Are kids really playing too many violent games?

[TheOneFreeMan]

I'm the first person to get into a bit of a rage when scaremongering mass media outlets attempt to pin anything and everything on violent games, but something happened recently which made me think.

I work at my university part-time helping to run school educational visits and such, mostly with 15-16 year olds. Recently we branched out to a few visits by primary schools, and I was asked to run a session with them on my specialist subject (which at uni has been video game design). I did this about three times with kids about the age of 9-10, and each time I opened the session with the obvious question to get them talking: what's your favourite video game, kids?

It's when some of them gave answers of Grand Theft Auto and Modern Warfare 2 that I started to think. Most of the kids seemed to have played and liked these ones the best, and they were half the age required to buy them. One little boy described to me in great detail how his ideal video game enemy would be one where you had to rip off his mask and stab a knife into his forehead to kill him. That was a bit of a "what the hell" moment for me.

How are kids this young getting hold of these games? Is it purely naive parents buying it for them, because if so I think there might be call for some major parent educating. You wouldn't buy an 18 rated DVD for your 9-year-old, why is a game any different? Or am I just blowing this a bit out of proportion?

 

[Sheepo]

I think I would say yes. For one thing, kids just play too many video games altogether. I've babysit kids who spend far more time watching TV, doing things on the computer, and playing videogames than playing outside. Before the age of nine, none of this is acceptable. They don't even have good shit to play, since casual gaming happily provides them with plenty of 'Dora's Adventure's and 'Barbie Horse Camp's. All though, I'm speaking mostly for a younger age, I'm sure at some point these kids graduate to shitty generic shooters which may or may not **** them up.

 

[Krynn72]

How are kids this young getting hold of these games? Is it purely naive parents buying it for them

Yes. There's probably also a bit of store clerk's not giving a **** and selling them to anybody, or kids ordering them online with their parents cards. But at that age, I'd say its parents buying them for their kids. Making it worse is the fact that even if a parent doesn't buy their kid the game, nothings stopping the kid from playing it at his friends house.

because if so I think there might be call for some major parent educating.

Agreed. But then they wouldn't have a scapegoat to blame all their kid's problems on and they'd have to take responsibility. Fat chance.

 

[Sheepo]

Come to think of it, I played Half-Life when I was six, and other than a severed head collection and being batshit afraid of spiders, I don't think it affected me at all.

 

[Acepilotf14]

Definitely parents. My parents and grandparents bought mature video games for me all the time, and I turned out okay, right?

The main problem is kids not getting enough education OUTSIDE of these video games. It'd be all fine and dandy if they were at least a little intelligent and were able to tell the difference between work and play.

As well, today's E rated games suck pretty hard. Most of the decent ones are on the DS. Back in the PS1/64 generation we had so many great non-violent or 'kiddy violence' games, there was no need for MW2 and killing everything. You had ****ing Croc, Gex, all that good stuff.

 

[Mogi67]

you should have asked them what their favorite type of porn was

 

[Stigmata]

Monica, age 9: "My ideal sexual experience would involve me being tied up and penetrated in every orifice by plungers and broom handles by a gang of at least 20 men."

 

[Barnz]

I grown up with Mortal Kombat. Now I perform fatalities on my friends.

 

[stemot]

You wouldn't buy an 18 rated DVD for your 9-year-old, why is a game any different? Or am I just blowing this a bit out of proportion?

Really? I was watching 18 rated films when I was 8. I was playing shit like Mortal Kombat, Cannon Fodder, DreamWeb, Bloodnet, Alien Breed, Barbarian Games, Brutal Sports Football, Double Dragon, Darkseed, Final Fight, WaxWorks, Moonstone, NARC, Persian Gulf Inferno, Aliens, Syndicate, Robocop, Smash TV and Zombie Apocalypse. All either 18 rated or violent games I was playing way before I was legally old enough. I'd like to think they are actually the reason I always find another way around things rather than using violence.
Not that I would ever let the lad play the GTA games at the minute or anything like that but I have no qualms letting him play something like Assassins Creed or AvP.

 

[flamingdts]

I played CS and Half Life when I was about 10-12.

I also played Diablo 2 when I was around 14.

To be honest, I don't know why some kids turn out violent. I find complacency in some violent video games (the awesome ways to kill your enemies are actually pretty satisfying), but I never do that in reality.

I guess the biggest issue is distingishing between virtual reality and reality. When kids fail to do that, then shit happens.

 

[CyberPitz]

Monica, age 9: "My ideal sexual experience would involve me being tied up and penetrated in every orifice by plungers and broom handles by a gang of at least 20 men."

 

[Katamariguy]

Even ToysRus has caught onto this.
http://blogs.toysrus.com/videogames/
This site doesn't let on thatgames such resistance and Starcraft are on sale
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE65841B20100609

 

[Deleted member 56031]

Hell idk i watched aliens when i was 4
i played half-life when i was about 7 and played gta when i was 10

 

[Danimal]

I actually called a kid mortal and tried to choke him to some effect when I was 12 and at the peak of my Warcraft 3 days.

So I do believe there is some thing as too many violent (Or any) video games.

Also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_effect

 

[Ren.182]

I was the first kid in my primary school to get GTA, I was around 8 I think.

Used to play Resident Evil late at night, it kept me awake the first night I played it, but that was excitement and wanting to play more rather than being scared or wanting to go kill people

Then again, games when I were young weren't really as gory (apart from Mortal Kombat) as modern day games purely because the graphics couldn't handle such things.

I think its fine as long as the parents educate their kids about the games, saying they aint real etc. My parents never educated me on the games but I knew they weren't real and just enjoyed them as games. But what you described about the kid wanting a game to stab someone in the head sounded pretty bad.

Overall kids play too many games these days. Granted I did play a lot, but I still went outside to play football and other sports everyday. I really only played a couple of hours at night. Parents need to take more responsibilities.

 

[Avoidist]

There are plenty of decent games out there other than COD and GTA that would be so more effective for these kids, from Super Mario Galaxy and Portal all the way to Mass Effect and Half-Life - more 'sensible' games with some merit other than killing sprees that might just spark their imagination as well as their interest.

The fact that these kids manage to get their hands on these more violent games that clearly aren't intended for them astounds me, and it seems they are just playing them for kicks rather than actually enjoying the games on a deeper level as well like we do.

The next generation will grow up to be a mass of football-aspiring shopping cart pushing steroid junkies playing Gears of War 7 shouting "Awsoom" at the top of their smoke filled lungs while shooting their friends in the face with a projectile chainsaw.

And I'm against that.

 

[Eejit]

I blithely assume it's what causes things like this.

 

[Kyorisu]

I blithely assume it's what causes things like this.

No it takes many hours of arse hattery and sheer hate for your fellow man that causes that.

As for the topic at hand I have a little brother who is 8 turning 9 sometime this year. The worst game he's played is MOH on the PS1. I tend to find older games aren't that bad compared to more modern things and he's playing the same things I did with the exception of the Wii. He also has a computer in his room with some popcap games on it but no access to the internet for obvious reasons.

 

[Jintor]

My lil' bro's 12 and he's goddamn addicted to Dota. Or LoL, or HoN, or whatever's the happenin' thing these days.

 

[13LACKBISHOP]

Are kids really playing too many violent games?

Maybe it's just me but I have been playing violent videogames ever since I was a child and I am less violent than the vast majority of people. I don't think I have become more violent because of it. Nor would I say anybody else that plays violent videogames that I am aware of has become more violent because of it in contrast to other children who play less videogames altogether. Just a simple observation.

 

[Jintor]

I wonder if the cartoony violence of TF2 would be considered a violent game by media standards bodies

 

[flamingdts]

My lil' bro's 12 and he's goddamn addicted to Dota. Or LoL, or HoN, or whatever's the happenin' thing these days.

I ****ing hate those two games/mod.

I love the actual game itself, but the mod really pisses me off. Every single time I lan with my friends, they want to play Dota. That game is imbalanced as ****.

 

[Mogi67]

I dunno, we've all grown up around violent stuff, it's just different violent stuff. Like, I started playing Doom when I was about 5 or 6, I also had tons of Aliens figures left over from my older brother. I would always make up violent scenarios when they tore apart the Space Marines. Then when I was 10 or 11 I saw The Thing and bought a grotesque Thing figure from Mcfarlane.

Etc etc


But yeah kids play too many games.

Yeah, I think most of us were exposed to a similar level of violence at a young age. I remember my parents didn't let me play Mortal Kombat, but I still did. I remember chuckling with my friend as we made up our own gruesome fatalities, and nowadays I'm a very nonviolent person. I think as long as children are taught that violent aggression is wrong and they realize the distinction between video games and RL, then they should be fine. But still, kids today spend way too much time indoors in front of a screen. When I have children they're going to be doing reckless shit outside, scraping their knees up

 

[Krynn72]

When I have children they're going to be doing reckless shit outside, scraping their knees up

Until they realize that their friends have video games. Then they'll be over their house all the time playing without you knowing about it.