If the charge is "gaming has become stalled and bland", then gaming is guilty of the charges leveled against it.
If the charge is that gaming is merely a mindless diversion with no redeeming value...well, OK, gaming's guilty of that too, and gamers, while they should not be persecuted for having the same need for escapism as the idiots who stare at reality TV or Hollywood movies, should not hold up their hobby as some form of high culture (especially if the best you can do is Metal Gear Solid, Heavy Rain, and Shadow of the Colossus. Roger Ebert is still right.)
It's easier to defend gaming against charges that are absurd, like "murder simulators" (my SimCity 4 region has a crime rate right around zero), brain-dead fluff for idiots (Paradox Interactive's entire body of work would like a word with you, and so would Sid Meier's), and "just a bunch of brown and gray environments" (which would come as news to the King of All Cosmos, just for starters.)
If the charge is that gaming is merely a mindless diversion with no redeeming value...well, OK, gaming's guilty of that too, and gamers, while they should not be persecuted for having the same need for escapism as the idiots who stare at reality TV or Hollywood movies, should not hold up their hobby as some form of high culture (especially if the best you can do is Metal Gear Solid, Heavy Rain, and Shadow of the Colossus. Roger Ebert is still right.)
It's easier to defend gaming against charges that are absurd, like "murder simulators" (my SimCity 4 region has a crime rate right around zero), brain-dead fluff for idiots (Paradox Interactive's entire body of work would like a word with you, and so would Sid Meier's), and "just a bunch of brown and gray environments" (which would come as news to the King of All Cosmos, just for starters.)