But I really have to go...

I like video games. I unabashedly like video games, despite the perception that they have little redeeming value.

I’m the proud owner of an Xbox 360 that currently features the most advanced games of any console, and the games promise to only become more and more “life-like.”

Ultra-realism in video games is certainly something to strive for. But having super-high-def graphics and physics and a branching storyline that could rival great works of literature are not necessarily what determines the success of the game. In fact, one of the main challenges many game developers are likely to face is deciding which bits of realism to illuminate and which ones they should omit.

Because, let’s face it, if our real lives were so exciting, there’d be no need to play a game.

Case in point: Bethesda Softworks’ The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. This is, quite honestly, an incredible game, with incredible depth, graphics and storylines. And as far as running, jumping, axe-swinging and reactions to said axe-swinging goes, the game is pretty realistic. Bethesda Softworks created a living, breathing world fully peopled with folks who wake up, go to their job, stop at the market, go home and go to sleep. They all have their routines.

But there’s one part of their daily routines that is conspicuous in its absence. You can go into every home, and explore every room. But if your character drank a little too much ale, at local tavern, touch luck, cause there isn’t a single bathroom in the game. No privies. No jakes. No johns. No crappers. No outhouses. No luck…

Here’s a little bit of reality that the developers left out, and the game doesn’t suffer for it (except for the woefully backed-up people who inhabit the game’s world).

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion is a triumph in gaming. But for all its realism and depth, I contest that it still can’t hold a fully-rendered candle running on a light engine that casts realistic shadows to Pac Man.

Take some time with Pac Man. Please. Re-acquaint yourself with the pizza-sans-a-slice and re-acquaint yourself with Blinky, Pinky, Inkey and Clyde.

Tomorrow, I intend to offer the first entry in a three-part series designed to illuminate and deconstruct this “Pac Man.”

It would be nice if we’re all on the same page.