Violence in VG & BioShock

The four readings for today all discussed the effect of violent video games in our society. I found the article “Violent video games make people violent. But so do pictures of snakes” to be particularly interesting. This article compared the rush after playing a video game to the feeling during athletic competitions or seeing something scary. Basically, it’s a spike in adrenaline. I do understand that this adrenaline feels amazing, and people may do things to achieve this high. That does not mean that people will take the video game into the real world by harming people. Plenty of people can simply play the game again and again or find it through another outlet. Maybe there are a select few who are inspired by violent video games, but their issue does not come directly from the game; it comes from personal mental issues and unhealthy interactions with the rest of society. I also found the comparison of the US, UK, and Japan to be convincing. The US, UK, and Japan all have similar video game use but very different levels of societal violence. If violence in games truly caused violence in society, then why would the numbers be so different (even among very different cultures)?

The third article talks about the NRA and how they label the video game industry but also brings up that over half of US households have a game console, meaning a large swathe of Americans play video games and do not exhibit violent behavior. This article made me more doubtful than before of the link between violence and video games when you consider the role of the NRA. They want to shift the focus of mass shootings away from issues with guns and chose violence in media to be their scapegoat. Considering their strong politcal influence, it is no surprise that they were able to effectively spread the misconception that violence in video games inspires shooters. (Sorry to bring politics into this discussion….)

I will say that for me personally, playing BioShock did not give me any sort of high. I found the creepy cult society a very interesting story (side note: I have a MAJOR obsession with cults). I couldn’t bring myself to throw the ball at the people tied up, and my only other option was to hit the announcer. That is when sh*t truly hit the fan. I knew that I had to find the officers, but the blood splatter and mutilated faces really bothered me. I tried to just run away from them, but they all just kept hitting me. The game did not give me any sort of high at all. I was super uncomfortable with my actions.

Posted on by Alexandra Smith
Categories: Uncategorized

7 Responses

  1. James Bachmann says:
    October 28, 2018 at 3:15 pm

    I do agree with many of your pints, where when it comes to any real issue, people point to something else as the scapegoat in order to protect their own ideals. It has been used many of times through out history and in truly horrible ways as well. As for not being comfortable with the gore, thats totally understandable. Some games are not for everybody, which goes for tv shows as well, some things that seem okay to a few disturb others.

  2. Joseph Sterling says:
    October 28, 2018 at 3:20 pm

    I agree with the majority of the articles that video games don’t cause violence. I also found it funny how the NRA took such a strong stance against video games, and then came out with a rifle range simulator targeted at children.

    Now for Bioshock. I too found the creepy cult society interesting and unnerving. But what was more unnerving was the controls. Not to say that they were bad, it’s just that I don’t like FPS’s and am bad at the controls. Not being as in control of my actions as Portal made me feel extra uneasy. Along with that, the sound being put through a dubstep meat grinder at 144p (best description I can think of), made my initial experience not that pleasing. I still liked the game, and am really interested in the story, but the sound problems really held the game back.

  3. Micaela Willoughby says:
    October 28, 2018 at 4:33 pm

    There was the third option of not throwing the ball at all, I believe, but I was pretty angry with the announcer so I chose to throw it at him, without really thinking about the consequences. I was a little appalled by the racist aspect of the game. I wasn’t anticipating it (though I did wonder why everyone was white, but I kinda chalked it up to poor representation of minorities in VGs). However, that’s part of the narrative and helps to vilify the villains. Like you, I’m very, very intrigued by the cult aspect of the game. Kinda want to know how it all got this way.

  4. Rachel Helbling says:
    October 28, 2018 at 8:47 pm

    I am also interested to find out more about the game and the setting of the game. I am still confused about where exactly we are, why it is the way it is, and what exactly our overall mission is. I was also disturbed by some of the very violent parts of the game and am not sure if I like the first person shooter style of video game. At some points I found it difficult to figure out the correct controls to use. I also threw the ball at the announcer and am very curious how the game would have played out differently if i would have choose a different option. I am interested to see what other kinds of choices we will have to make in this game.

  5. Hyewon Hong says:
    October 29, 2018 at 10:21 am

    Most of the time violence in video games is not hyper realistic, giving it sort of a cartoonish feel that feels fun and exciting. When it is realistic, at least in a story driven plot line, it is often designed to make the player uncomfortable. It makes the hard choices even harder and adds to an underlying tone of the game. The notion that one singular thing can cause personality defections is absurd, it stems from a coalition of multivariable traits that develop over the course of someones life.

  6. Ahsan Ahmad says:
    October 29, 2018 at 11:25 am

    I personally agreed with the articles that disprove the link between violence and gaming as well. Certainly, there could be a correlation, but that happens with a lot of things. As noted by the article though, it is not synonymous to causal relationships and thus does not prove any sort of link. There are definitely other factors at play which is why there’s a disparity between the statistics of different various countries. The article mentioning the NRA portrayed it pretty well, how the association’s hypocritical actions were attempts to defame videogames while ignoring the gun-control factor.

  7. Josephine Bossidy says:
    October 29, 2018 at 11:31 am

    I too found the comparison of the US, UK, and Japan very intriguing. If there was a correlation between video games, which are played in all three of these places, and violence we should’ve seen a similar amount of violence in every place. Because the amount of societal violence was different, we are able to conclude that there is surely another factor impacting violent acts. What exactly is that other factor? I am not quite sure.