Do you know about the science of video games? 👾

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Speaker 1: Hi, science fans. Guess what. We are launching season four of sleep Tight Science this September, and we need your help to make it extra special. Did you know that your voice can be part of our show? We want to hear your amazing voices in our show opening. It's super easy and fun to join in. Just record yourself saying you are listening to sleep Tight Science. Then send your recording to the email address in our show notes. How cool is that. We can't wait to hear all your fantastic voices. Thank you for listening. You're listening to sleep Tight Science. Do you know that in the game Pac Man, if you munch all the dots, ghosts, and fruits without losing a life, you get the highest possible score of three million, three hundred and thirty three thousand, three hundred and sixty what. Hello, friends, and welcome back to sleep Tight Science, a bedtime show that answers your questions about science. In this episode, we will start talking about the science behind video games. Imagine peeling back the screen of your favorite game and discovering a universe buzzing with science, from the gravity defying leaps of a character to the mysterious artificial intelligence that seems to think independently. We are going to learn how games use physics to make things move and psychology to keep us coming back for more. So let's start by giving some quick definitions. I bet if I asked you what a video game was, you might be able to come up with an answer pretty quick. Sometimes when I talk to kids, I ask them to imagine if the games they play in the playground were inside their computer or TV, they could control everything with just a push of a button or a swing of their arms. That's pretty much what a video game is, at least the video games that we like to play. To play the video game, you might use a game controller that's the thing with all the buttons and sticks, a keyboard, or even just your body if you have a motion sensor, like when you're dancing or jumping around to play. When you play a video game, you're telling the characters on the screen what to do. Want to jump over a hurdle, Just press the right button. Want to race a car, turn that joystick. The game takes your commands and shows you what happens next on the screen. You can even have the character build a house, a castle, or an ice cream cone. Video games come in all sorts of flavors, just like ice cream. Some are like big adventures where you explore new worlds. Some are fast paced puzzles that make you think, and some let you create and build things any way you want. You can play by yourself with friends in the same room, or when your parents are with you. You can play with other kids all over the world through the Internet. But what makes all this magic happen. Well, there's a special set of instructions called software that tells the game how to run. It's like the game's recipe, including everything from the rules and story to the pictures and sounds. Games can be pretty cool. Let's progress to the next level and talk of about the science behind video games. First, there is the virtual playground where all the magic happens, the realm of physics in video games. Think about when you are playing your favorite game and you jump over a hurdle or dodge an incoming obstacle. That's Newton's laws of motion and action right there in the gaming universe. And when you shoot an arrow or toss a grenade, you're dealing with projectile motion, calculating angles and force to hit your target. It's like a live action physics experiment, except you can respawn if things go kaboom. Now let's change our mode to chemistry. You're actually performing virtual chemical reactions when you mix different elements in a game to create a new magical potion or a piece of armor. Games allow us to see how different substances interact without the risk of a real life explosion, unless that's part of the game. Moving on to biology, we have ecosystems within games that mimic our natural world. You've got predators, prey, and plants interacting with one another. Some games even let you evolve your character over time, adapting to the environment like animals do through natural selection. Next, every game you play is created with code, the building block of all things digital. Understanding programming helps you know how games are built from the ground up, like crafting a towering structure one brick at a time. And then there's the brainy side of games, the artificial intelligence or AI. This is how characters you don't control seem to think on their own, making decisions and reacting to your actions. It's like teaching a computer to think like a human, which is kind of cool. Right. Have you ever played a video game and didn't want to stop. That's the psychology of gaming at work. Games are designed to keep you playing, using rewards and challenges to tap into your brain's love for achievement and recognition. They use a system of challenges and rewards to make sure you're always striving for that next level or shiny new item. It's almost like they put a treasure chest of motivation inside your brain, and the game designers have the key. Now, we can't forget about math. Every aspect of a game, from the towering castles to the creepy dungeons, is built on geometry. Understanding shapes and how they fit together is crucial for creating these environments. And those random loot drops, they're not so random. They're all about probability and statistics. So when calculating the chances of scoring a rare item, you're doing math faster than your genius math teacher. Finally, there is the topic of optics and life. Light. Game graphics are a digital art form showing us how light and color can create worlds as vivid and detailed as our imagination. The way light bounces off surfaces, creating shadows and giving depth is all part of the science of optics. And just like artists use paint to create images, game designers use pixels. So that was a super fast introduction to the science of video games, from the physics of a character's leap to the psychological tricks that keep us glued to the screen. Science is the secret ingredient that makes games fun and mesmerizing. Did you know those dance moves in rhythm games are actually helping your brain? Some reports show that following those beats and grooves can improve memory and attention skills. So next time you're nailing that dance routine in a game, remember you're also giving your brain a workout. Before we continue learning about the science of video games, we have a couple questions from our listeners. We hope to answer more questions in an upcoming special episode. Zach, who is six years old, asks are aliens real? And if they were real, would they have big eyes? The universe is like a giant ocean, and we live on just one teeny tiny boat. There's a lot of water out there we haven't explored. Some people think that in all that huge wide space there might be aliens living on other planets. We haven't seen them, so it's like they are hiding in the deep parts of the ocean where we haven't been. If aliens are out there, they could look like anything. Maybe they would have big eyes to see in the dark, like owls do at night, or they could be so different that we wouldn't even recognize them as aliens at all. They could be made of light, or they could be really tiny, or they could even look like talking plants or rocks. But what is really cool is that we learn a little bit more about the universe's big secrets every day, and maybe one day we'll find out for sure if aliens are real and what they look like. Wouldn't you like to be the one who discovered life out there in space? Thank you for your question, Zach. Next is a question from Jackson, who is six years old and is from Johannesburg, South Africa. One of Jackson's questions is how our stars made it All? Starts in space with these huge clouds made not of water like the clouds we see in the sky, but of gas and dust. This space cloud is called a nebula or nebulae for more than one Some nebulae are regions where new stars are beginning to form. For this reason, some nebulae are called star nurseries. Now, gravity, that invisible force that keeps our feet on the ground, pulls all the gas and dust in the nebula closer together, and everything gets squeezed into a smaller space. It gets really warm, like you feel when you snuggle under your blankets. This is because all the particles of gas are bumping into each other super fast. When it gets hot enough, the center of this big space squeeze starts to glow, and voila, a star is born. This glowing ball is so hot and bright that it can shine for millions and billions of years. Scientists believe there might be approximately two hundred billion trillions stars in the universe, and that is a lot. Thanks for the question, Jackson. Video games are a hidden laboratory of physics. From the realistic bounce of a ball to the thrilling flight of a space rocket, the laws of physics are at play everywhere in the video game universe. First, let's talk about simulated physics. Games are like a sandbox where programmers can tweak the rules of gravity or how objects slide, bounce, or crash into each other. Have you ever wondered why your character can jump so high, or why that car didn't trumple after a massive crash. That's because game developers can adjust the physics to make the game more fun. They can dial down gravity to let you leap like a superhero, or make walls indestructible for that epic car chase. It's like being in a world where you can choose which laws of physics to follow and which to bend. If you had that power, what would you change? Would you make it so you could jump to the moon? Next, we have motion and forces. Every time you sprint, swing, or skate in a game, you're seeing Newton's laws of motion and action. When your character stops suddenly or takes off like a rocket. It's all about inertia, the tendency of an object to resist changes in motion. And when pushing objects around like boxes or enemies, you're dealing with forces and how they interact with mass. Think of it like being in a bowling alley. The heavier the ball, the more force you need to get it moving. Now, what about projectile motion? This is the science behind every arrow, shot or ball thrown in a game. Have you ever played a game where you can throw ice cream, cones or cookies? I haven't. When you aim and release, you're calculating trajectory, velocity, and angle, often without realizing it. It's like your controller is a secret science tool, teaching you the same principles that Isaac Newton figured out sitting under the famous apple tree. In games, you can gracefully see the path of your projectile curve under the game's gravity. This can teach us about parabolas and angles in a fun way, and it's certainly safer to shoot an arrow in a video game. But it's not just about getting the science right. The real magic happens when game designers balance accuracy with fun. Too much realism and games can become well, not so fun. No one wants to play a space game where it takes years to travel from one planet to another, too little, and the game feels like you're in a dream without gravity. The best games find that sweet spot where things feel just right and you're learning fit physics without even trying. In the end, physics in video games is all about creating a world that feels consistent and believable, even when it's packed with dragons or set in a galaxy far far away. It's a world where you can experiment with the fundamentals of movement, force, and flight, and sometimes break the rules, all in the name of fun. Did you know that Minecraft has sold more copies than any other game, with sales that would make even best selling books jealous. Now let's take a look at the psychology of gaming. This is important because sometimes games reward you in such a way that you just don't want to stop too much. Video gaming can mean that you're sitting still for a long time, which isn't the best for your body, and you might miss out on running around outside, reading books or making cool stuff with your hands. Plus, your eyes could use a brake from the screen to see all the awesome things in the world around you. First, let's chat about the rewards i mentioned. Do you know that awesome feeling when you find a hidden treasure or level up in a game. That's because your brain is getting a little high five in the form of dopamine. It's like a happy chemical that makes you feel fantastic, and games can give out lots of dopamine. They keep you coming back for more with shiny coins, new levels, and cool equipment. It's like if your math homework gave you a cookie every time you finished a problem. Pretty sweet, right, But what happens after you have finished twenty problems? Now? What about challenges? Games are masters at giving us problems that are just tough enough to make us stretch our brains, but not so hard that we want to quit. It's like Goldilocks and the Three Bears. But everything has to be just right for your brain. Overcoming a tough level or boss makes you feel like a hero, and that's because you've overcome a real challenge and learned something new. Your brain loves that stuff. But wait, there's more. Have you ever played a game so intense you lost track of time? That's called flow. It's like you're in a gaming bubble and everything else just fades away. This happens when a game perfectly matches what you're good at. You're so focused that you can't hear someone speaking to you or notice much about the real world around you. Games can help you in some ways, like getting better at problem solving and making quick decisions. When you're in the middle of a game, you're constantly figuring out puzzles, choosing the best move, or deciding which resources to use. It's like being a detective, but with dragons. Creepers and spaceships. Your brain is working really hard. Lastly, there is empathy. Empathy is the feeling you get when you put yourself in someone else's shoes. Many games have stories that can pull at your emotions and make you feel for the characters when you care about what happens to them. It's like your empathy muscles are doing pushups, getting stronger and helping you understand others better. So the next time someone says you're just playing video games, you can tell them you're actually on a journey through the world of psychology. You're learning, growing and becoming a master of challenges. In this episode, we learned a little about the science of video games. We looked at the physics in video games and how they used Newton's law of motion and also projectile motion. We noticed that they also use chemistry when mixed different elements in a game to create new things like a potion. We saw that biology is also used in ecosystems that mirror our own world and the evolving of our characters. We looked a bit at programming and the AI that controls the other characters in your game. But let's not forget about the psychology and math that are also thrown in there. We also looked at aliens and their eyes and how stars are made. This episode was made with questions from Zach and Jackson. Thank you to Daniel age six from Northern Virginia, Zara and her brother Haussun, Fiona and Frankie from Nashville, Tennessee, Mila Yusef who lives in Ohio, Wolf in Chicago, Henry age six from Wisconsin, Ernesto age eight in Washington, DC, and Devin and Ruby. We love getting your feedback on our show. If you have any feedback, please send it our way, and if you want to make sure you get all the episodes, please ask your parents to subscribe. You can find us on Apple Podcasts or wherever your parents listen to podcasts. And please, if you love learning about science with us, leave us a review. It may help others find our show. If you'd like to send us your questions, please send them to Hello at sleeptightscience dot com. Sleep Tight