Wii

Last week, while I was eating lunch at USC, a student approached me and asked if I’d be willing to be a research subject for an experiment involving the Nintendo Wii. I said sure. The experiment involved me trying to answer questions and solve word problems while playing Wii Tennis. I’d never played Wii before, but I went undefeated at Wii Tennis. (I was the only research subject to do so, according to the students running the experiment.) I was told to make my in-game character look as much like myself as possible. So, as instructed, I spent five minutes carefully and artistically constructing a devilishly handsome tennis player who looked exactly like me — except for the fact that I have arms and my head is not the same size as the rest of my body put together. But then I wasn’t allowed to play with the guy I’d created, and instead had to play with a character who looked nothing like me. I guess part of the experiment was gauging the effect of playing with a character who didn’t look like you. To quote the research subject student at the beginning of Ghostbusters: “The effect? I’ll tell you what the effect is! It’s pissing me off!”