Fishbowl Games

Have you ever sat staring at a fish tank watching the fish swim back and forth.  As the fish swish up and down and back and forth your mind goes blank, calm and into a hypnotic state.  The fish aren’t going to do anything very interesting but just maybe there will be some unexpected interaction between two fish or a fish might hide in a piece of coral and then dart out unexpectedly from a little opening you thought too small to hide its small frame.

The fish tank is, for the most part, self sustaining.  It requires some feeding, cleaning and general maintenance on an easy to follow schedule.  And it is a place to decorate with cute little fish structures like hidden treasure and underwater plants.

I’ve never been interested in the games that try to mimic a fish tank on my computer.   I haven’t been able to sit back and enjoy the fake fish swimming around because it seems like cheating.  Shouldn’t I just get a real fish tank?  And plus I don’t even like fish (while they are alive and not smothered in butter that is).

But recently I’ve been enthralled with a facebook game called Restaurant City.  In it, my little restaurant has chefs, waiters, and janitors all working at a plodding pace to keep the restaurant churning through customers.  I only need to occasionally feed them, decorate the restaurant, and clean up some garbage to keep the place running.

Other than that I can just sit back and watch the little people go about their day of cooking, cleaning and eatting.  Sometimes they’ll do something interesting but always within their limitations of the artificial world created for them.

And it was today that I realized I was falling into the exact same pattern with this game that I had with fish tanks previously.  I had to wonder is this really a fish tank in disguise? Based on the amount of time I’ve spent watching the little people lumber around and the time I’ve spent rearranging their chairs and decorations I’m leaning heavily towards fish tank.

That brings up one other question for.  If this is a re-skinned fish tank, is it a game at all?  I wouldn’t consider a fish tank to be a ‘game’ if I had one in real life.  I might call it a hobby or a diversion but not a game.

Restaurant City refers to itself as a game but the more time I spend watching the little creatures go back and forth and up and down between their stations I’m more and more convinced it’s pushing the label of game a little too far.

Maybe it isn’t a coincidence that the name of the company that makes Restaurant City is Playfish.