英语访谈对话 290 Video Games

 　　Todd: So, Eli, you're young and you're into Manga, so I take it you like video games?

　　Eli: Mm-hm, I do very much. It's my other hobby. Um, almost an obsession¹ sometimes. I think my friends get quite worried about me sometimes, the amount I play, but yeah I've always since I've been little liked computer games. I think my dad on his old macintosh forced us into it originally, so I blame it all on him, but that sort of developed into obviously in my field that I do which is animation². It's very close connected to it, and I'd like to maybe work making computer games one day, uh.

　　Todd: What's a really good game? What do you think is the best game?

　　Eli: My favorite games are I think a split between two, the Final Fantasy series, which is a spread of lots of different games which are RPG which are role playing games, where you are, you're a character, or party of characters and you run around talking to people, discovering things, fighting battles, lots and lots of puzzles, lots of secrets. That's what I like.

　　Todd: Is the setting now or the future or the past?

　　Eli: The setting's always in some fantasy world, but you don't know about. That's kind of, that's one of the nice things about computer games, it's almost escapism. You can escape the reality of the real world and go and run around in some fantastical world I mean, now that the graphics³ and computer games are getting so advanced it really does feel like your going into a new world of your own actually,and that you're there running around, so yeah, that's great and I think my other favorite game would have to be the SIMS series, which is,started with SIM city, which is a little city building game, where you're the mayor of the city.

　　Todd: You're the mayor!

　　Eli: You're the mayor of the city and you have to build up your city over hundreds of years and advance it, and then from that they made the SIMs which actually goes into the houses and you control the lives of the little SIM people in the houses. It's almost like playing dolls houses, but very, very advanced and they have their own wants and needs and they fall in love and they go to work and it's basically just determining the destinies of your little character and furnishing their houses at the same time, which is always fun.

　　Todd: Wow, what a game! So actually, shows how old I am, you said, "computer games!" So you don't say video games anymore?

　　Eli: Well, the SIMS and SIM City, I mean the first SIM City series I played on, probably the Mac had only just got a hard drive, um, really old when I was about, sort of seven or eight, even younger than that, so yeah, those PC games, mac games, and also video games, video games are Play Station, the ones that you play on the TV.

　　Todd: Which to you prefer a play station or an actual arcade⁴ game to play on?

　　Eli: Uh, I never actually got into arcade games, cause you got to put money in to play them so, and I don'tthink my, our parents ever wanted us to sort of waste money like that so.

　　Todd: What kind of player do you have: a play station?

　　Eli: I have a play station, and a Dreamcast, and an X box, and a Game Cube, and an N64 and a GameboyTodd: Wow, I don't even know what those are.

　　Eli: And a PC!

1 obsession   

n.困扰，无法摆脱的思想(或情感)

参考例句：

• I was suffering from obsession that my career would be ended.那时的我陷入了我的事业有可能就此终止的困扰当中。
• She would try to forget her obsession with Christopher.她会努力忘记对克里斯托弗的迷恋。

2 animation   

n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作

参考例句：

• They are full of animation as they talked about their childhood.当他们谈及童年的往事时都非常兴奋。
• The animation of China made a great progress.中国的卡通片制作取得很大发展。

3 graphics   

n.制图法，制图学；图形显示

参考例句：

• You've leveraged your graphics experience into the video area.你们把图形设计业务的经验运用到录像业务中去。
• Improved graphics took computer games into a new era.经改进的制图技术将电脑游戏带进了一个新时代。

4 arcade   

n.拱廊；(一侧或两侧有商店的)通道

参考例句：

• At this time of the morning,the arcade was almost empty.在早晨的这个时候，拱廊街上几乎空无一人。
• In our shopping arcade,you can find different kinds of souvenir.在我们的拱廊市场，你可以发现许多的纪念品。