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Legend11 on 23 March 2008
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HappySqurriel said:
Legend11 said:
HappySqurriel said:

At the same time, I think there is some reason to be worried about the influence of violent videogames; in particular the influence of violent videogames on younger gamers. It is believed that a vividly imagined event can be as powerful as actually being part of that event, and this is used in several types of therapy (and sports psychology) in order to get results out of people. As videogames become more realistic (and potentially immersive) what kind of impact does performing violent acts really have on a person? I'm not saying these games should be banned, but I don't think it is wrong for people to question their impact.


You mean like movies are now?  Movies like Hostel seem to be far more realistic than games out now and likely even for the foreseeable forture.


A movie is fairly brief in duration compared to a videogame though ...

I don't know if you remember the release of Soldier of Fortune for the PC several years ago. Even though (by today's standards) the graphics were cheezy, the game allowed for fully "deformable" human bodies. 5 years from now, hardware will be powerful enough to offer very realistic damage to people's bodies. If you take this to the ultimate sadistic level, and give people "rewards" in multiplayer depending on how violent they are, a teenager could virtually perform more ultra-violent acts in 1 week then the most violent people in histroy have performed in their lifetime.

What kind of impact does this have?

Once again, I'm not saying violent videogames should be banned, but I think people are right for being concerned.


I would argue that the impact of movies and other media is far worse than videogames.  For example hate propaganda is spread mainly through videos and other media, not by videogames, simply because videogames don't have the same impact.  The vast majority of people can differentiate between reality and a videogame but when it comes to movies and other media that may not be the case.  The same for the news, disturbing videos (Iraq War, violent crime, etc) get people far more upset and angry than videogames (from what I have seen in forum postings, etc).

As for games it's hard to believe games like Grand Theft Auto for example fuel gang violence or auto theft as opposed to drugs, poverty, and peer pressure.  It's hard to believe someone is going to play Soldier of Fortune and because of that game they're going to go out and shoot people.  The real reasons are almost always due to something else (emotional breakup, bullying at school, social isolation, drugs, etc).  I think part of the problem is that banning videogames is a simple knee jerk reaction to trying to solve a complex problem rather than having to actually put the hard work and possibly a lot of money into the real reasons for a lot of the violence we're seeing.