As someone whose day job it is to blog about videogames, I have a singular insight on a growing demographic in the voting population: virgins. No, I'm only joking; that group is already well represented by the Virgin Voter Society of America (motto: "Saving it for the right candidate"), and just one visit to the virtual city of Stormwind in the World of Warcraft will find Night Elves and Gnomes having sex of all kinds -- sometimes even with each other. Instead, I'm talking about gamer voters.

Videogames are a big deal nowadays, and their formerly young players are quickly becoming captains of industry and progress. People who once played hours of Dr. Mario and Tetris are getting jobs as pharmacists and bricklayers. Gamers come from all walks of life, trailing their Fritos wrappers and Bawls energy drink bottles behind them, and any candidate who wants in the White House will have to do a little pandering to the Pac Man vote.

So, speaking as the expert I am, what will today's political candidates want to do to garner the growing gamer vote? Making jokes about how "the cake is a lie" and perhaps even making actual cakes shaped like videogame characters would be a good start. Arguing about which console is best will get gamers interested, but the issue is violently divisive, so if ever asked, the best response is just to say, sagely: "It's a shame the Dreamcast never got the chance it deserved."

Also, I can tell you from experience that gamers like scantily-clad women, especially if they're in provocative poses. It's a strange attraction that is almost certainly specific to the gamer population. Oh, and if you arm them with large futuristic weapons and/or have them hug or otherwise interact with more barely-dressed women, people seem to enjoy that, too.

Gamers have also made a lot of progress into virtual worlds. Not only do vast online universes like World of Warcraft and EVE Online contain whole societies and economies, but games like Halo and Call of Duty on the Xbox Live service provide gamers with a platform for their concerns and complaints; a modern town hall, if you will. If John McCain appeared in a Big Team Battle ranked match, tagged a flag carrier with a melee kill and told his opponent to "get out my house, fool," he could pretty much count on both the Covenant and Spartan votes (the parasitic alien Flood haven't been able to vote yet, though they are reportedly gnawing on the brainstems of certain Congressional heavyweights until they get the majority they need for an Amendment).

In point of fact, garnering the votes of gamers isn't a tough task at all -- they'll do almost anything you want as long as you give them points for it and let them brag about it to each other afterwards. But it's getting them to the polling place that presents the real challenge for candidates.

Fortunately, there is one way to get gamers out in droves, and to make them line up for hours or even days, blocking major thoroughways, and discussing which Final Fantasy was best and whether Solid Snake would beat Lara Croft in a fight (answer: it doesn't matter -- we'd all win). Yes, I'm speaking, of course, of a major game sequel release.

So I think it's clear what the candidates need to do. All that's required is to mock up a few extremely high resolution screenshots (again, big guns and scantily-clad women will serve you well here), send them around to the major game sites, and mark them something like "Goldeneye 64 Sequel -- Top Secret!" Then, you simply create a countdown on a website counting down to "Election Day" (use some weird phrasing like "110408" -- gamers enjoy solving easy puzzles), and then, as a masterstroke, install polling places at all videogame stores.

Optionally, you can also offer preorders for "Election Day" -- that way, Gamestop employees won't shut up about it until then.

And come November 4th, you'll have the full force of the gamer population behind the choice for President of the United States. And believe me, I will happily join all of my gaming brethen in welcoming Gears of War's Marcus Fenix as our write-in candidate for the Commander-in-Chief. After all, those Locusts aren't going to exterminate themselves.

Mike Schramm has been writing about technology, videogames, and life for almost ten years now. He's the lead blogger of WoW Insider, and blogs at Massively and TUAW, and has been published in many other places, both in print and online. You can track his exploits on his personal site, mikeschramm.com.

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