[yakubin]

That's a broader theme. Watching TV is considered more childish than reading a book, even though TV content requires a lot more kinds of creative work in order to exist. The reason is that usually when the medium is richer, it demands less of its audience. Instead of imagining a scene, you're given its picture ready-made. Instead of actively following the lines of a story, you passively assimilate what appears before your eyes. It's less effort, and it's less active. It's common for people to watch TV in order to "turn off their brains" when exhausted. "Turning one's brain off" when reading a book is usually an accident, not an intentional thing, and happens a lot less.

Games demand more from their audience than TV, but you're still given a lot to consume passively, compared to a book: instead of imagining scenes, you're again given them as pictures. Games do compensate though with demanding that you make choices as you play a game, which may impact a story. Well... that's as long as the game is not an FPS, or a racing game, where choices don't matter for a story, as the story is either non-existent, or barely important; and what matters a lot more is your dexterity and reflex.

[crtasm]

There are games that are entirely text-based. I play less than I used to but always try to check out the yearly winners on https://ifcomp.org/

Also see https://ifdb.org/

[rascul]

> There are games that are entirely text-based.

There are a lot of MUD games. I've been playing WoTMUD on and off for a little over two decades now.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD

https://wotmud.info/

[andrewflnr]

Pretty sure those still fit the thesis in practical terms. They demand more of the player, and AFAIK are not particularly associated with childishness (if only because much fewer people know they exist, but still, you can't take imagine people thinking some arty piece of IF is childish, can you?).

[StillLrning123]

"That's a broader theme. Watching TV is considered more childish than reading a book, even though TV content requires a lot more kinds of creative work in order to exist." While TV shows are more involved and complex to make, that does not automatically give the TV show depth, reflection, nuance etc. A TV show is often quite the opposite; a banal story full of platitudes.

[Tostino]

I absolutely agree with your comment from the consumption perspective, but I believe GP was referring solely to the creation aspect.

[andrewflnr]

By bringing up the association with childishness, no, they were not.

[cma]

In sandbox games with lots of building you are often painting the picture moreso than someone reading a book.