives may hold both loss, as in the decline of reading, and promise, as in games’ novel ways of entertaining and informing us.
