Ethics of Violence in Video Games - Essay Example

The Ethics of Violence in Video Games 0 Thesis Violence in video games is not ethically wrong, either in a normative or applied sense. 1.1 Introduction Before delving into a subject as complex as the ethics of violence within computer games it will be advantageous to outline some initial definitions to provide a foundation for the study. To be succinct, ethics, violence and computer games need to be defined. While these words might appear to be self-evident as to their meaning, having a specific definition in mind will help to frame the overall study. What person may regard as an adherence to ethics may be another person's attempt at censorship. Similarly, what may be violence to one may be just a form of harmless aggression to another. Within this introduction the basic definitions will be introduced that will be expanded upon later in this analysis. Ethics is the study of what is morally "good" or bad, "right" or "wrong" (Cahn, 2001). It deals essentially with ought to be rather than what should be, and thus is concerned less what factual knowledge than with a consideration in a moral sense of what is occurring within a situation. The kind of ethics that will be most applied within this study is applied ethics, that is the application of so-called "normative" theories to actual situations. Normative ethics attempts to find an absolute standard of right and wrong, and thus tended, until recently, to be divorced somewhat from the real world (Bonhoeffer, 1995). Applied ethics takes these norms, for example, the idea that "violence in computer games is harmful to children playing them" and attempts to make an ethical statement about them. Thus the applied ethical standard in this case would be, "violence in computer games is ethically wrong". Violence is defined by the American Heritage Dictionary in the following way: 1. Physical force exerted for the purpose of violating, damaging, or abusing: crimes of violence. 2. The act or an instance of violent action or behavior. 3. Intensity or severity, as in natural phenomena; untamed force: the violence of a tornado. 4. Abusive or unjust exercise of power. 5. Abuse or injury to meaning, content, or intent: do violence to a text. 6. Vehemence of feeling or expression; fervor. (American, 2006) A cursory look at this definition raises some interesting questions regarding "violence" in video games. Are any violent acts actually committed when someone is playing a video game or are they acts of simulated violence Indeed, the only exact correlation between what exists in a video game and the above definition may in #6 and this, as shall be explored, may in fact be a positive aspect of the playing of video games. The definition of video game is fairly simple. It is a game "played" on either a computer screen or television screen in which a person (or persons) interact with the game through some kind of peripheral device such as a keyboard/mouse in a traditional computer game, or a controller in the dedicated video game consoles such as the Playstation and X-Box which now dominate the market. This study will examine, in an applied ethical manner, the rights and wrongs of violence within computer games. It will first consider briefly the history of video games vis--vis the violence in them. Next it will consider arguments against computer game violence and then those that support the idea that the experience may actually be beneficial rather than harmful to the player(s) of the game. The study will end with a consideration of how violence in video games is likely to develop in the coming years. 1.2 The History of Video Games: Violent and Otherwise The history of video games may be traced back to 1948, when the idea of the video game was patented by Thomas Goldsmith and Estle Mann (De Maria, 2003). Ten years later, William Higginbotham's Tennis for Two became the first video game that was displayed to the public, but it was only in 1972 that the Magnavox Odyssey became available as the first consumer video game console (Kent, 2001). None of the early games that existed during the 1970's and into the mid 1980's could be regarded as "violent" because even if the video game depicted violence, such as in the Atari boxing game, the game was unrealistic and far removed from the actual experience of the activity. 'Boxing' involved tiny "men" with square limbs who fought one another through a series of repetitive movements. To a modern day gamer they resemble dots on a screen. By the late 1980's and into the early 1990's personal computers were becoming much more powerful and with the introduction of the Nintendo game system, somewhat more realistic games started to appear. The characters in the games started to take on more "human" physical attributes i.e. they actually looked human. Thus the difference between video game simulation and actual reality began its long progress to the current situation in which some of the most advanced video game systems, such as the Playstation 3, have high definition graphics that approach the point at which the characters being controlled by the gamer could be mistaken for real human beings in a film. As video games developed during the 1970's and 1980's and then exploded in the 1990's different genres of video game started to appear. While gamers often disagree on which category individual games should be placed in, there are several main types into which most games clearly fit. There are Action, Fighting, Racing, Role-Playing (RPG), Strategy, Sports and Shooting games. Many of these have some component of violence involved with them and this has caused much of the controversy surrounding the video game market. These various genres developed independently upon Nintendo, Playstations and more recently X-Box consoles, and normally customers have a choice of buying a single game for whatever console they happen to have. Competition among the three major players in the gaming industry: Ninetndo, Microsoft and Sony has spurred innovation and advance, brining about much more complex and realistic games that appeal to a wide range of the population. Currently the dominant age-group for game-playing is young males under the age of twenty, although many of them seem to carrying on playing games well into adulthood as the sales of both new systems and games to the 20-40 age-group are greatly increasing (NPD, 2006). The NPD Group (National Purchase Data) tracks the sales of both individual components and whole sectors of the consumer sales industry. In 2004 it reported $6.2 billion in software sales and $3.7 billion in hardware (console) sales, while computer game sales had fallen to $1.1 billion (NPD, 2005). The $11 billion total compares favorably to the $7.1 billion that the movie industry took in from the box-office during the same year. The video game industry can thus be described as one of hte4 major, if not the major, form of entertainment at present in the Western world in general, and within the USA in particular. As far as the development of violent video games is concerned, they have become increasingly complex, realistic and imaginative in terms of the types of violence being offered. Early "shoot-em-up" games involved fairly simple plot lines in which the player would merely shoot at everything he (and seldom she) sees in front of them, somewhat similar to the type of shooting that occurs in an amusement arcade. However, as computers, and increasingly dedicated game consoles, became increasingly complex and more powerful, so the games started to expand in terms of the range of activities available to the characters and the type of violence they would indulge in. Role-playing and strategy games started to be mixed with the more violent killing games to create complex worlds in which violence, while often extreme, would be part of a sophisticated, remarkably realistic world. Thus one of the most famous, and criticized, video games, the Grand Theft Auto series has opportunities for a wide variety of violence from ordinary shooting to beating up to torture to sexual violence, but all is placed within a complex plot-line. This type of game, which has been copied by numerous others, places the gamer within a realistic modern environment, complete with dialogue and plot-lines. The violence is recognizably relevant to today's society: the gamer can play a role that they could conceivably go out and mimic in the real world. Some violent games involve fantasy-playing in which the character moves within an imaginary world, perhaps related to a fictional environment (such as the Middle Ages in The Lord of the Rings) or puts them in the position of a non-human creature or occasionally, an animal. An example of this is Jaws: The Revenge in which the gamer plays the role of the shark rather than of a character trying to kill it as might be expected. As the shark the gamer dwells in a strange underwater world in which it needs to eat fish to keep going, can attack people, boats and other animals for a reason (as part of the plot) or for no reason at all. Thus one section of the game involves what is termed "free swimming" in which the player can swim around the ocean and attack people, slowly ripping them to pieces or swallowing them whole if they so choose. So video games have become increasingly violent, and now offer a whole range of simulated violence that would assuage the most developed imagination, and yet they set that violence within a complex environment in which quite a lot of thought is often required. 2.0 Criticism of Violent Video Games Criticism of violent video games has been part of an age-old (but resurgent) attempt by various groups and individuals to examine different forms of entertainment and to censor them when they are considered in some way unethical, in either a normative or applied sense. Those who criticize video game violence from the purely normative to the purely applied with a continuum between the two. The idea that video game violence is an absolute wrong because it coarsens society in general and makes young people desensitized to violence is perhaps epitomized by the organization called MAVAV (standing for Mothers Against Videogame Addiction and Violence in Underground Video Game Cultures). On its website MAVA paints an alarming picture, comparing video game addiction and addiction to violent videogame in particular as "comparable even to drug and alcohol abuse" and accuses the videogame industry of marketing and promoting "hatred, racism and the most disturbing trend: clans and guilds, an underground video game phenomenon which closely resembles gangs". Within the point of view of MAVAV vide game violence and addiction is equivalent to the supposedly absolute evils of drug and alcohol abuse. Video games are unethical in a normative sense, yet also in an applied sense because they supposedly lead to violence in the real world, perhaps even gang related. Video game violence is seen as the absolutely unethical fulcrum around which other unethical activities revolve. While obviously well-intentioned, those who take an absolute normative stance against video game violence often seem to descend into a form of unintentional self-parody that is rather amusing for someone not involved in the group. Thus on the homepage of the MAVAV website the organization informs the reader about "gamer plays 28 hours straight to Beat the Burning Crusade First" (MAVAV, 2007) . This article states that a 24 year-old French gamer "by the alias of Gawell played 28 frightening hours straight to beat the Burning Crusade expansion pack, a video game which experts predicted would take months to complete" (MAVAV, 2007). In all apparent seriousness MAVAV announces that they have "previously raised the threat level to red in preparation of the possible dangers, such as this, from the Burning Crusade expansion pack" (MAVAV, 2007). This kind of criticism of video game violence seems to actually be a reflection of a much wider and deeper mistrust of modern society within the members of the organization. The idea of having a "threat level" for new videogame releases attempts to put videogame violence within the same category as terrorist violence with its constantly changing threat levels. As with terrorist violence it is the "threat" of violence that seems to worry MAVAV more than its actuality. What the precise threat is from a grown man, albeit perhaps a trifle obsessed, playing a videogame constantly for 28 hours is uncertain and never actually defined by the organization. MAVAV starts with an assumption that they never seek to fully explore or question: violent videogames are absolutely unethical, and then move on from there. As is the case with most ethical arguments however, most of those who are opposed to video game violence claim to be so because of the supposedly damaging effects upon the gamer him/herself and the society that they live within. This applied ethical point of view is that video games desensitize the players to violence and/or make them more likely to commit violence in real life. There are many, varied and often contradictory explanations for the supposedly harmful effects of violence videogames propounded by these critics. For example, one segment of the critics seem to consider that videogames in general, and violent videogames in particular are "bad" because they take the person away from "real" live to live out their fantasies. Thus the makers of the multiplayer online game World of Warcraft (Blizzard Entertainment) are criticized for making a game so complicated and difficult that it will take "nearly several months of a player's life to complete" (MAVAV). But the same critics suggest that these games will make the children and teenagers who play them more violent in real life. There is a contradiction here: how can a person find time for gang activity and/or other acts of violence if they are spending virtually every waking moment not at school or work playing video games Again, most of the critics lack either the academic credentials and/or the neutrality to examine the casual relationship between videogame violence and actual violence. This causal relationship is necessary if the person is attempting to condemn violent video games based upon an applied ethical, rather than a normative ethical standpoint. At times anti-violence groups use some very spurious, if not outright misleading 'logic' to attempt to prove their point. Thus in an interview with NPR (National Public Radio) one of the organizers of MAVAV, Pamela Eakes, states that "homicide, suicide and accidents are the top causes of death for 15 to 24 year-olds". This is true, but the main reason for it is that these people tend to be enjoying the healthiest time of their lives and are thus not prone to the diseases that top the death rates at later ages. What precise relation these death-rates have to videogame violence is again never made clear, especially as the majority of such murders are black-on-black murders that are gang-related, and thus occur among groups that are unlikely to be avid gamers. To be fair to those opposed to video game violence, there are cases in which acts of violence have been committed that seem linked to video games, but in a sense that actually discounts a causal link. For example, the Columbine High School killings of 12 students and 1 teacher were committed by two young men who had played thousands of hours of a first-person shooter video game that had been modified to have the same lay-out as their high school. But of more relevance were the dozens of hours the two teenagers spent practicing shooting with real guns in the forests of Colorado. In this case, as with many others, it seems as though video games were used to practice violent acts which the perpetrators were already planning to carry out. They were useful dry-run for the murders rather than a causal agent (Brown, 2002). In fact this case may suggest, in a bizarre sense, that the conditioning offered by videogames can actually limit the potential number of killings. Thus when Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold actually started shooting people they stopped within a few minutes when they could have actually killed hundreds. The reason that they stopped is unclear, but it may have been because the killings were not similar to the clean, clinical and bloodless killings of the videogames. Harris and Klebold may have been conditioned for videogame killing, but not actual killing. At the other end of the scale in studies regarding the effect of videogame violence on players in general, and young impressionable male players in particular are the host of academic studies that do attempt a scientific, and thus objective analysis of the behavioral influences of these games. Many of these studies start with a perhaps undeniable inference that if a person spends a large part of their waking hours doing a particular activity:- whether it is reading books, hunting, surfing the Internet, playing videogames - it is likely to have at least some effect upon their behavior. As Strasburger (1995) puts it, concern about videogames is merely present end of a long line of supposedly seductive and corrupting influence upon youth that starts with Socrates being forced to commit suicide for teaching young men dangerous ideas, and moves through books, theatre, paintings, photography, film and on to the computer revolution. Strasburger suggests that the ethical arguments against videogames are, at least in part, based upon the fact that constant exposure to violence can condition children, at least partially, towards a desensitization towards violence. As he further suggests, there is long distance between this fact and proving a causal link between videogame violence and actually committing a violent act. The gap between thinking about something and doing it is thankfully still quite vast. 2.1 In Support of Violent Videogames It is a paradoxical but undeniable fact that the more violent a videogame is the more complex its structure and thus the greater strategic skills are needed to complete it. "Violence" in this sense does not correlate with a simplistic calculation of the number of violent acts in the game: by this token a Tom and Jerry cartoon would be most violent form of film available, but rather the sophistication, realism and impact of the violent episodes. The "shoot-em-up" variety of videogame have more acts of violence but tend, except in their more complex form, in games such as Hitman, not to attract the kind of attention that the more "adult" plot-driven games do. Steven Johnson argues that the most violent games are actually those which best teach skills that are needed in the real world. The violent, complex adult games require a sophisticated, analytical mind in order to complete them. Johnson uses the fact that the strategy guide for Grand Theft Auto III is 53,000 words long and that "learning the boundaries, goals and controls of a given game is a highly demanding one that calls on many different areas of cognitive function" (Johnson, 2005). While this might be considered doubtful by some, a recent study involving both gamers and non-gamers suggests that visual acuity and selective attention are actually improved by playing videogames (Green, 2006). As Green suggests, :action-video gaming is capable of altering a range of visual skills" and all of these alterations were considerable improvements from the skills of non-game players. Specifically, game-players exhibited more than 20% increase in attention span over non-game players on a series of tests. The videogames that these players had been playing for at least an hour a day for at least a month before the tests included Grand Theft Auto 3 and Counter-Strike, two videogames regarded as the most violent, and thus criticized by those seeking to censor them. The causal link being identified here is not between violence and increased visual ability, but rather between the concentration required for the game and visual complications that the brain must process in the course of the game. However, the "fight or flight" elements of the brain suggest that adding an element of violence (and thus potential 'death') to the videogame leads to higher rates of involvement and concentration within the game environment. Essentially, the more violent a game is, the more likely a player is to become highly involved within it. This is an applied ethical point of view regarding videogames in general, and violent videogames in particular. Improving visual and cognitive skills within individuals, especially at a young age is a desired outcome. In one test that Green undertook with players there was a more than 60% difference in accuracy between gamers and non-gamers: 80% correct versus 20% correct. Such a massive difference suggests that not only are existing skills being improved but perhaps brand new types of visual acuity and skills are being created by videogames. The fact that these games are violent may be a necessary component of developing this skill, as it is the violent games that keep the gamers interested in playing. A peaceful, happy videogame that occurs in a world in which all the characters live joyfully together will hardly make for a very interesting gaming experience. The simulation of violence may also act as a type of therapy that enables a person to live through violence without actually having to commit a violent act. Thus a simulated piece of violence within a videogame will act as a deterrent to actual violence rather than an encouragement for it (Anderson, 2003). The theory that simulated violence may act as a block to actual violence is controversial but may be related to the behavior of many different societies and even animals. Thus many higher mammals indulge in "ritual conflicts" in order to avoid the injury and possible death involved with an actual fight. The existence of violent games is also linked to such symbolic avoidance of actual violence: both the players and the spectators purge themselves of violent emotions through the game. Videogames may be the ritualized combat of the Twenty-First Century. One ethical argument that support violent videogames is one that is both normative and applied in nature. This revolves around the idea that freedom of expression is central to all other freedoms that are enjoyed within a free and democratic society. There is a reason that the first amendment to the US Constitution is the one that guarantees freedom of speech: it is because from this all other freedoms flow. Violent video games are a form of "speech" or "expression", both on the part of those who develop/distribute them and also on the part of those who play them. Normative ethics suggests that only the most objectionable behavior and language should be stopped: that which actively and undeniably harms others or tries to persuade one group to hurt another. There is a cost to such freedom, but applied ethics suggests that it is well worth the advantages which thus accrue. The majority of people may well find violent videogames objectionable and parents have the perfect right to stop their children from playing them, or stop them from playing any videogames at all for that matter. But the right to stop such games cannot extend to the supposed right to stop others from enjoying these games as they see fit. Applied ethics suggests the "slippery slope" doctrine here. This is the idea that once one type of speech is banned it becomes progressively easier to ban other forms of speech. A country then starts to descend the slippery slope towards an authoritarian government in which all expression needs to pass through an official censor or passed a gate-keeper before it is acceptable. Those who seek to define what is ethically "right" and "wrong" for others should consider the fact that one day their opinions may be unpopular, and they too may be silenced. A violent videogame might appear to be a slim reed on which to hang as large a part of society as freedom of expression, but it serves the purpose nevertheless. It is the defense of unpopular or supposedly "immoral" speech and expression that is the test of a country's resolve to preserve its freedoms. Thus violent computer games are ethically acceptable because they are part of a society in which all forms of human activity and expression are regarded as correct unless they are specifically harmful to others. The ethical correctness of the activity is found within the fact that it exists and is allowed. A diversity of views and activities guards against the abdication of expression to the totalitarian few. 3 The Future of Violent Videogames As computers become more and more powerful and as game consoles/software match them in terms of the realism, complexity and total involvement that they offer to the game-players, it is likely the violence will become ever more realistic. The advent of virtual reality videogames in which either goggles re worn or, in the more distant future, people can enter "game rooms" that offer a near-to-real experience of the particular game world then gamers will be able to live out their aggressive fantasies within ever increasing verisimilitude. While this present analysis has effectively shown that there is no intrinsic ethical wrongness in the present violent videogames this does not necessarily imply that future problems will not occur. The total immersion of a gamer within a violent world may make the person even more desensitized to violence than is presently the case. If videogames get to the stage where telling the difference between the game and reality becomes almost impossible (this is currently not on the horizon but may occur some time in the future) then the whole paradigm through which the games are seen needs to be changed. One of the first ethical principles ever developed was the idea of the "golden mean", first introduced by the Ancient Greeks nearly 3000 years ago. The golden mean suggests that all activities should be done in moderation - it is only when done to extreme that most of them become a vice. This ethical principle can be applied to video games, both presently and in the future. Common sense suggests that if a child is playing a violent videogame for eight hours a day at weekends and for four hours a night during the school week then their behavior is likely to be influenced. The violence is not the factor here, but rather the obsessive and apparently addictive qualities that video game-playing seems to have. The important factor is for the gamer to have balance within their lives. An enthusiasm for videogames may bring about a number of advantages and improvements in life. The ability to concentrate on a single task for long period of time, visual acuity and comprehension, cognitive skills and the ability to navigate through a complex environment may all benefit from playing video games. But these benefits will accrue from a moderate amount of time spent playing them. There is simply no need to play them eight hours a day, as many other aspects of life will surely suffer because of this. Again, the golden mean, which involves moderation in all activities, is what should be aimed for within video game-playing. There will always be those, both as individuals and as banded together within groups, who will seek to censor the realms of enjoyment and entertainment open to others. Some of these people are well meaning, others are influenced by an unfortunate tendency to be afraid of (and thus want to destroy) anything which they do not understand. The lightning reflexes and apparently obsessive concentration exhibited by the videogame player may seem threatening to those who were not brought up with such devices, and to whom computers in general are rather frightening machines. With time there will be fewer and fewer people who do not understand videogames and what they can bring to a person's life. Children should be taught that there is a time to turn off the game console and to indulge in other activities, but they will not be taught this through presenting them with the supposed evils of playing a violent game when no such evil exists, at least for the vast majority of people who are reasonably balanced in an emotional sense and unlikely to commit violent acts. A few, thankfully rare, individuals may use videogames to practice their planned murders, as the Columbine killers did, but their actions should not be allowed to stop the enjoyment of the vast majority who merely experience videogames as a harmless amusement. Care should be taken to see what effect very violent games have as they become more and more realistic, but the tendency should be to accept that most people have the good sense to know the difference between a game and real life. This reliance upon the innate common sense and virtue of most people is perhaps the most ethical stance a society can have. ________________________________________ Works Cited Books American Heritage Dictionary, Houghton-Mifflin, New York: 2006. Anderson, Craig. "Violent Video Games: Myths, Facts and Unanswered Questions". Pschological Science. Vol. 16, #5. October, 2003. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Ethics. Touchstone, London: 1995. Brown, Brooks. Erritt, Rob. No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine. Lantern Books, New York: 2002. Brown, Brooks. Merritt, Rob. No Easy Answers: The Truth Behind Death at Columbine. Cahn, Steven. Markie, Peter. Ethics: History, Theory and Contemporary Issues. Oxford UP, London: 2001. De Maria, Rusel. Wilson, Johnny. High Score! The Illustrated History of Electronic Games. McGraw Hill, New York: 2003. Green, Shawn. Bavelier, Daphne. "Action video game modifies visual selective attention" Nature, April 29, 2006. Johnson, Steven. Everything Bad is Good for You. Riverhead, San Francisco: 2005. Kent, Steven. The Ultimate History of Video Games: From Pong to Pokemon - The Story Behind the Craze that Touched Our Lives and Changed the World. Three Rivers Press, San Francisco: 2001. National Purchase Data, "Video Game Receipts", 2005. Strasberger, Victor. Adolescents and the Media: Medical and Psychological Impact (Developmental Clinical Psychology and Psychiatry). Sage, New York: 1995. Games Grand Theft Auto Grand Theft Auto III Hitman Jaws: The Revenge Tennis for Two The Lord of the Rings World of Warcraft Websites www.mavav.org Research Folder 1.1 Introduction American Heritage Dictionary, Houghton-Mifflin, New York: 2006. Look "violence" up on the free online version, print this page out. The exact definition of the words and terms used within an analysis is essentially. This is especially the case with a term such as "violence", which is apparently simple to define, but which in reality is more than complex than might appear superficially. This dictionary was important in discerning that violence is normal an active, actually occurring happening rather than a portrayal of it as occurs in video games. The definition of violence also includes the idea of "vehemence of feeling or expression; fervor" which might be applied to video game violence. Thus 'violence' is a complex, multifaceted word that can be applied, used and abused by those who have a particular point of view. Those who suggests that video game 'violence' is wrong seem to equate it with actual violence rather than the simulated violence which occurs in the games. This slippery use of definition needs to analyzed and shown up for what it is. Bonhoeffer, Dietrich. Ethics. Touchstone, London: 1995. Amazon again, p.1. Bonhoeffer is useful as a reflective, but profound reflection upon the nature of ethics and their relationship to actual activity. Thus her opening line, "the knowledge of good and evil seems to be the aim of all ethical reflection" is an essential element of this analysis of video games. Those who would wish to censor them seem to suggest that their violence is innately "evil" while other activities are seen as "good". Many people who support video games do not consider the world in terms of "good" or "evil", but rather have a more relativistic stance. The analysis will consider whether those who support video games in general, and the right to play the violence within them in particular, can actually argue that these activities are "good", even though they do not feel comfortable with the world. Cahn, Steven. Markie, Peter. Ethics: History, Theory and Contemporary Issues. Oxford UP, London: 2001. Look this up on Amazon.com - print out p.2. in the excerpts Cahn and Markie provide a useful background to the whole topic of ethics. This was particularly important for this study as many people, especially those who criticize video games, attempt to use the words "ethical" and/or "unethical" without a sound grasp of what they imply. Ethics are designed to apply somewhat theoretical concepts to practical situations, and those situations in turn lead to changes in ethics. The idea that ethics and, as Cahn puts it "moral philosophy", are living, changing disciplines rather than standards set in stone. Changing ethics are needed to consider a matter as modern and apparently "new" as computer games and the violence contained within them. Ethics can be used, in Cahn's words "to alter behavior", and thus should be used carefully, especially within a free society in which liberated choice is the norm. 1.2 The History of Video Games: Violent and Otherwise De Maria, Rusel. Wilson, Johnny. High Score! The Illustrated History of Electronic Games. McGraw Hill, New York: 2003. Same p.1. This is an excellent resource for the consideration of the history of videogames. Video games have developed exponentially over the last two decades. As with much of modern technology they were introduced and then grew to prominence in a rapid, almost dizzying manner. Some attempt, as occurs in this book, to provide at least a timeline for how they have developed is necessary. This book was useful for discovering that video games had in fact been envisioned as early as when the first televisions were produced, but have only really been developed for commercial distribution in the last thirty years. Thus while the idea was there, the practical application of its depended on the development of computer technology. As the speed and storage capacity of computers have increased so games could take on the form that they now have. The authors trace this development in a readable and yet informative manner. 2.0 Criticism of Violent Video Games www.mavav.org Print out the homepage of this website This is an excellent example of some of the more extreme forms of criticism that exist regarding video games. This website is a primary source for discovering that many people regard video games, correctly or not, as a threat on a par with terrorism or other direct possibilities of violence. The website offers a fascinating insight into the thought processes of those who see video games as a corrupting influence on their children and teenagers. While some of their claims may seem amusing, MAVAV are an example of a group that might have considerable influence on law-makers and the public if their opinions are allowed to go unchallenged. Some of their points are well considered, such as the obsession exhibited by a man who plays a videogame for 28 hours straight. 2.1 In Support of Violent Videogames Anderson, Craig. "Violent Video Games: Myths, Facts and Unanswered Questions". Psychological Science. Vol. 16, #5. October, 2003. www.apa.org/science/psa/sb-anderson.html Print this out Anderson is a scholar who provides a professional psychological insight into the questions surrounding videogame violence. While he is most concerned with spelling out the dangers of playing videogames he also offers evidence for those shoe would to leave gamers alone to enjoy themselves. Essentially he says that the relationship between videogame violence and actual behavior is very complex and unproved, either way. The writer himself errs on the side of caution, but this "we don't know yet" can also be used to preserve the status quo as it is. Attempts to ban violent videogames (probably impossible because of free speech laws) or to curtail the number of people how play them should have firm evidence to back them up. Anderson shows that such evidence does not yet exist, despite his own concerns. Green, Shawn. Bavelier, Daphne. "Action video game modifies visual selective attention" Nature, April 29, 2006. www.bcs.rochester.edu/people/daphne/GreenandBavelier.pdf Green provides firm scientific evidence that playing video games actually improves various essential skills within people. The results of his scientific, controlled stuffy show a 60% difference in visual skills within certain tests between videogame players and non videogame players. Again, the videogames that were being played by the people were mostly violent in nature, suggesting once again that it is the concentration and cognitive skill needed to complete and win these games that is most important. Visual skills are increased by concentration on the game and the complex hand-eye coordination that is needed within them. The importance of Green's work is that it is firm and based upon science, rather than the innuendo and emotion that often seems to inform those who are opposed to videogames. Johnson, Steven. Everything Bad is Good for You. Riverhead, San Francisco: 2005. Amazon.com again: print out p.17 This is a humorous, easy to read but actually well-researched and deeply argued book that supports the contention that playing videogames can actually be good for a person. The idea that reading books is necessarily more "educational" or will improve a person more than playing a videogame is, according to Johnson, based upon ignorance and snobbery rather than reality. He shows that video games may actually provide a deal of cognitive learning and skills-training that will be useful to a person later in life. Johnson also points out the enjoyment per se is in fact something to aimed at as it is good for both mental and physical health. The cognitive skills that are developed by navigating through a complex game are in fact more stimulating than the actually passive process of reading a book. It is violent video games that are most difficult and which stimulate the brain most. Read More