Violent Video Games

Some History-Making Violent Games

DOOM and Quake left a deep impression on gaming that’s still felt today. They established the all-new genre of the first-person shooter. The common gamer term “gib” (derived from giblet, the dense gizzard organ you find in some table fowl) was born in these games - an enthusiastic word for the bloody chunks that go flying when you shoot an opponent. DOOM was a favorite of the Columbine murderers.

Another first-person shooter, Duke Nukem 3D also raised protests with its violent, consequence-free gameplay. The most offensive portion involved the strippers located in one city level. The player was able to shoot and kill these neutral bystanders.

Mortal Kombat, the martial-arts themed fighting game, caused a firestorm of controversy with its viciousness - specifically, the ridiculous killing moves that could be performed at the end of a match, including one where the victor rips off the head of his opponent. Instead of coming off cleanly, the head is extracted along with a bloody, animated spine.

The gonzo driving-and-destruction game Carmageddon was censored in some countries because the original setup encouraged players to run over pedestrians in the game’s urban environments, awarding points for each hit.

Soldier of Fortune broke down a significant, previously-unbreached wall with reactive corpses. When you shoot dead enemies in SoF, they flip, flop, and disturbingly, ooze more blood. The small hairs on this writer’s arms prickled with alarm when he first shot a corpse by accident in this game. Rainbow Six, a seminal tactical shooter, also featured ragdoll corpses that added to the realism of video game mortality.

The first Grand Theft Auto left hardly a ripple. It was a top-down 2D game featuring the same action that’s now so well-known: driving, shooting enemies and innocents both, fighting the cops, carjacking, thieving and robbing. Grand Theft Auto II brought that same capricious, violent behavior into hard-hitting 3D, and the franchise has been controversial ever since.

Experts Say

Studies on the effect of video games have returned mixed results. Gaming is a relatively difficult behavior to isolate. Do video games make kids more violent? Or do they merely attract violent kids?

Here are a few of the more interesting research findings about video game violence:

- After playing the uncensored version of the aforementioned Mortal Kombat, male college students tested out as more violent and evidenced higher blood pressure when compared to similar students who played a censored Mortal Kombat. (Ballard & Wiest, Society for Research in Child Development, Spring 1995)

- Teachers rated the aggression level of over 150 middle and high school students in their schools. Then those students were asked to describe the amount of time they spent playing video games. The results matched - aggressively-rated kids tended to spend more time in video games. (Fling, Smith, Rodriguez, Thornton, Atkins & Nixon, Southwest Texas State University, 1992)

- The Interactive Digital Software Association (a partisan source, it’s true) surveyed 1500 people and 42% said they enjoy video games as a social activity that can be enjoyed with friends and family.

- A meta-study of 59 research projects, performed by the Washington State Department of Health, resulted in a finding that the current body of clinical evidence does not indicate that violent video games cause gamers to imitate that behavior in real life. (Bensley and Van Eenwyk, Journal of Adolescent Health, Vol 29, 2001)

It’s well-known that fantasy violence is one of the natural releases for a healthy mind. Kids will imitate all phases of adult life in their play, as part of preparing for adulthood, and those phases include marriage, social events, adventures, conflicts, and death.

Whipping Boy

Video games are a favorite target for politicians and pundits who are trying to win points with aggrieved parents. Game publishers complain that books can depict much bloodier and more subversive behavior than games, and yet are available to be checked out of public libraries by children and teenagers.

Illinois and California have passed state laws that make it illegal to sell mature video games to minors. The Entertainment Software Association is trying to overturn these laws and forestall similar legislation in other states on freedom of speech grounds.

However, in November 2005, Senators Hillary Clinton and Joe Lieberman introduced the Family Entertainment Protection Act to make this same offense illegal across the country. The ESA is concerned but respectful; it may be time for them to cut their losses and pick their battles differently.

Speech And Crossing The Line

The freedom of speech argument rings a little hollow in a medium in which the most impactful statement seems to be, “Have fun!” Social commentary isn’t much of a factor in gaming, reflecting the priorities of the companies that make them. But undoubtedly video games play a significant role in millions of homes, bringing people together and enabling them to enjoy some healthy stress-relieving fun.

As games improve in quality, the central question is the line between fantasy and reality. At what point will video game realism erode that line to the point where gamers feel killing is a natural behavior?