system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: What Actually Is Happening When a Videogame Loads? (And is loading an offline vs. online game different?)

Hi All!

Was very curious what actually occurs when loading a game up to play! I also was curious if the process is the same for a singleplayer game versus a multiplayer game?

Thanks!
gpt
Consider a board game analogy...

When you chose to play a game and click on the 'play' button in Steam, you are grabbing a board game off your shelf. All the files are packed away in a nice compact box that holds everything, but you cannot really do much with it.

The game then loads. This is the process of opening the box, setting out the board and sorting out all of the playing pieces. In the computers case it means copying the relevant data from its home on a hard drive into the RAM and unpacking it in a way that the computer can understand, and allows it to call up the files and information it needs quickly and conveniently.

Then you play the game.