Should video games really be categorized as entertainment?

Well, are crosswords entertainment? Is a choose your own adventure book considered entertainment?
Perhaps entertainment to you is just sitting there, soaking in spoken word or a movie but for some, video gaming is ridiculous amounts of fun.

When reading a book, I am imagining the scene. That is not work either, it is entertainment. Just because a story is interactive does not make it any less entertaining.

What else would it be categorized as?

Yepper. Just like sex, playing cards, and, in some instances, taking a poop.

How is entertainment defined? Video games may, or may not be, legitimate entertainment based on what defines entertainment itself. I’m not sure of it myself, really. The definition, that is. Recreational fun though, for lack of better words, comes to mind. I don’t think it has that many specific boundaries, not like you’re describing anyways.
Regardless, people play them for fun, no matter what is required, or not required. Generally, anyways. They’re considered as entertainment for the recreational values they offer, which use very similar elements that books or movies do. In the beginning, they added competition, which to many is entertaining. I think entertainment is vast, and has a lot of fishing hooks for different kindsa fish.
Okay so now games can be hobbies, obsessions and everything, but what form of entertainment hasn’t seen that. The core of it remains, games fit into the entertainment spectrum, whether they’re a story, or achieving high scores in days gone by.
I don’t quite know what relates everything, but if you look at things like board games or table top RPG’s (Dungeons & Dragons and the like) which are considered entertainment, video games have a rightful place in the spectrum. Mostly because I don’t really think anything specific needs to be applied to be called entertainment, as long as it adheres to what entertainment is. Whether that’s for profit or genuine fun having. Lol.
And fuck video games based on the Da Vinci Code. XD

But yeah, lots of games are hard work, but if people have fun through it and it catches on, such as many other forms of entertainment, it fits in. I hate chess because it’s too hard analyzing everything constantly, but for those who like it, it’s great fun.

Er…what? So because there’s a level of participation other than simply sitting and observing, it’s not entertainment? What about when a band gets the audience to sing along? What about audience suggestions for stand-up comedy? What about choose-your-own-adventure books? Board games? Clapping? Even conversation (which, for some reason, you mentioned) has a pretty high level of participation.

I suspect I don’t understand what you’re trying to get across.

Yes, I think they should. How else should they be classified? Just because a film or a book or a game, just because play challenges our minds and emotions in a way that is not pure entertainment doesn’t mean we have some other category to put it it. With most forms of entertainment and games, they engage us in all sorts of ways. That is not limited to video games.

I’m not thinking so much about participation vs. observation, but the subjects and mechanisms involved.
Take Modern Warfare 3. The game simulates the ‘interesting’ parts of what is, in real life, a dangerous, messy, boring job – running around in a war zone, killing, getting injured, and making sure that you haven’t shot all of your ammunition (but, mercifully, without potato-peeling) – and presents it for your enjoyment. I’m not denying that it’s fun; but at the end of the day, it’s simulating work.

@Nullo I see what you mean, but MW3 doesn’t encompass the entire video game central on its own. There are SO many different kinds of games that don’t apply to the reasoning you bring with that one example. How does Final Fantasy fit in there. Silent Hill? Cooking Mama? Bubble Bobble? Movie based games? Some people might not think so, but video games get extremely versatile in concept, and even that many borrow the same mechanics, (gameplay and its genres, mostly) the variety of them makes it too hard to answer this lol. So many games have fuckall to do with real life lol, or anything remotely related to it, besides stuff we can recognize. If your point is to relate the fun factor to what is plausible in real life, then that doesn’t really have anything to do with it, since I don’t think this is a priority with game designers. Even if war simulators agreed to that, it’s all rendered ridiculous with respawn points lol. Sorry, just a little joke. :) But I mean, so many games include Norse mythology, yet there’s never any Vikings in them, unless it’s a game specifically about Vikings. Either way, they’re still fun though. Wish I had a better answer, but I’d have to look stuff up for that, and I dun wanna. XD

I’m immersed in “Skyward Sword” at the moment and the combination of design, background music and interactivity means this game qualifies as a new form of art.

if you mean that equipping my ACR with snake skin camo, my Trophy system grenade blocker to help save me and putting on my silent boots so no one can hear me is work! Someone sign me up because MW3 is badass. Especially when I drop a live grenade automatically when I die or when I get turned in to a Zombie to chase my friends. Oh and jumping off of roofs and then running and shooting….So real life.

Of course, pwning on a global scale as you hear many, many tortured souls choking on their lack of talent…...now that’s entertainment!

I think when you’re playing a tough game and have to play the same part over and over, like 50 times, then you die again and have a long ways to go to get back to the part where you die again….that definitely is not entertaining. Nor is walking around, beating monsters to level up in an RPG for a couple hours. Not fun.

@cockswain But playing tetris for hours? Fun.

I believe that video games should be categorized as entertainment.

I agree with @HungryGuy .

I agree with @Ayesha .

@HungryGuy Good :)