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The topic of violence in video games has been generating some great conversations on the web these last few days, coming largely by way of a thoughtful blog post by designer Steve Gaynor at his Fullbright site. I’d advise you to go there and read it before you read my response. Click here for a read of Steve Gaynor's excellent write up.
The general consensus seems to be that for games to mature, violence in video games needs to be given weight and meaning. The consequence should equal the act, which in the vast majority of games it certainly does not.
This is entirely true, but my two cents on the topic is tread very, very carefully.
Everyone has a favourite example of a meaningful moment that has shaped their gameplaying lives. Mine was an incident in Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory. This was the first game in which Sam Fisher discovered a new gadget, the knife, and turned it’s application to his chosen profession, killing terrorists, with gusto. I was most of the way through an early level and had merrily cut the throats of a good dozen ‘bad guys’. Crouched in the shadows I listened to two guards conversation while waiting for my time to stab. Then things got… heavy.
One of the guards confided in his mate his fear of the dark, how when he was a child a rebel band his family had run with had been attacked by a US special forces team at night and almost everyone in the camp was killed. The traumatic event clearly still haunted him. Eventually the other guard wandered off leaving the story teller exposed, I grabbed him and pulled him back into the shadows and he gasped, “Finally, you’ve come to finish me, after all these years”. Or words to that effect.
I couldn’t do it; the simple inclusion of a five minute monologue had given this pixelated obstacle a humanity I couldn’t take from him. Many games give enemies character that increase your desire to kill them, not many do the opposite. In the end I gave him a sedating strangle and left his unconscious body in the corner. It’s a perfect example of what Gaynor is discussing, giving the violence meaning instantly matures the gameplay.
At first this seems like a good thing, more mature games, emotional impact, and better quality story telling as a result and, presumably, a greater respect for the industry. More Heavy Rain (appropriate name) elements in games and less endlessly spawning Call of Duty bullet piñata bad guys is a good thing. It is, but as I read forum reply after reply discussing the pros of this I felt a small sliver of dread. Sure this could mostly be a good thing, but not for every one.
Heavy Rain, slow, meditative, tense, and nine kinds of messed up
While harping in defence of our hobby that games aren’t just for kids we too often forget that they’re not just for our 16 to 30 demographic either. Being a father of three kids under 12 who closely monitors all their media consumption I’m painfully aware of when adult concepts and games meet, and not just bad language and nudity, when they really meet. When this happens the emotional situation is way more than a ten year should have to handle. I’m happy to let my kids play games like Modern Warfare 2 because emotionally the games are empty. There is as much humanity in the enemies of Call of Duty as there are in the ghosts of Pac Man; largely the reason the No Russian level was a loud noise about nothing.
By comparison I would not let my oldest child play Heavy Rain and not just because of the boobies. He’s at that age when a moral compass has suddenly appeared in his brain and concepts of right and wrong are more than just the difference between whether or not you get ice cream after dinner. He’s still sorting out his own personal morality, it’s an undeveloped muscle, and dealing with the moral implications of actions in a game like Heavy Rain would be a strain, possibly even a damaging one. Yes it’s not real, we all know that, but there’s a part of our brain that feels a connection to the games we play, otherwise we wouldn’t play them, because we would feel nothing. Games like Heavy Rain stretch that connection outside its comfort zone, which is exciting and intriguing to prosaic adults like us, but potentially very upsetting to younger players.
I’m trying my hardest not to pull a Mrs. Lovejoy here and impotently shake my fists and wail, ‘won’t someone think of the children’. But when we snicker at the mainstream for wailing that way about games its because we know the games they typically name drop, Call of Duty, GTA, Mass Effect, are largely empty of the confrontational material they claim to be so destructive. Video game violence is mindless fun for us and junior players because it is just that; fun but largely forgettable.
Like the difference between Die Hard and Goodfellas, it’s down to style and technique choices. Dozens of people get killed in Die Hard, compared to one (or two?) who get killed in Goodfellas but which would you say is more violent? If we’re making style choices to increase the impact of violence in games, for narrative purposes or to try and steer a player down a certain path, we’re steering into territory that young gamers, and some adult gamers, are unable to navigate properly. I don’t think for a minute that every game in the future is going to be an anguished torture of the human soul, I’m just advising caution as the medium of games evolve.
I guess what I’m getting at is be careful what you wish for. If developers start shaping and creating experiences to make people consider the impact of violence in video games, the most involving type of media there is, it’s a real gazing into the abyss scenario and game players might not like what they find there. The abyss has this nasty habit of gazing back (or at least Nietzsche thought so before he went bonkers). Developers need to be wary of getting too excited with their toys and playing with peoples emotional states. Likewise as immersion and realism increase gamers, and the parents of gamers as many of you will become, need to be more discerning in the games they play, just as some movies are beyond peoples coping abilities (to this day I wish I could unwatch French film Irreversible) soon games will have that dubious honour. When you play a game you’re making a connection between yourself and a game, but that connection goes both ways.
Take care of yourself, and each other. Goodnight.
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Comments
Top shelf article mate. Brilliant.