Violence in the Binding of Isaac - Assignment Example

While there is the aspect of child abuse as a background story, we cannot deny the fact that it is overshadowed by violence and that gamers want to play not because they want to see why and how Isaac was being abused but to be able to go to Isaac’s violent imaginary world (Giantbomb Website).  If the designer wanted to use his game to inform people about child abuse, I must admit that he succeeded and I admire him for it. But the point here is that the game while opening the gamers’ eyes on child abuse, seems to teach that violence is the answer.

Isaac, on being pushed to a corner resorts to imagining himself in violent situations where he must win in order to get a prize and feel good. And as a gamer is elevated to another level, he will again battle his way to get out of that level. While it is true that the game was created for adults, children today have easy access to computers and when unsupervised, they can get access to, and play this adult game. The designer, in using child abuse as the main story in the game and violence as an answer to forget pain, unwittingly encourages gamers to accept violence as just.

The danger of such video games is that we never know if and when a player will soon be so absorbed that his sense of justice and what is right and wrong will be so muddled that there will come a time when he will unintentionally cross the line.