A Special Message from Kill Screen’s Official Ombudsman
Hello, this may be the first time we’ve met, but I am Killbert, Kill Screen’s official ombudsman and in-house cartoon fun frog. You may not see me very often, this is because I am usually very busy having fun playing videogames, which is my favourite thing in the world. But sometimes it is my duty to set the record straight, to settle slights, to make sure that, no matter what trials may weigh us down, we’re all having just a ton of fun! And I am here today to join us together to, solve an issue that has been plaguing fun videogames long enough.
I love having fun! I am, after all, a fun frog. Most frogs cannot play videogames, and that is an overlooked tragedy. Not a day goes by where I don’t appreciate that I am a frog who can play videogames. Fun videogames have defined me, they make me the frog that I am. I do not like to imagine what it would be like if I was a normal frog, who cannot play videogames. What would I do? Who would I be? I would sit around, eating flies, hopping from lilypad to lilypad. I would watch the days and nights sift by, waiting for my princess to come and plant a magical kiss on my froggy cheek, magically transforming me into a charming prince, who could play videogames and have a lot of fun! Thankfully this is not the case, and I can play videogames any time I like!
Most frogs cannot play videogames, and that is an overlooked tragedy.
Videogames are fun! If you go into your local videogame store and ask for something fun, the clerk should be able to happily point out a fun videogame. But it has become confusing as of late. It seems not every videogame is fun anymore. What a bummer!
Some videogames still intend to be fun, others have alternative purposes. To be introspective or explorative, artfully inclined or merely a virtual object. In the crossfire are games that could have benefitted by skirting in the opposite direction, or the player may see something of greater volume than the creator’s intent. Some find this to be an evolution of the form, others find it troubling or disruptive, but I think I have discovered the ultimate root cause of why certain audiences think not every videogame is fun or is required to be fun, while others staunchly disagree. This is all a big misunderstanding, and it ends today.
Let’s break it down: videogames. Fun. F-U-N. Do you see the problem? That is right. There is no fun in video games. Check again, really, look. You can spend hours, days investigating, as I have, and you will not find fun in videogames. It isn’t there! Shocking, I know! Despite all the fun you have had with videogames for all these years, there is, truthfully, no fun in videogames. Not a single part of fun. Not the “f,” not the “u,” not the “n.” And if we want to seek out a metric to clean up this boggy mess, we need to reconsider how we talk, write, and think about videogames.
Where should the fun be in videogames?
Where should the fun be in videogames? There are a few places, though not all of them are surgical or clean. We could say, perhaps, vifundeogames? Videogamfunes? Videfunogames? Hmm, perhaps not. Maybe there is a better way to go around this conundrum. This isn’t strictly my decision to make, but I will gladly take the first step to find the solution.
Maybe we don’t have to lump it in, we could be a little more subtle. Vfideuongames, for one. Or we could refer to them as vifudeogamnes. These are the queries that keep scholars like me awake.
I got it! Videofguamesn. From here on, so that there is zero confusion if we are speaking about a game which seeks specifically to evoke fun, and only fun, which is great, I love fun, we will refer to those videogames as videofguamesn, and the rest merely videogames.
I’m glad I could clear this all up. Keep on having fun, game players!
– Killbert the Kill Screen Fun Frog
