Video Games and Placing Blame!!!

I am not an avid game player nor do I pride myself on being able to kill as many aliens as I can, but having studied video games in a textual studies perspective and having studied them neutrally, I must say that it is interesting as to how the media has not only misrepresented the role of video games in society but has lured players into news channels so they may openly blame these game players. Today, on CNN Chris Mathews, asked the gunman's roommate from Virginia Tech about the lifestyle that his roommate lived. And in a series of questions about his personality, the first thing Chris Mathews said was "Is there a gaming culture on campus? Are there a lot of people interested in video games and do they play them seriously?" I was shocked at how random but cleverly placed the questions were and how calculated an effort he made to get this roommate of the gunman to say "Yes we play video games and e want to kill people." But this was not the case, and in actuality, Chris Mathews was clearly disappointed when the roommate said, "Some people like the games and others don't its not a big issue or anything on campus." I really understand what the class was speaking of when they discussed the ready blame that was being placed on video games for violence and what the group on Racing cars and simulation was exploring in terms of game play aggressive and real life aggressive. I observed this same stigma for video games amongst the new genre of upcoming South Asian themes games where religious leaders claimed that if children learn in their teen years to blow up "Mother Kali" and ancient Hindu temples, as they do in Ashoka and Hungama and Animex which got me thinking of how these players both in America and in the South Asian sub-continent would react to such strenuous comments. This incidence took me back to our Speaker's comments about powerful people's invested interests but in this case I never saw it so real as I did today.

Slipper Slope Argument

Listening to the guest speaker's talk today, I found the concept of what we call in Ethics the "Slippery Slope " Argument very relevant and interesting when connected to the idea of textual studies within the genre of video games. The basic idea is that of one action that is borderline to something else and causes controversy will eventually lead to an action of a higher degree or next level. For example, if one says it is alright to test embryos in stem cell research then is it also alright for one to test infants? One may ask Where do we draw the line? And that is the concept of the slippery slope where one thing may inevitably lead to another which is much worst. Our speaker discussed this slippery slope concept as argued by the media and how the violence in video games will eventually spill over into real life and how that is an argument many hold to be valid within the political and social sectors of the world. To think that those groups all have a vested interest in making the argument changed my perception of violent video games and the actual act of playing as well. It makes one think twice of how the Calvinistic way of thinking has become so automatic in our heads that if an activity is considered idle we think of it as immoral or at least very close to that. I wasn't aware of the concept of an alternate reality that we create for ourselves even as children in which we create those acts that we desire to do but cannot in the "real" world because of social limitations. It almost makes me think that is players wouldn't rid their aggression in video games then maybe they might build up frustration an dwho knows what that would lead to. This might be too extreme a thought but it does make me think of video games as a mode of releasing violence safely and venting rather than traditionally presented by the media as violence builders and increasing violence in society as opposed to acting like a filter and maintaining the sanity of players.

Rejecting Reality

After spending some time with FACADE and our online class on Friday I began to think about the implications of such games which provide a setting and history but then allow you to create your own. In terms of Resistance, I would compare it to reading the background notes that come up right before every level but then having the option to go through the notes, rewrite the history in terms of the main character and also the armed forces at a large ,and then go in and play the game each time with a new plot. That is almost exactly what these games allow for they provide the option to reject the already created reality by automatically using your actions to decide a new game type without which the game cannot go on. The difference I see between these games and First person Shooters in terms of plot is that there the action occurs after the plot methodology is decided, for the armed forces need a reason to fight, whereas FACADE is more creative and less reactive which means one is able to create one's own world and allow the plot methodology, but not the plot itself, to alter for the goal is to unite the couple at the end. Though i must mention, I am very skeptical as to the level of freedom that I have heard other reviews overestimate regarding these types of games as "a future canvas for players" for there are a limited amount of reactions that can be programmed. This leads us back to the same question about how "real" first person shooters are for they too have a programmed set of ways the enemy can react in terms of the players actions. I found that after a few movements, if one chooses a different route, such as going around a car or under a flight of stairs, the inevitable contact with the enemy occurs as a result of the setting eventually leading you back to where they are waiting to fight. in that sense, one may feel that there is much freedom in these games, but once again, our freedom as players is limited by the imagination of the programmers for they predict a list of our reactions and they ALLOW us to perform those actions in the game so the false sense of freedom will soon, I think, be treated like all other games that we've had in the past as limiting and our desire for "more reality" will continue.