Will video gaming ever become as respected a pastime as athletic sports?  They don’t seem close to achieving the same appeal quite yet, but the ability to play over networks such as Xbox Live and the addition of voice communication to connect gamers across the world have helped give video gaming at least a couple of the most cherished aspects of sports.

First, with the ability to communicate on the fly, teams of gamers can now coordinate game strategy at the speed of sound across the globe.  Games like Splinter Cell:  Pandora Tomorrow would be nearly impossible to coordinate without the use of a wireless headset.  A new generation of war games have emerged where players can follow a squad leaders orders in real time in order to accomplish an objective.  Cooperation and coordinated strategy are essential to any team sport.

Possibly more important is the evolutionary leap in trash talking that’s been a result of the new technology.  Players can now let one another know when they’ve been egregiously PWNED in a game, getting inside their opponents heads in the same way that Muhammad Ali taunted his opponents to tilt a match in his favor.  No longer are video games the polite domain of dry, emotionless CPU foes.  When you’ve got a 13-year-old laughing at you in a game of NBA 2k10, it becomes a matter of pride.   In fact, the game is one brawl in Detroit away from becoming a little TOO real.