32 replies to this topic

[cryptik76]

[quote name='liveinabin]A few shoot-em-ups here and there are pretty harmless' date=' but if your main hobby is wasting virtual people, isn't that cause to be asking a few questions about your moral stance?[/quote']

Not necessarily. I don't think that "wasting virtual people" says anything about who you are in the real world. I hate guns in real life. I have a big problem with America's policy on guns (or lack thereof) and its flippancy towards real-life violence. I would be pro-gun control if I felt it weren't already far, far too late to do anything about it.

I just don't find any connection, in my own life at least, between playing violent video games and real-life violence. I can play Grand Theft Auto and pause the game to give my cat a hug, or kiss my wife. I can play Splinter Cell and then turn on the news and still cringe, gasp, and sometimes cry at the real-life tragedies that occur. As far as my own life goes, there's no connection between what I do in a video game or what kind of character I play and who or what I am in real life.

I won't assume that it's that way for everyone, but I know a lot of really nice people who happen to like violent video games (though, like me, they are also into a variety of non-violent games as well).

[liveinabin]

No, I don't assume for a second that you are in any way a violent person or that you have a tendency to violence. Far from it.
My point is really, what is so much fun about blowing people away in ever more realistic ways?
I just hear people talking about (usually PS2) games - saying 'yeah, you can snipe them in the head' or whatever. It just bothers me that my hobby has gone this way.

While we're on the subject of wrong-mindedness in games - anyone seen EA's latest 'Freedom Fighter'? Now that is wrong on SO MANY LEVELS

[RCmodeler]

[quote name='liveinabin]A few shoot-em-ups here and there are pretty harmless' date=' but if your main hobby is wasting virtual people, isn't that cause to be asking a few questions about your moral stance?[/quote']


The first realistic game I played was "Hostages" on the 16-bit Amiga (around 1989). I felt no qualms about shooting those terrorists, because they *were* the bad guys and deserved to die before they hurt any innocent people.

In contrast, a game like Vice City where you go around AS a terrorist killing innocents is just plain wrong.

So as usual, it's not a simple black-n-white issue. You have to look at WHY the killing happens and whether or not it's for a good cause.

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Like the guns used by farmer during the Revolutionary War. It's easy to say, "Guns are bad," but it all depends upon WHY the guns are used. Our ancestors were simple farmers fighting against the tyranny of the British Isles. As Thomas Jefferson said, "The Tree of Liberty is watered with the blood of patriots and tyrants," and George Washington emphasized, "Guns are the safest security against a tyrannical government."

Guns, like cars, are merely tools. Both cars & guns sometimes kill innocent people, but both cars & guns are necessary tools to ensure (a) the protection of your home from criminals and (b) the liberty of your freedoms against power-hungry politicians.

I definitely do NOT support outlawing either gun-based games or guns themselves. Regulated? Yes. But outlawed? Definitely not.

[liveinabin]

Ah, but define BAD guys. Terrorists or freedom fighters? I mean, take the current spate of WWII games - is that German paratrooper that you just wasted an active supporter of Hitler's ideals or just a man forced to serve who just misses his wife and kids?
I know, I'm reading too much into this but it's a fairly good point.
This good guys / bad guys thing - everyone has a reason for doing what they do - no matter how evil and twisted it seems.

[Fretwobbler]

Quote

- is that German paratrooper that you just wasted an active supporter of Hitler's ideals or just a man forced to serve who just misses his wife and kids?
I know, I'm reading too much into this but it's a fairly good point.

You definately are reading too far into it there

You mentioned earlier people are spending their lives talking in language like "you can snipe him in the head" etc, etc. Thats people doing that, not the game, and I agree, people talking in such way can get tedious, I have friends that I avoid because of it, but I dont avoid the game because of them.

The way I see it is sniping somebody in the head etc is just another thing that you practice until you get good at it, its a gaming skill that you pick up, much like any other thing in a game that needs a bit of hand-eye co-ord. The fact the target your aiming for is a blokes head is irrelivant. Its no differant to saying ' You shoot the ducks up the arse" in Carnival.

[cryptik76]

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In contrast, a game like Vice City where you go around AS a terrorist killing innocents is just plain wrong.

So as usual, it's not a simple black-n-white issue. You have to look at WHY the killing happens and whether or not it's for a good cause.

I think that the argument that many gamers would make to those statements is: If you're playing a video game, where nobody is actually being harmed, then why does it matter whether or not the "people" you're "killing" are, in the context of the game, deserving of death? Whether you're playing as a good guy or a bad guy, what does it matter if nobody's actually being harmed? Are games moral, immoral, or amoral?

Obviously, arguments can be made opposing this, such as: How far is too far? If someone creates a game where you can realistically rape a woman, does it matter whether or not the act is simulated? Is it "okay" because nobody's really being harmed?

Obviously anything can be taken too far. But I suppose we as people need to draw our own lines. For instance, although I don't mind the violence in GTA: Vice City, Postal 2 (for me) crosses the line because there's really no point to the game other than the killing of innocent (though annoying) people. I'm not going to say it's "wrong," because I feel that in most instances it's wrong to hold any sort of "entertainment" or "art" to the light of morality. But I personally will never buy Postal 2 because not only do I think it's a stupid game, but I don't feel comfortable gunning down innocent people, even if they are simulated and nobody is being hurt.

liveinabin: I too, as I get older (27 and counting), I'm becoming more and more disturbed by the graphic violence in games, not because of the violence itself, but by the fact that so many people literally CRAVE it. The fact that people were so upset that you can't dismember people in Max Payne, or that there's no blood in Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, kind of mystified me, because the absence of that gore makes no difference in the gameplay. I don't have a problem with graphic simulated violence, really, but I don't miss it when it's not present.

Splinter Cell is just plain cool, though. I especially like the missions where you're not allowed to kill anyone, because it's such a change from the "gun down everyone" concept that most 1st and 3rd-person shooters go by.

[liveinabin]

Quote

liveinabin: I too, as I get older (27 and counting), I'm becoming more and more disturbed by the graphic violence in games, not because of the violence itself, but by the fact that so many people literally CRAVE it. The fact that people were so upset that you can't dismember people in Max Payne, or that there's no blood in Medal of Honor: Allied Assault, kind of mystified me, because the absence of that gore makes no difference in the gameplay. I don't have a problem with graphic simulated violence, really, but I don't miss it when it's not present.

Splinter Cell is just plain cool, though. I especially like the missions where you're not allowed to kill anyone, because it's such a change from the "gun down everyone" concept that most 1st and 3rd-person shooters go by.

Ah right, we're seeing eye to eye there. Yeah - I certainly agree that it is the people craving it more than the games themselves - and, of course, the more people crave it, the more gaming swings over to that type of title.

I personally didn't have any problem at all with Splinter Cell, I played it on the PS2 a little bit - not really my type of thing but it was well put together, inventive and I had a lot of fun. I love some of that guys toys:)

[kisrael]

There was an interesting point in half life where you over hear some soldiers talking about how your character (Freeman) (this was after you saw some "yore dead freeman!" graffiti ) about how they're under orders to get you but its become personal because you killed off a bunch of this guy's buddies. A nice shade of moral ambiguity there.

Reminds me a bit of some of the early Aeon Flux cartoons, where at first you see her as a typical sci fi action hero mowing down the evil guys, then you see it as more of a parody of the genre, and then the bodies pile up so much, and there are a few details of the soldier's deaths, that you find the moral picture kind of reversing itself, like one of those "is the image a vase in sihlouette, or two faces talking" pictures.

As a further digression, and at the risk of getting into way too much politics, if one were to cast "Star Wars" with modern pollitical entities, the USA would be a decent match for the Empire. I mean, if you can momentarily put aside your political loyalties and try to get in the heads of the people who hate the USA, it's a very close match, and they see themselves as the plucky rebels.

On the other hand, I've read some pretty decent arguments that you can view the Star Wars thing as pro-Rebel propaganda. With the exception of some obviously evil stuff, like blowing up a planet in the first movie, for all we know the Empire isn't such a bad thing. (I guess the prequels are changing the equation a little bit, but hey.)

A blog entry of mine from last year has a lot of fun Star Wars links, some focused on this moral ambiguity:
http://kisrael.com/v...date=2002.05.18