Analysis of item collecting in video games

Student writer Marley Cole wrote an essay analyzing item collecting in role-playing video games. Here is an excerpt from her analysis.

Gamasutra writer Kris Graft suggests that the desire to collect items in a game world is similar to compulsive hoarding in the real world. The consequences of gathering items may not be as negative for the gamer, but gamers and hoarders, according to Graft, experience similar degrees of emotional investment and gratification when they acquire objects. Graft, however, does not account for the limits placed on acquisition in many game worlds and the penalties incurred when the gamer ignores those limits. Usually, a character cannot carry more than a certain amount. Sometimes that amount increases when the character gets stronger, but there is always a limit. When the character’s pack is full, that character can’t pick up new items (see the image below for an in-game inventory example). The character is forced to discard or sell old items to make room for new ones.

In some games, overburdened characters can’t even move until they discard items. Rather than facilitating virtual hoarding, video games actually force gamers to be strategic about what they keep with them. In addition, the experience of parting with items is often positively reinforced. Selling an item can be accompanied by the sound of coins dropping into a pouch or the sight of a money count going up. A character who has lightened his pack might even be able to move faster.