Originally posted by Arcayn
This falls into the category "Japanese weirdness", together with fishing simulators (with actual rod! yawn..), horse race sims (with actual (somewhat) horse!) and train simulators. I'm not kidding you. Oh, and of course sports and dating sims as well.

For me the point of games is to do something you couldn't in reality... immerse in a world of fantasy, or be a one-man army, things like that. It's called immersion. Hence, should those other games be called, "unimmersion?" Anyway, they don't interest me.
I don't see much point in fishing gmaes either, but maybe I'm missing something.

I don't play horse race sims, but I can understand why other people would. Taking care of a horse, training it, etc is a huge commitment. Horse race sims allows those of us who don't want to make it our life to enjoy something like that.

Train simulators? Not sure what you are talking about there. Do you mean simulating what it's like to be a passenger in a train? I agree that would be stuped. If it's running a train or managing many trains, on the other hand, that's different. Even though it is technically possible, running/managing real trains is something few of us will get to do in real life, especially if we don't want to make it our life's work. If it's managing many trains, than you must also be saying model train sets are also pointless.

As for sports sims, how else do you plan on managing an entire team in professional sports? Sure, it's technically possible in real life, but most of us have the same chance of ever getting to do that as we have of ever getting to cast magic. Same goes for racing. I love racing games. F-Zero is one of the two SNES games I like the most. Same thing with that. It's racing for the rest of us, those who don't have the money/time/will to make it our life's work. Also, both sports examples I mentioned come with risks in real life. There are no risks in playing video games. If I'm playing a racing game and crash, it's no big deal no matter how realistic the game is. If I totaly flunk at managing my team, I can just hit reset and try again. Not only that, but a manager/coach of a team in real life cannot control and be every one of the players like you can in a game.

As for dating sims, maybe you're a real atteactive ladies man who can go out and have sex with anyone you want, but many of us aren't that lucky. Sure, it's not real sex and women, but it's as close to have many lovers without risk that people like me can ever get to. Not only that, but bashing dating sims is also bashing romance novels, all forms of pornography, and even fantasizing. Even some people who have attractive lovers enjoy those things. What you are saying is like saying "Why fantasize when you can date and have sex for real?"

As for dancing things, if they only involved punching buttons on a controller, I'd agree that they were stuped. But these dancing things sound like they add things to real dancing. I don't say sims because if you are really dancing, it can hardly be called a simulation.