Video Games Have Become the Soundtracks to Our Lives

Digital experiences can leave indelible marks on the story of the self

Video games propose a thousand ways to be. We live, we breathe, we dream the experiences they gift to us — either across an eight-hour campaign as the titular hero or through months as an alter ego in massively-multiplayer world.

Become what you want, when you want. Become a beefed-up supercop that chases green orbs across a darkened cityscape, or a bow-wielding hunter that slays giant mechanical dinosaurs. Become a near-infinite wardrobe of things to wear, with each choice saying just as much about us as the real decisions we make — simply because there’s so much to do and so much to be.

If reality’s palette spans a thousands colours, then video games span a million — a palette not shackled by the constraints of day-to-day life. We can blend those colours to create an identity that’s truly distinct from the person sitting next to us at relatively little cost.

We spend countless hours in these virtual worlds, too — effectively forging multiverse versions of ourselves. You’re a fighter, a skater, a soldier: each its own alternate lived life, if only fleetingly. And when those identities inevitably die, those memories, those feelings, become part of the baggage we…