More evidence TV knows little about games. Or the modern world

Just as we thought it was all going so well. Jack Thompson is nothing but a vaguely amusing anecdote to tell the grandkids. All the biggest entertainment launches are for games. The industry is forking in more cash than Hollywood on a daily basis. Games are mainstream and no-one’s clueless any more.

Or so we thought.

Earlier this week, Meiks brought you the rage-inducing news of ITV’s recent games debate/public flogging of a games journo. The discussion on The Alan Titchmarsh Show (comprising said journo, an aging actress-turned-daytime-TV-sexpert, a tabloid writer and a TV gardener) was naught but a flailing attempt to claw back a bygone generation, made by the kind of people who still worry that they could get ill if they touch their computer after downloading a virus off a Google.

It was nonsense, but depressing evidence that in some eyes, it will always be 1991. And we’re not talking in terms of Justin’s on-going Mega Drive fanboyism.

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Far less annoying though, but still a bit silly, is a recent report on NBC’s The Today Show. Taking the opposite angle and celebrating the benefits of the brave new gaming world, the feature was actually about as progressive and forward-thinking as a corpse. One that died in 1897. One that died in 1897 and was pretty set in its ways when it was alive.

The gist? That NBC has discovered that games aren’t just played by 13-year-old boys. Not only do adults play them, but women-folks do too. Egad! Who on earth will knit our socks now?

Above: They've even made games old ladies can play with a crochet needle

To be fair, The Today Show’s segment had its heart in the right place, and we should be glad that there’s a slice of the mainstream media making this kind of a positive effort, but we just wish its knowledge and research could catch up with its intentions. We can only assume that the show’s reporters have been so busy journalising that they haven’t had the time to be exposed to a single Wii advert since 2006.

And it does all make you wonder that if the mainstream press is still so ill-informed about a medium as significant as games, what else are they getting wrong? Our favourite bit though? The revelation that in the modern world, people can maintain relationships over long distances via the interwebnets and electronic mail. We hear it’s quite a bit faster than normal mail, and it collects all the paper inside your monitor so you don’t even have to file it away.