Rath said:
For the most part games are either for entertainment or educating young children, I have never found a game designed to educate an adult - largely because it would be nigh on impossible to convey an understanding of anything complicated and meaningful through games. The Metal Gear Solid series certainly doesn't give an understanding of philosophy to the player and never actually tries to, it uses philosophy for entertainment value. If you want to learn philosophy or politics go take a university course on them, or even just get a book on them. No game will give you any sort of decent grounding in any of these things and no game to my knowledge has ever claimed to. |
I disagree on some level. First of all Kojima has reiterated during interviews and his own blog in the past that he doesn't want people playing his games purely for fun, entertainment or as a means to escape boredom. He wants there to be meaning and thought behind his games that drive people to think about themselves and the world around them while (obviously) being wrapped in an entertaining package so that anyone can enjoy it on different levels.
I think if you play each of the 4 MGS titles, really do in-depth research on them and a lot of thinking of your own they alone do provide a foundation from which to build your own intellect and philosophical worldview upon. It doesn't replace more high concept ideas such as those presented by Kant or Neitzche but for what it's worth it does provide enough "meat" in a few dozen hours of presentation for the average man to feed off of for many years as the basis of their own intellectual development.
