The Outline

Here it is, the start of my argument about how games effect our cognition and long-term psychological development. I am keeping it brief, but I will flesh this out more later.

We do not just play video games. Video games play us too.
When we are playing a game, some parts of the game are acting in accordance to our actions through whatever peripheral we are using. This much is really obvious and intuitive. But what about how the game is playing us? There is a whole system running the game, a set of mechanics that work together to make something more than the sum of it's parts. It creates in a sense real-time interactivity with behaviors that we integrate into ours in order to play the game. We shape the way we behave to shape how the game unfolds, and the unfolding of the game shapes our behavior right back.

The events and systems in our lives can radically change our thinking.
Another uncontroversial statement at first; Attitudes about the nature of intelligence have profound effects on our lives (Dwyeck) and can push us towards foolishness. Small changes from moment-to-moment can change our way of thinking, such as the changes in insight problem solving ability exhibited by people when told to focus on the different aspects of navon letters.

The developmental power of games is that they provide a stable system that we can explore that can subtly guide our development.
This stability and the exploration is what helps turn the short term moment-to-moment interaction into the long term attitudes and cognitive styles. That is why games can be incredibly powerful engines of folly in our lives, but can also be useful tools to help us become wiser.