To make your Monday complete, I present you with a variety of videos featuring animals playing video games , along with analysis of whether they are good at the games. BEHOLD:
A bearded dragon plays "Ant Smasher," an Android phone game. He or she is excellent, clearly differentiating between ants and other insects in the game, but seems to do a little unnecessary lip-licking. Best YouTube comment: "Thumbs up? if you are an Ant and you find this offensive."
With some encouragement by researcher Susan Savage-Rumbaugh , this bonobo plays Ms. Pac-Man. Skill level: low -- ghost avoidance strategy needs work. (See a bit more of this in Savage-Rumbaugh's excellent TED Talk ; a snippet of this Pac-Man video is shown at the very end, minus narration.)
Two cats attempt to master an iPad game called, appropriately, Game for Cats (iTunes link -- the game is free). The cats seem generally confused by the notion of a screen, and attempt to go underneath the iPad, with unsatisfactory results. Their claws also keep getting stuck on the carpet; for optimal play, perhaps a carpet isn't a great idea. In general, the cats seem pretty interested in smacking those mice, though their technique isn't optimal.
Related: there's a similar app in which cats "paint" as they stomp on virtual mice (iTunes link; app costs $1.99).
This poor cat does a great job playing Duck Hunt, but lacks the Nintendo Zapper Light Gun -- so that obnoxious in-game dog keeps popping up and mocking the poor feline's apparent failure. Skill level: excellent . Virtual dog's conduct: unsportsmanlike.
While not a video game per se, some industrious hamster owner has put together a diorama version of a platformer game (reminiscent of 8-bit NES games like Super Mario Bros. ) and unleashed his hapless hamster into it. The hamster does a pretty good job traversing the maze, but takes a few breaks to do some adorable self-grooming.
Leave comments with any videos I missed! (Note: the "dog playing Tony Hawk" you see all over YouTube is fake.)
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