Reading 3 - Katherine Martin

               
            When I was younger, I was a gamer. My dad had his own computer programing company, and the office room in my house had three or four old fashion box monitor computers that my sisters and I were free to use. Even though I've had experience gaming, I never really considered video games as a type of art that involves "action", and Alexander Galloway opened my eyes to this idea.
              Galloway says in Gaming: Essays on Algorithmic Culture that "If photographs are images, and films are moving images, then video games are actions". This quote really stuck out to me. Instead of being a passive consumer looking at a picture or watching a film, when you play a video game it requires you to do an action. Without user input then there is no game and instead it's just a bunch of computer code.
              This idea relates back to Brenda Laurel's piece we read last week about human-interface interaction. Galloway agrees with Laurel's idea that both the computer and the user are essential in order for anything to work properly.               Galloway says that there are two basic types of action in video games. The first type is machine action, which is when an action is acted out by the software or hardware of the game computer.  The second type of video game action is operator action, which is when the player performs the action.
             The following link  is a trailer for Mario Kart for Wii:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKHLzFGA8o8. This video shows examples of both types of video game actions. A machine action takes place whenever the player runs over a banana and spins out of control, because the computer code is controlling that actions and not the gamer. Steering on the other hand is an example of gamer action, because the player controls the direction the kart goes in.

         I really enjoyed Galloway's piece because I've never really thought about video games in this way. I've always been much more of a passive consumer, and never really thought about games in comparison to pictures and movies. This piece has really changed the way in think in terms of games. It takes a user in order for the code to become an actual video game.