153: Monkey Play, Monkey Do

[Uncompetative]

I think it is important that experiments use games that share a consistent point of view as a 3rd person perspective may make it easier to feel at a remove from their "alter ego". They didn't just chainsaw someone in half, Marcus Fenix did (even though they were controlling his actions). A 1st person perspective game may well be more immersive and lead the player to feel that they are responsible for their actions, so Gordon Freeman stays silent to avoid "breaking the spell" and make you aware that there is this other character involved interposing between you and the game world and making you second-guess your assumptions as to your freedom of choice - not just what you can do within the game world, but what you ought to do in order to conform to your adoptive role. The more that role is minimised the more you can feel free. Even the HUD (Head Up Display) of a game can break immersion by interposing between you and the 'world'. Operation Flashpoint 2 and Far Cry 2 strive to remove this HUD, making the games more immersive as a result - yet, ironically, I would assert that they represent less of an "emotional risk" as their desire for realism spreads the enemies so thin within an enormous map that they almost become dull.

I'd just like to see as much effort put into non-linear emergent gameplay as there is in story and presentation.

Too many wannabe movie directors spicing up dull multi-genre behemoths with a bit of sex, violence, bad language and drug abuse.

 

[paragon1]

Yeah, the short-term aggression thing is old news. You can get the same thing from getting people to wear black shirts. Seriously, there was an experiment were one group of men were given white shirts, and the other black. They were then given a list of activities to choose from. The guys in black shirts consistently picked more aggressive activities. Sorry I don't have a link.

 

[Doug]

Excellent article, well researched and written, and clearly showing the bias by some researchers towards the political idea that 'Games == Violence cus then we can get votes/money by telling parents we'll get rid of it'. That said, I don't get this bit...

Surprisingly, I found Thompson to be friendly and open. Even when I disagreed with him, he treated me with respect. Despite much of his public rhetoric, in which he blames the GTA games as the sole cause of certain school shootings, he told me he sees videogames as one of many factors that contribute to violent crime.

"I wouldn't, nor would anybody in their right mind, say that videogames would turn a boy scout into Jeffrey Dahmer," he said, but games can encourage unbalanced people to become aggressive or violent and teach them "methodologies" to hurt people more effectively. He said he respects the First Amendment - since it makes protests like his own possible - but that the danger of videogame violence makes regulation necessary.

"I'm a conservative. I don't want government to have to do anything," he said. "I love the First Amendment."

Basically, I'm reading this as 'Jack Thompson doesn't believe his own argument'. He is or was campaigning for anti-gaming laws, and has harassed, bullied, and generally been a dickhead (including writting a letter to a developers mother calling her son a mass murderer) and yet he doesn't want laws against gaming cus it'd got against the First Ammendment?!

Seriously, what the hell...

Also, I call BS on the studies that 'prove a link between games and aggression', like you said too - short term aggression does not equal long term aggression.

 

[yourbeliefs]

I'd like to see a follow up to this where he interview Australia's Michael Atkinson. We're lucky in America in that we have the First Amendment to protect outright banning and censoring of video games. I mean they're censoring Left 4 Dead 2 because you get to cut limbs off of ZOMBIES and they bleed! Last I checked, zombies don't even exist!!

 

[The Big Eye]

"We wanted to use next-generation technology to show the impact of a nuclear explosion," he said. "That was the best way to do it, other than making a more detailed mushroom cloud or something."

Reading that made me very sad. When I played through that scene in the original MW, it reminded me (in a good way) of Will Smith's death scene in "I Am Legend" (which I'd watched not long before): perhaps not a didactic sort of moment (although it's pretty easy to read [a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/24-Call-of-Duty-4"]"nukes r bad"[/a] into it), but an unquestionably powerful one, a great outpouring of human emotion in a human being's last moments of life. Nothing kills the vibe quite like learning that the entire scene was intended to serve as a spot of carefully orchestrated eyecandy.

Basically, I'm reading this as 'Jack Thompson doesn't believe his own argument'. He is or was campaigning for anti-gaming laws, and has harassed, bullied, and generally been a dickhead (including writting a letter to a developers mother calling her son a mass murderer) and yet he doesn't want laws against gaming cus it'd got against the First Ammendment?!

Seriously, what the hell...

I'm pretty sure he does want laws against violent video games. He's just saying they shouldn't be banned altogether, as that would violate the First Amendment, which he loves. That's the gist I'm getting, at least.

I suppose violent video games are always going to serve as a scapegoat for general badness in society. Politicians like clear-cut straw-man problems which can be solved using straightforward solutions that deliver hazy, unquantifiable results. It's easier than dealing with homelesness or child abuse or sex trafficking, anyway.