I have always been a fan of video games. From my halcyon days of my youth playing the Berenstain Bears Camping Adventure on the Sega Genesis to literally yesterday, it has been a favorite pastime of mine.
However, the real canon event that kicked this whole hobby off was right after I had gotten my own Game Boy Pocket. It was my first device that was officially mine, not the family’s, and it was my prized possession. In this particular memory, I remember wanting to get a new game and looking at the shelves when my eyes caught a blue box with a really cool looking turtle on it. I mean…the turtle had cannons on its back; what’s cooler than that?!
I pointed it out to my parents, who had offered to buy me a new game, and they exchanged a look.
“Now Ethan,” my mom had said, “that kind of game is going to have a lot of reading in it. Do you think you would be able to handle that?”
I, a voracious reader, scoffed in my head. Of course I was up for the challenge, and even if I wasn’t, I was petty enough to prove anyone wrong when they said I couldn’t do something.
So, out loud, I confirmed that I was, and my parents bought me a copy of Pokemon Blue, and the course of my gaming life was set.
That moment always stuck with me, not just because of my continued love for Pokemon, but because of what my mother had said to me. Yes, there was in fact a lot of reading in that game, and because of all that reading, I continued to develop my literacy skills in new and profound ways. It eventually even led me to write about how using video games helps promote literacy for my final thesis when getting my MLIS.
Now, as much as I want to just copy and paste that entire document into this blog and call it a day, I’ll admit it’s a bit more of a dry read and far too long for a quippy little blog as I’m known to write. So instead, let’s just focus on a few different types of literacy that exist and can be developed with the help of video games that we have in our collection here at JCLS.
- Linguistic Literacy
Personally, when I hear the word “Literacy” by itself, I am inclined to believe that this is the one that everyone thinks of first. As the name suggests, it focuses more on linguistics: being able to read, write, speak and comprehend language as it is presented. To some degree, most games will have this in the form of dialogue between characters, in-game texts and lore, or in the terms and services that we all totally read in their entirety and agree to.
Some great games that feature this heavily would be your expansive RPGs with deep lore, like Elden Ring or Black Myth: Wukong, or visual novel type games, like the Ace Attorney series.
- Visual Literacy
As the old adage goes, a picture is worth 1,000 words, and developing the skills to help interpret the visuals is important if you want to understand those 1,000 words.
Honestly, as video games are more of a visual medium, yes, it would stand to reason that all games could help in this regard. With that said, I also believe that this kind of understanding is important when games have a puzzle aspect or hidden items that are important to progress in the story. In these scenarios, being able to look at the scene presented to you, analyze what you see and figuring out how to use what you have in this situation is paramount. Great examples of this include Stray, Untitled Goose Game, and Resident Evil.
- Spatial Literacy
I’ll admit that this type of literacy was something I hadn’t heard of before and found it to be intriguing.
Spatial literacy is the ability to understand and interpret spatial information like location, distance, direction and patterns, and using that to make an informed decision. Common examples of this would be using a map to determine the best course to get to a location quickly, which, in my case, usually involves a lot of jumping, or fitting objects into a finite space.
Feel free to explore this skill more in games such as Stardew Valley as you set up your farm, or in other cozy games such as Unpacking! On the other hand, in strategy games such as Unicorn Overlord, knowing the map and having an awareness of your units can help you seize victory with the fewest casualties possible.
- Audio Literacy
Alright, stop, collaborate and listen to this next one: audio literacy!
Like the name suggests, it’s basically all about using audio cues and analyzing them to make sound decisions (pun intended). Outside of games, this helps people use the nuances of sound to help understand emotion and meaning to the world at large.
I find that also being an active listener while playing games can help in a variety of ways. For example, in Super Mario RPG, timing can be very important when strategizing your attacks, and to help with timing there are audio cues that I use to know when to press the buttons.
- Information Literacy
Finally we come to Information Literacy, which encapsulates knowing how to find information, evaluating it for credibility and usefulness, and applying it to the problem at hand.
Whether you’re trying to find guides for games online to help you out of a tricky spot, or using the information you gathered in game to try and solve a mystery, this is something that is honestly important IRL (in real life) and helping develop these critical thinking skills is never a bad thing in my book. Personally, I like games like the Nancy Drew adventure games and Blue Prince, which require you to find information as you play and then use it to solve the mystery at large.
Unfortunately, these aren’t in our catalog (yet), so allow me to suggest you check out Triangle Strategy, and also once again plug the Ace Attorney games because they just are that fun in my opinion.
That will bring us to the end of our foray into the video game world and literacies that can be gathered like collectibles as you play. Of course, I should add that if you don’t like video games or are parents who want to limit their kids’ screen time, that’s perfectly fine! We have plenty of other offerings to help get these skills like audiobooks, graphic novels, reading aloud or just good old-fashioned reading to yourself. Just remember that everyone enjoys reading differently. So, if you ever were the kind of person to scoff at people gaming, maybe take a second and try to reframe what is happening for that person in that moment. Each book (or game) has its own reader (player).
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a virtual farm to attend to. Later days!