“Video games don't create violence in society, they reflect it.”

March 19, 2018 3:01 PM

Let's Talk About Guns and Video Games [Waypoint] “America is finally having an ongoing conversation about gun violence. In the wake of last month’s school shooting in Parkland, Florida, and driven by the energetic political action of countless students across the country, it feels like there could be real regulatory action taken for the first time since the Federal Assault Weapons Ban went out of effect in 2004. Unsurprisingly, those that would prefer to dodge such regulation have, in searching for an alibi for gun violence, pointed again towards video games. In the weeks that have followed, old debates have sparked new and classic scapegoats have been pushed again to cover for the nation's inability to address a root cause.”

• The White House meeting on video game violence was unproductive and bizarre [The Verge]

“Today, President Trump brought together top executives from the gaming industry, parents groups, and members of Congress for a meeting to discuss violence in video games. Announced last week as part of President Trump’s response to the Parkland shooting, the meeting was hastily assembled and has been criticized as a purposeful distraction from more concrete gun-control measures. The proceedings were closed to the press, but by all accounts, the meeting was a strange one. The president opened the meeting by showing a supercut of hyperviolent gameplay scenes drawn largely from the Call of Duty series — a compilation that was later posted to the White House’s official YouTube account. According to The Washington Post, the president asked the group, “This is violent, isn’t it?” after the video ended. Attendees said there was little serious talk of government restrictions on content (which would present significant legal challenges), and the conversation focused on more robust age restrictions or voluntary measures that could be undertaken by the industry itself.”

• Donald Trump Takes on the Nonexistent Link Between Violent Video Games and Mass Shootings [The New Yorker]

“The notion of a causal link between virtual violence and real-world violence was present almost from the moment video games entered the mainstream. On November 9, 1982, C. Everett Koop, the U.S. Surgeon General, gave a speech at the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, in Pittsburgh, in which he challenged the country to confront the roots of domestic violence and child abuse. After the speech, an audience member asked whether Koop thought video games had a negative effect on young people. “Yes,” he replied. Teen-agers were becoming addicted to video games “body and soul,” Koop said, and it was a form of entertainment in which he saw “nothing constructive.” Though he retracted his comment the next day, the idea persisted. In the decades that followed, researchers tried and failed to discern a relationship between video-game use and mass homicide. As Justice Antonin Scalia wrote in a 2011 U.S. Supreme Court opinion, studies purporting to show such a link “have been rejected by every court to consider them, and with good reason: They do not prove that violent video games cause minors to act aggressively.””

• Trump’s tough talk on violent video games might run into a free speech wall [Vox]

“Instead, both the president and critics of violent video games at Thursday’s meeting argued that more restrictions that would prevent children from seeing or playing violent games are necessary. Sen. Rubio seemed to agree, saying afterward in a statement, “While to date there is no evidence linking violent video games to the tragedy in Parkland, Florida ... I have an interest in making sure parents are aware of the resources available to them to monitor and control the entertainment their children are exposed to.” The ESA, for its part, said in a statement that it “welcomed the opportunity” to meet with Trump and others today and that it “appreciate[d] the President’s receptive and comprehensive approach. “We discussed the numerous scientific studies establishing that there is no connection between video games and violence, First Amendment protection of video games, and how our industry’s rating system effectively helps parents make informed entertainment choices.” ZeniMax Media and Rockstar Games did not respond to requests for comment. And historically, the law has been on their side. While Thursday’s meeting focused on potential age restrictions on violent video games, the ESRB created a ratings system in 1994 indicating what questionable content a game (including violence and sexual material) may contain. And the Supreme Court has already ruled that such restrictions — when enforced by the state — are unconstitutional.”

• We Do Not Need Yet Another “Conversation” About Video Games and Violence [Slate]

“Trump’s main solution to homogenize media-enriched kids appears to be a rating system for movies and video games—a baffling idea, since movie ratings were instituted in 1968 and video game ratings in 1993. Bevin, for his part, warned that we have to be careful with what we “put in the hands of our young people” and wants us to have a “conversation” about video games, which he blames for the violence. But I have great news for these politicians, news that will save them lots of time and research money. We’ve already had this conversation. We had it after Springfield. We had it after Columbine. We had it after Sandy Hook. We’ve had this conversation so many times that it has become predictable: A shooting occurs. We learn that the suspect played video games. News articles remind us of just how violent video games are today, with screenshots of computer-generated bodies riddled with bullets. And then we look at the extensive research, which currently suggests that video games do not, in fact, lead to violent behavior. But by the time that predictable conversation winds up, we’ve been distracted from the gun issue—exactly, one would imagine, what Bevin, Trump, and other firearms enthusiasts hoped. So let’s skip right to the end, shall we?”

• Video Games Remain an Easy Out For Politicians, But Change Will Come With Time [Rolling Stone]

“The meeting is ostensibly about what the game industry can do to help with the prevalent issue of gun violence in America and the seemingly constant threat of school shootings – despite any correlation between the two. But really this meeting – the second with White House leadership about video games and violence in about half a decade – is about once more explaining to the powerful, but vastly uninformed what a video game is. No, they're not just for kids. Yes, they've moved beyond the playful bits and nonsense of Space Invaders, Pac-Man and Mario Bros. No, they don't cause violence. Yes, they can be for good, both in shaping opinion and expressing powerful ideas. The game industry meeting with President Trump is a reminder that despite the booming economy of making and selling games, despite the near-ubiquity of playing games and despite the view – earned through both great works and a Supreme Court decision – that games are art, video games are somehow still considered pop-culture adjacent by many of those in power, bits of child's play wrapped in big numbers and fancy graphics.”

• Why Most Video Game 'Aggression' Studies Are Nonsense [Kotaku]

“One major problem with the tests used by these studies is that they all measure their subjects’ aggression directly after they’ve played violent video games. Even if you assume the tests are good ways to measure aggression, this is not particularly useful information for practical purposes. If you’re a parent who wants to know how violent video games might affect your children, the bigger concern is how their behavior will be impacted in the long run. But there aren’t enough studies on the long-term effects of violent video games. Admits the APA in their report: “However, the meta‐analyses we reviewed included very few longitudinal studies, and none of those that were included considered enough time points to examine the developmental trajectory of violent video game use and associated outcomes.” So the APA’s conclusion—that there’s a consistent relation between violent games and aggression—is misleading at best. What they’ve actually concluded is that there’s a consistent relation between violent games and short-term aggression. Many of the studies examined by the APA’s report look through a wide variety of violent video games ranging from Mortal Kombat to Grand Theft Auto to Call of Duty. Often, researchers split up students or test subjects and ask some to play violent games while others play non-violent games. But there’s one factor they often don’t consider: competition.”

• Why video games are safe from Donald Trump [Polygon]

“There’s only one problem: It doesn’t seem like anyone from the industry has heard a peep from this administration. The Entertainment Software Association has issued a statement saying that neither the organization nor its affiliated companies have received an invitation to Trump’s table. Clearly, it doesn’t look like he’s meeting anyone who is in the business of actually making video games. So who is he going to meet? My best guess would be the same people who caused him to reach his conclusion in this truly memorable sound bite. “I’m hearing more and more people say the level of violence on video games is really shaping young people’s thoughts,” Trump said. “And you go one further step and that’s the movies. [...] Maybe they have to put a rating system for that.” Ignoring the massive slight to the ESRB, which already rates games, we need look no further than the usual suspects if we want to identify a possible source for this information — your Dr. Craig Andersons, Jack Thompsons and various watchdog organizations that have been pushing states and the federal government to regulate the distribution of video games for decades, often regardless of the actual content of the game.”

posted by Fizz (81 comments total)

It's worth noting that many of the current crop of FPS shooters are war games, created in partnership with the US Military and gun makers, as propaganda to get young people interested in joining the military. So, video games are bad and encourage mass shootings, except for the ones that are good and encourage joining the military so you can kill brown people overseas.
posted by SansPoint at 3:06 PM on March 19, 2018 [67 favorites]

Oh god. I am having fucking flashbacks to Leland Yee, mr anti-videogames himself- who ended up pleading guilty to a bunch of corruption charges not too long ago. Speaking as a CA resident this debate ended along time ago. What a fucking useless detour in our gun-obsessed society. Let me play my fallout in peace.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 3:07 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

*sighs*
posted by Fizz at 3:07 PM on March 19, 2018 [5 favorites]

Oh god. I am having fucking flashbacks to Leland Yee, mr anti-videogames himself- who ended up pleading guilty to a bunch of corruption charges not too long ago.

It's worth noting that one of the things he was involved with was gunrunning.

Not joking.

Also, I firmly believe that any meeting involving Brent Bozell is categorically bullshit.
posted by NoxAeternum at 3:13 PM on March 19, 2018 [16 favorites]

If you’re a parent who wants to know how violent video games might affect your children, the bigger concern is how their behavior will be impacted in the long run. But there aren’t enough studies on the long-term effects of violent video games.

The problem with the "we don't have studies!" calls is that there is no way in hell that a proper study would pass an IRB, especially one on developing minds. So yeah, I'd be hugely interested in what would happen if you have a five to ten year study of one group of children who are only allowed to play violent video games and one group of kids only allowed to play cooperative video games, but you just can't ethically do that.
posted by corb at 3:19 PM on March 19, 2018 [11 favorites]

A 9-year-old boy shot his older sister to death over a video game controller, sheriff says

Other countries have videogames. Other countries do not have handguns just left casually around for 9 year olds to use. This does not happen in other countries.
posted by Artw at 3:20 PM on March 19, 2018 [76 favorites]

Oh god. I am having fucking flashbacks to Leland Yee, mr anti-videogames himself- who ended up pleading guilty to a bunch of corruption charges not too long ago.

Funny that, Jack Thompson was disbarred and then later started hanging out with misogynist gamers and offering support for their harassment campaigns.
posted by Artw at 3:24 PM on March 19, 2018 [5 favorites]

I'm pretty sure we'd see the Republicans grasping at straws to establish a link between mass shootings and using silicone utensils on copper pans before going after the real problem, because those violent games sell millions worldwide and yet, there's just one country where that happens. If they want to keep pretending in Europe we're just a bunch of pinkos playing FIFA, F1 and Cities: Skylines, go ahead, but they're only deluding themselves.
posted by lmfsilva at 3:25 PM on March 19, 2018 [10 favorites]

playing FIFA, F1 and Cities: Skylines

Which presumably lead to dramatic injury faking, speeding, and Civil Engineering degrees.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:36 PM on March 19, 2018 [27 favorites]

I suspect that Trump's noise on this issue isn't going to translate into any action on the federal level, at least not from a White House whose domestic policy mirrors the Ron Swanson theory of governance. Instead, I think he's giving the party talking points to use on the school violence issue this November.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 3:48 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

playing FIFA, F1 and Cities: Skylines

Which presumably lead to dramatic injury faking, speeding, and Civil Engineering degrees.

Correction: Cities: Skylines leads to urban planning degrees. RollerCoaster Tycoon is what leads to civil engineering degrees.
posted by asperity at 3:51 PM on March 19, 2018 [19 favorites]

Do you want to know what actually does increase aggressive behavior? Having a gun in sight.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 3:51 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

I have made spreadsheets about my guns in Borderlands. I do not care to own a gun in real life.

I enjoy shooting living things in Borderlands because they are trying to shoot me or eat me or maim me or otherwise kill me. I have no interest in shooting anything in real life because real life is not a video game.
posted by elsietheeel at 3:57 PM on March 19, 2018 [11 favorites]

Honestly I think this is stupid. Humans are animals that survived by hunting, we enjoy videogames for the same reason we enjoy shooting baskets and playing tag: we like chasing and catching things and we really like hitting distant objects with projectiles. Developing hand eye coordination is a huge part of our childhood, we have numerous games and sports all designed to improve kids ability to hit targets, develop binocular vision and develop strength and dexterity in the hands and arma. Video games do nothing to make kids "violent" at a basic level the way these articles imply. We are literally born with an instinct to chase running things and try to knock them down.

When you start doing that to other humans is the problem but that's a problem that's been around approx 20,000 years longer than videogames. Every culture grapples with how to control it, we just happen to suck at doing that right now in this place. Restricting access yo weapons is method A and always has been. It's stupid that we don't do that.
posted by fshgrl at 4:03 PM on March 19, 2018 [11 favorites]

Yeah, I have a deep fear of zombie media- (long story) playing fallout 4 and finding the best weapons to kill feral ghouls makes me feel safe. Absolutely doesn’t make me want to kill people in real life (rifleman perk for life yo- shotgun best gun)
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 4:04 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

Video games are probably a safe outlet for aggression, not a source of it.
posted by fshgrl at 4:05 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

I have a deep fear of zambies in general and I feel safe by avoiding all media involving zambies. And also by calling them zambies a la this Bob's Burgers bit.
posted by elsietheeel at 4:10 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

Do you want to know what actually does increase aggressive behavior? Having a gun in sight.

I don't know if I've told this story here before, but a couple of years ago I lived in Glasgow for a year. Once while I was there, I went for a walk w/ my then 5yo son. We walked by a pair of police officers who were dealing with a very upset and probably emotionally unbalanced person. We walked no more than five feet from them, yet the entire time I felt like everything was fine. I never felt like I nor my son were in any danger. This was in large part because - despite the upset man yelling and cursing - the police were calm, and dealing with him rationally. Nobody had guns, so there was no reason to fear it was going to escalate into some kind of fucking showdown at the OK Corral.

If that had been in the US? I'd have picked up my son and crouch-run the other way until there were at least two city blocks between us and the police. American cops scare me, all the time. I haven't done anything wrong and I'm still frightened of them. I never, ever felt that in the UK.
posted by nushustu at 4:13 PM on March 19, 2018 [42 favorites]

“video games promote violence” = ehhhhh.... no
“video games promote guns” = maybe?

I mean, it was fine when FPS’s were all just “shotgun,” “rifle,” “pistol,” but once you’ve gamified gun fetishization with the intense stats geekery and real-world specificity of, say, PUBG, it’s not much of a jump from wanting [very specific weapon with very specific specifications and very specific accessories] in-game to wanting it IRL, and if it’s easily accessible...
posted by Sys Rq at 4:32 PM on March 19, 2018 [12 favorites]

Fallout, (3, new Vegas, 4) are literally the only games with guns I have ever played. And yeah you get into a lot of: which is better? .44? Shotgun? Hunting rifle? Laser gun? How should I mod it? But the atmosphere is never a positive one. You are moding guns and weighing the most lethal choices in a starkly post-apocalyptic context- one which was partially a consequence of the American gun loving lifestyle. But as noted I can’t comment on the purely FPS landscape- never played them.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 4:45 PM on March 19, 2018 [1 favorite]

This feels like Satanic panic.
posted by hoodrich at 4:53 PM on March 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

There's a halfway interesting conversation, to be had re:the issues raised in the first link, but just ban the fucking guns already.
posted by Artw at 4:55 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

If that had been in the US? I'd have picked up my son and crouch-run the other way until there were at least two city blocks between us and the police. American cops scare me, all the time. I haven't done anything wrong and I'm still frightened of them. I never, ever felt that in the UK.

I don't think I've ever seen a fictional or real-life American law enforcement officer use de-escalation techniques. They always seem to bark orders and either get in close and get rough, or shoot.
posted by Merus at 4:57 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

They are basically untrained except in escalation, and indoctrinated to treat every situation as a shooting situation.
posted by Artw at 4:58 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

I think you're all forgetting that when NetHack was released in 1987, broadsword attacks proliferated on university campuses and mainframe labs.

But in all seriousness, melt the fucking guns, already.
posted by talking leaf at 5:00 PM on March 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

I would be OK with Trump pushing stupid video game legislation purely to watch the alt-right gamer crowd have an aneurysm.

I would be more OK with government addressing the true source of gun violence, as well, but I'm less hopeful for that, even if Democrats take congress this November.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 5:26 PM on March 19, 2018 [4 favorites]

I'm sure my Rocket League fixation would lead some very unsafe driving practices if people in the commuter lane weren't such ball-chasing boost hogs.
posted by Phobos the Space Potato at 5:27 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

broadsword attacks proliferated on university campuses and mainframe labs

You know, my gamer stepbrother owns historical replica swords as well as regular ol' guns. He's never shot himself, but he did accidentally stab himself in the thigh with a gladius a couple weeks ago...
posted by elsietheeel at 5:28 PM on March 19, 2018 [6 favorites]

Has anyone looked at how unstable political, economic, and health prospects might also have an effect on aggression? I'm not saying the economy causes mass shootings, but I can't imagine that a generation with bleak life prospects is going to be very well suited to coping with stressors.

None of this is nearly as important as access to guns, though. Even if we were to fully accept that video games might promote major aggressive behavior, and it doesn't sound like we should, we should also be asking why that is expressed as actual violence in this country, and this country alone. I don't know how you could explain what makes us different by pointing to an activity that people all over the world engage in. Especially not when there are things that make this country unique among developed nations, like extremely easy access to guns.
posted by shapes that haunt the dusk at 5:31 PM on March 19, 2018 [7 favorites]

I have a confession to make. As some of you may know, I'm a fan of the Mass Effect videogame series. The game involves a lot of guns and a lot of shooting. I've spent quite a bit of time trying to get the best guns in the game and deciding which ones I wanted myself and my squadmates to carry. And after all that time and effort put into the game, I... wow. This is hard to finally come out and say... I want to romance a blue-skinned alien woman. I mean, even a bit more than I wanted to after decades of watching Star Trek. And if she was the top information broker in the galaxy, that would be even better, it would really help with missions.

embrace eternity
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:37 PM on March 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

I have made spreadsheets about my guns in Borderlands.

It has been a few years since I really played much Borderlands 1 and I still know without looking it up that your spreadsheet just needs a single entry that says HX440 Steel Anarchy.

The actual question of video games causing mass shootings or whatever just seems amazingly dumb on the face of it given that several generations of kids before there were video games spent gazillions of hours LARPing murder, war, and genocide.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:03 PM on March 19, 2018 [1 favorite]

Just to check one minor detail..
Are these games released outside America too? You'd think you would see a similar trend where these games are relased if they really were the trigger..
I know I've been shooting things in games since my Atari 400 back in 1980(ish) and as far as my memory serves me, I haven't shot anyone yet, but then my game induce kill rampage could be clouding my mind..
posted by Merlin The Happy Pig at 6:13 PM on March 19, 2018 [5 favorites]

You all scoff, but with the popularity of Assassin’s Creed Origins it’s just a matter of time before roving gangs of charioteers take over the highways firing bows and hurling jav- fuck it that sounds awesome we need to make this happen
posted by um at 6:33 PM on March 19, 2018 [8 favorites]

Lots of the are yes.

I played a lot of Battlefield 3 and 4 years back. It's a straight-up military shooter. Eventually I became an admin on a popular server and started regularly seeing location data but just country and sometimes also timezone. We saw a lot of Russians, Ukrainians, Brits, a smattering of every mainland European countries, Aussies and New Zealanders, Brazilians, and Chinese players playing through VPNs to get around the great firewall.

On weekends I often end up getting to know Australians because I get up early and play games while my spouse is sleeping in and the time zones overlap.
posted by VTX at 6:39 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

I think media does have an effect on us, but it's not really a simple A to B path, it's much subtler than that. For example, watching a horror/slasher movie with a serial clown killer won't turn people into clown killers, but it might make you gain a phobia of clowns. Reading a story about a queer character won't make you queer, but maybe you'll think more positively about queer people. A lot of girls watching the X-files didn't literally go hunting for the supernatural but Scully's character inspired a lot of them to enter various STEM and law enforcement fields now that they had a role model (see "the Scully effect").

I myself make artwork and over the course of 2 decades, have had people tell me they realized they were gay after looking at my art, or they gained a new fetish from my art, or my art inspired them to buck gender norms, or their political views on gender changed because of my art, and all sorts of stuff like that. But, you know, nobody's ever said "your knight-themed superhero inspired me to go slashing the people I hate with swords" or "nice body horror tentacle porn, it inspired me to fuck a live octopus on acid." Or maybe they just never lived to tell the tale, but mostly I prefer to think my audience has some sense about them.

So, I'll definitely believe that there's no causative factor between guns in video games and mass shootings, because MOST people have brains and they know murder is wrong. But I'd also like to see if there's at least a correlation between, say, military games vs. people's political opinions about the military. Or, in the case of mass shooters, what kind of non-gun related media influences their thoughts? The majority of mass shooters have histories of domestic violence, and quite a number of them have stated motivations relating to white supremacy and misogyny. It sounds more like they get radicalized, they're steeped in a pro-gun culture, and easy access to guns allows them to let their plans unfold.
posted by alexlaw at 6:42 PM on March 19, 2018 [24 favorites]

In places where there's no guns to be had irl, the guns on offer in shooters might as well be light sabers or psionic beam weapons. (I'm the same way--I've never even touched a gun in my life, I'm far far outside US gun culture, and I don't play a ton of shooters but when I do I might as well be in Narnia riding a unicorn for all the relationship it has to my real life.)

Here though, for a certain segment of gamers, it's not Narnia Unicorns, it's real things they have real access too and can really shoot at other real things. That's the difference. Get rid of the irl guns and Narnia Unicorns can't damage us as a society. With the presence of irl guns, the combination is toxic (for, as I say, a certain segment of gamers).
posted by soren_lorensen at 6:54 PM on March 19, 2018 [5 favorites]

On a more serious note, I thought the first article was spot-on about the particularity of death and how that's often missing from video games. That's nothing unique to games, with roughly a million murder-of-the-week TV shows and all-the-blood-you-can-fit-in-two-hours movies out there, but it's reasonable to think that interactivity can make that feel different.

On a less serious note, I played all the Ace Attorney games and then went to law school. Correlation isn't causation, but it's possible we should think really hard about the negative effects video games can have on impressionable minds. Like mine.
posted by asperity at 7:01 PM on March 19, 2018 [5 favorites]

Today. Just this goddamn day. I went to pick up the kid from the BEYOND EXCELLENT after-school program where all the elementary and middle-school kids with working parents go. There was a jerk there, not a bully, but a teaser. He should have his teasing dealt with, NO QUESTION. My kid's tougher than this guy, so he's not on the radar, except when I went to pick her up today, I saw -

1) The jerk tease another kid and get yelled at for it by a friend of the kid.
2) The jerk get called into the main room, where I have to go into, to sign my kid out.
3) See an action figure of one of the Rebel Commandos on Endor, one of the ones kicking ass with Leia, and it's a recent one with very nice paint, and an adult is angrily confronting him with it.
4) Hear the scared and confused elementary school kid whine that it's not a gun, it's a blaster, Dad says it makes you go unconscious, it's his favorite scene in Star Wars.
5) Grownup says they have to go to The Office now.
5) Have no freakin' clue what to do, apart from sign my kid out and go home. I sometimes have hero-dad fantasies. I failed myself and that kid right there.

I mean, what the fuck? What the fucking fuck? Clearly fantasy and arguably non-lethal toys get you in trouble? That Rebel was covering Leia and without him the attack on the new Death Star would fail and suddenly he's indicative this 9yo is gonna shoot up a school? Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck, fuck fuck. Literally no words.

Gun Culture Delenda Est.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:26 PM on March 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

It's kind of clear that media shapes public thought. For example, "24" (and a lot of other spy shows) created fictional situations where torture may be lawfully wrong, but it was necessary to avoid more death and destruction. It popularized the "ticking time bomb" scenario.

Now, do video games/media with guns have an influence on mass shootings? I think it does, but just like how watching "24" doesn't make people want to torture each other, the influence of gun media isn't in making people shoot each other. It seems much more influential on shaping American public thought about stuff like support for the 2nd amendment and the idea that "only a good guy with a gun can stop a bad guy with a gun".
posted by FJT at 7:36 PM on March 19, 2018 [11 favorites]

I read that first link, Austin Walker's extended note on Waypoint's week of coverage, this morning and chewed on it a bit because it touches (and I gather their whole series this week will touch on) some of the things I have struggled with as a video game enthusiast for years, decades at this point, about the frustrating and problematic nature of so many games' marriage of convenience to guns and gun violence.

So I wearily acknowledge that there's the rest of the National Conversation shit going on with Trump's feckless summit and the retreads of the causality argument about fake guns vs. real ones, but god I'm not interested at all in that. Solving gun violence needs to start with the real guns, there's not left in me even a splinter of discussion to have on that point. So, yes.

What I struggle with as a long-time gamer is my relationship with an industry that falls so comfortably into the general trope of murder simulation as a setting and a mechanic, especially as high-def graphics and models and animation have ascended the ladder from the sprites and blunt polygons of the 80s and 90s to the big budget verisimilitude of contemporary AAA games. There's a kind of sick bargain in a lot of otherwise very good, very fun/compelling games where "and you're gonna use a relatively realistic gun to shoot relatively realistic people" is lashed to the game in a seemingly fundamental and inextricable way. Even though the shooting is just a metaphor, even though the people are just placeholders.

I long for a massive, principled, collective shift away from that within the industry. It's all else aside a crutch: people develop games where guns murder lots of people because games where guns murder lots of people sell. They make the games, the games sell, they iterate and repeat. It's an easy theme to reach for; you don't have to invent, you just extract and recycle these assets that exist as established design elements in the shared understanding of people who play video games or watch action movies and cop shows.

To say I want to see fewer guns, fewer lovingly modeled guns killing lovingly modeled human bodies, doesn't require that there be anything more dangerous about guns in video games than the fact that they're thematically uncomfortable. I don't think think video game gun violence is begetting real world gun violence in any meaningful way, but I still dearly wish video games would stop relying on dotingly simulated gun killings as a core design element. Because it sucks.
posted by cortex at 7:41 PM on March 19, 2018 [33 favorites]

Yeah, I'm getting more and more tired of playing games where you kill, like, 8000 people. It's like we're still basically playing Space Invaders, but they've swapped out the aliens for more complex and realistic enemies. But fundamentally, it feels like we've just added a bunch of elements onto that same basic formula where things are thrown at you and you shoot them before they get you. I mean, I'm not trying to pull a moral superiority thing here, I just mean it's gotten frustrating for me, personally.

I find myself gravitating more towards stuff that isn't based on points or powerups or health packs or anything (which in my case ends up being walking simulators and puzzle games -- I've gotten really into TIS-100). On the RPG side of things, I've been curious to try NEO Scavenger, because the fighting in that is supposed to be really rough. Like, desperate and pathetic, and you end up rolling around on the ground until someone gets stabbed, and then you limp away. People say good things about that game because it makes death and fighting seem just awful and sad, something you try to avoid but can't.

I like the Heart in Dishonored, because even if it's all random, I like that it says something about the life of everyone you point it at: "his daughter waits for him to come home every day," and that sort of thing. It definitely makes it harder for me to play through casually killing everyone (or anyone at all). (I really liked the author's thoughts on Watch Dogs, because it had so much potential to really drive home that everyone had their own life, except that everything was more about you having power than about them having agency. )
posted by shapes that haunt the dusk at 8:02 PM on March 19, 2018 [2 favorites]

Now, when I was a young'un, determining who in fact was actually dead at the end of a make believe gunfight was the sort of thing that could lead to actual backyard fisticuffs. I reckon these kids with the newfangled internet shoot-em-ups are at least spared that particular danger.
posted by Trinity-Gehenna at 8:06 PM on March 19, 2018 [1 favorite]

I wonder if VR will make an impact on how people play and think about shooters? I started playing Fallout 4 VR recently and the sense of immersion definitely affects my mental state and the way I approach the game. Case in point: I no longer feel like a badass. When playing non-VR there’s a sense of distance that makes you a bit more calculating, not just in combat but in everything. I lost a lot of that in VR. There’s an early mission that takes you to Concord where you end up battling raiders. No problem! I run up behind some cover, aim my 10mm pistol at the back of the nearest guy, and let him have the entire clip: 12 rounds.

Missed every shot.

So I run and find some cover and try to shoot back at the raiders who are now alert to my presence, and I miss a lot because I’m so worked up my hands are shaking and the muzzle of the pistol is vibrating like a plucked string. And it dawns on me I can’t act like a badass anymore. I start to dread firefights. I’m boosting Charisma and taking Sneak perks and relying on explosives and setting traps because I hate it when the bullets start flying. And this only happens in VR. I know this because I started a parallel run in regular Fallout 4, and in that game everything feels chill.
posted by um at 8:14 PM on March 19, 2018 [12 favorites]

Just hearing people talk about how video games lead people to act out what they've played makes me angry, because if that were true, we'd have a goddamn space empire by now! And a bunch of Eve players running all the economies.
posted by the agents of KAOS at 8:37 PM on March 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

I'll give you my Aisleriot when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.
posted by flabdablet at 8:44 PM on March 19, 2018

I wonder if VR will make an impact on how people play and think about shooters?

My first encounter with Superhot was in VR and I definitely became absorbed but for the rest of the day, I walked around cranky and jumpy, full of queasy adrenaline that at length I recognized as a minor version of how it felt to just barely not get in a car wreck a few years back. So I was definitely immersed in the violence, but I'm not sure I'd say I had any fun.

There's a kind of sick bargain in a lot of otherwise very good, very fun/compelling games where "and you're gonna use a relatively realistic gun to shoot relatively realistic people" is lashed to the game in a seemingly fundamental and inextricable way. Even though the shooting is just a metaphor, even though the people are just placeholders.

Yeah, I'm getting more and more tired of playing games where you kill, like, 8000 people. It's like we're still basically playing Space Invaders, but they've swapped out the aliens for more complex and realistic enemies. But fundamentally, it feels like we've just added a bunch of elements onto that same basic formula where things are thrown at you and you shoot them before they get you.

Totally agree. The more gorgeous and believable the game worlds and characters become, the stranger and ickier it feels that the main ways we're given to touch these worlds are violent. Watching Westworld really made me feel gross about what my Skyrim character and I had been doing to the characters around us. There's a point past which the guy in enchanted plated armor killing penniless bandits with his cursed mace isn't really a hero any more. I went back to the estate, put all but the most basic weapons and armor into storage, and played my next several levels as a travelling jeweler and smith.

The game kept trying to tease me away from my growing business with side quests and when that didn't word, would force the issue from time to time with dragon attacks. But I had a blast seeing the countryside, making bank and becoming a master craftsman. In time, I drifted back to the adventurer's life but goddamn, what I wouldn't give for a high fantasy small business RPG.

My lifetime XP number is in the millions, minimum. I've seen plenty of monsters and dealt with all the succession crises I can stand. What I want to do now is buy up an old tavern with my treasure hoard, mount a couple of these old axes and dragon's heads over the hearth, brew up some mead and become the number one relaxation destination for today's traveling adventurer. I want to hire bards, negotiate quest posting fees with the local guilds, and level up my food and furnishings.

I've killed all the orcs and elves I care to. I'm looking for a game about selling them a mug of beer instead. Game developers should rest easy knowing that they've done a very good job of simulating violence, on every scale and in every fashion imaginable. They did it! So now it's safe to try some other things.
posted by EatTheWeek at 8:55 PM on March 19, 2018 [14 favorites]

"Games don't create misogyny in society, they reflect it" and "Movies don't create cis white male privilege, they reflect it" would be a pretty obviously laughable defense to anyone on the blue. We had a thread recently where a bunch of people bagged on the Civ series for the imperialistic and nationalistic impulses it fostered. I'm 100% certain games (and movies and TV) contribute to both shootings and anti-gun control sentiments in many ways. It's all a broad tapestry.

I get that at least half of this is in response to Trump--I mean, no one is proposing banning* misogynistic games--but I think a lot of the responses prove too much, as the saying goes. Trump is trying to use games as a distraction. Spending time and energy defending them is how the distraction plays out.

I say this as a guy who's killed a whole lot of things in video games and stills enjoy doing so. I like movies with gunfights too.


*Which, I'm sorry for the sidebar, is one of a countless number of examples that make me say "how does the right wing continued to collect coverage as if they are the principled defenders free speech?"
posted by mark k at 9:39 PM on March 19, 2018 [15 favorites]

It seems the general experience of VR is that you can't distance yourself from the experience. So horror games and violent combat games become much more uncomfortable to play, while just being in a nice space is much more interesting than it tends to be on a screen.
posted by Merus at 9:47 PM on March 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

Being an RPG shopkeeper in VR would definitely be kind of awesome, if only because there’s a certain fascination derived from picking up and handling objects in VR.

The other interesting experience I had playing Fallout 4 in VR gave me also happened early on: having escaped the vault you return to your home which is now a ruin. At this stage I’m still adjusting to the experience, so I’m just doing really simple interactions: picking up junk, searching containers, opening and closing doors, etc.

I walk into Shaun’s room and without really thinking about it start to straighten it up: picking things up off the floor, studying them for a moment (something I never did in non-VR), and putting them on tables. Tidying up my lost son’s room. Holy shit suddenly I’m emotionally engaged in this for some reason!
posted by um at 9:55 PM on March 19, 2018 [3 favorites]

The killer shot people.
The killer ate food. Literally everyday. It's like he was addicted to it. Body and soul.
Did food make the killer kill?
Let's say yes.
Ban food, but now you can buy guns in vending machines!
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 10:18 PM on March 19, 2018

>It's worth noting that many of the current crop of FPS shooters are war games, created in partnership with the US Military and gun makers, as propaganda to get young people interested in joining the military.

Do you have any more information on an explicit partnership between the US military and the current war games related FPS shooters? I just spent the last 20 minutes doing basic google research and found the following:

The US military had an explicit role in the America's Army series, Full Spectrum Warrior series and Close Combat: First to Fight.

I also found this quote:

While there’s currently no public evidence that the US military helps to fund mainstream video games that double as propaganda, as routinely happens in Hollywood, the makers of military-themed games often pay a license fee to gun manufacturers to use representations of their weapons, drawing consumers unwittingly into the Military-Entertainment complex.

Right now the top war related first person shooter games are:

PLAYERUNKNOWN'S BATTLEGROUNDS
Counterstrike : Global Offensive
Rainbow Six Siege
Call of Duty WW2

Trailing pretty far behind are:

Battlefield 1
Tom Clancy's The Division
ARMA 3
and the multiplayer for the officially sponsored US Army games are basically dead

The ARMA series has ties to the US Military:

In the early 2000s, the US Army began using a mod of the first Operation Flashpoint, named DARWARS Ambush!, to train soldiers. In financial distress, Bohemia capitalized on its use and made a small sum of money, saving the company from falling into immediate bankruptcy. Bohemia also set up a new division called Bohemia Interactive Simulations, specializing in creating military simulation games with its Virtual Battle Space titles for armies around the world to use.

As your original statement is worded it seems incorrect to say that evidence of paying a licensing fee to use weapons in games implies that these games are created in partnership with the US military and gunmakers by any typical use of the word partnership.
posted by laptolain at 12:28 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

"Games don't create misogyny in society, they reflect it" and "Movies don't create cis white male privilege, they reflect it" would be a pretty obviously laughable defense to anyone on the blue. We had a thread recently where a bunch of people bagged on the Civ series for the imperialistic and nationalistic impulses it fostered. I'm 100% certain games (and movies and TV) contribute to both shootings and anti-gun control sentiments in many ways. It's all a broad tapestry.

Yeah, while one certainly doesn't have to sign on with the political shenanigans around this latest Republican attempt to shift blame from the most pressing issues around gun violence, that doesn't mean that there isn't any connections to be made in how media inculcates destructive social attitudes towards aggression, violence, and weaponry. If you believe media plays a role in attitudes about racism, sexism, homophobia, and all the many varieties of consumer desires and attitudes about society and life, then it's really bizarre or disingenuous to claim violence is somehow removed from that same accounting.
posted by gusottertrout at 1:46 AM on March 20, 2018 [12 favorites]

To this day I still headbutt gold rings and jump on mushrooms.
posted by srboisvert at 2:16 AM on March 20, 2018 [5 favorites]

I've killed all the orcs and elves I care to. I'm looking for a game about selling them a mug of beer instead.

There's been a brief vogue in indie games for games involving selling drinks to the denizens of neon-choked future cities.
posted by entity447b at 2:28 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

I believe in the scientific merhod so I believe the evidence of these studies, but I just can’t shake the notion that using killing for leisure in place of other activities isn’t somehow corrosive over the long term.

One of the things that feels to me like a counter-example is paintball. Players buy the most realistic guns and body armor and other gear they can afford, and practice real infantry tactics. Wouldn’t this game be a more direct cause of gun violence than video games? Or is it done less often? Or is it simply less common? I have lots of questions, but I’m still wondering.
posted by wenestvedt at 3:27 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh, and it's not entirely true that we won't have at least somewhat of a cohort to study for effects of violent media, While it won't be measure up to strict scientific standards, the ever increasing emphasis video game companies and Hollywood is putting into giving young women the same opportunities to watch women engaging in violence, you know, heroically, will provide a chance to see if the slop we've fed young boys all these many decades will have an effect on girls, finally bringing some equality to the slaughtering.
posted by gusottertrout at 3:55 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

I do wonder about paintball - off the top of my head, it doesn’t seem particularly popular with people who go on to become mass shooters. (I would love to see actual data on that).

I’ve played and enjoyed paintball before, and I wonder if it functions as a healthier outlet for aggression. Also, paintball ranges tend to be pretty social, close-knit places (in my limited experience) where people don’t actually want to get hurt: a really dangerous person might not be tolerated long. Perhaps it’s easier to go unnoticed in that way when playing multiplayer video games.
posted by faineg at 5:21 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

Rating/censorship schemes tend to reinforce dominant hierarchies. While it's moderately true that some comics become more violent when the comics code was abandoned by most publishers, that shift also fostered the British Invasion and an explosion of alternative comics willing to discuss adult relationships and LGBTQ issues. Parallel to that was an explosion of critical work that took sequential art seriously as medium and had a lot to say about the ways in which violence was portrayed, among other issues.

Movies had a better track record of criticism but Hollywood's self-regulating body, the MPAA, has long had weird double-standards regarding male vs. female sexuality while tolerating violent imagery in younger ratings categories.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 6:12 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

School shooting at Great Mills High School in St. Mary’s County, Maryland — many people shot
posted by Artw at 6:29 AM on March 20, 2018

it doesn’t seem particularly popular with people who go on to become mass shooters

Seeing as paintball also exists in other non-USA countries like Canada and Australia that do not have an epidemic of ongoing mass shootings, I would say that it is probably not a factor.
posted by jkaczor at 6:39 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

I've killed all the orcs and elves I care to. I'm looking for a game about selling them a mug of beer instead.

There are some really fun JRPGs from the last few years that cater to this, Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale is worth checking out.

Recettear is the story of an item shop, the girl who lives in it, and the fairy who turned her life upside down. Recette Lemongrass finds herself in charge of an item shop built into her house, in order to pay back a loan her father took and then skipped out on -

Shoppe Keep might also satisfy this itch.

Run an adventurers shop – a serious business in a fantasy environment. Stock your store with dangerous weapons, fancy hats, sturdy armour and magical potions.

Both available on Steam.
posted by Fizz at 6:41 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

There's been a brief vogue in indie games for games involving selling drinks to the denizens of neon-choked future cities.

Tracking this trend very closely, believe it. If VA-11 Hall-A was just a little bit less on rails, it would be exactly the thing. I do setting up the jukebox though. And last time I played, I had a setback on account of forgetting a customer's favorite drink. Minor emotional labor challenges aren't something you see a lot of in games, and I felt embarrassed about the lapse, even though it was a customer I don't like that much. While it doesn't have all the grognard stats-bothering I might wish it did, this incident put VA-11 Hall-A in the class of Games I'd Better Keep Notes On anyway. Given that it's about being a regular person in an oppressive world, maybe the fact I have yet to feel much influence on the world is the point.

I believe in the scientific merhod so I believe the evidence of these studies, but I just can’t shake the notion that using killing for leisure in place of other activities isn’t somehow corrosive over the long term.

Same. Fair enough that games don't seem to directly "cause" mass shootings, but if 30 seconds with an advertisement can subtly influence our decision making then come on, 1000s of hours spent gaming is something our synapses are going to notice and respond to. Especially in a post gamergate world, it's hard to argue that allowing a couple generations of men and boys to grow up immersed in ever more lush and elaborate violence and domination simulators has been or will be entirely without consequences. I'm certainly ambivalent about whether or not that was a net positive for my own personal development, and I was lucky enough to grow up gaming in a mostly safe and supportive environment.

I type all of this as someone who still loves games. I just think Gaming could try harder - developers and players alike. Developers aren't likely to risk breaking out of their safe genres as long as players never take chances on anything unfamiliar. Last night my roommates and I had a great time playing a very splashy couch co-op twin stick shooter called Alienation. It's an intoxicating combo of familiar shooting mechanics and long-term level / equipment grinding, but it occurred to us that there's no reason these exact same mechanics couldn't be used for a game about being a diplomat at a series of important balls and salons, blasting waves of dignitaries with compliments and flattery, dodging bullet-hell insult spread shots and using area-effect dances and poetry declamations when you got cornered.

One of the things that feels to me like a counter-example is paintball. Players buy the most realistic guns and body armor and other gear they can afford, and practice real infantry tactics. Wouldn’t this game be a more direct cause of gun violence than video games?

Paintball involves going outside and running around with friends in good weather, usually. I wonder if that might make the trademark gamer rage and resentment harder to build and maintain.
posted by EatTheWeek at 8:04 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

A big tension in gaming right now is that a majority of gamers are not young adult or men. American AAA PC Gaming and it's supporting mass media has been less than nimble at dealing with this reality. But any attempt to make big pronouncements on "gaming" without acknowledging that mobile often beats MOBA in terms of gross revenue is likely short-sighted.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 8:55 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

jkaczor: Seeing as paintball also exists in other non-USA countries like Canada and Australia that do not have an epidemic of ongoing mass shootings, I would say that it is probably not a factor.

Oh! I honestly didn't know that paintball was big elsewhere, given America's exceptional gun culture! OK, that's very persuasive to me, actually.

EatTheWeek: Paintball involves going outside and running around with friends in good weather, usually.

Plus, now that I think about it, you don't do it all day and all night, but in shorter "appointments."

OK, Paintball, you are free to go. :7)
posted by wenestvedt at 9:00 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

The left cannot sustain simultaneously arguing that misogyny and rape in video games is harmful, but violent mass murder in video games is not. Sure, Trump poisons all debates by raising the issue in the context of real mass murders, to which video games are a tiny or nonexistent contributor. But Trump aside, as others have pointed out, the left is deeply invested in the idea that misogyny is deeply imbedded in, and affected by, cultural representations -- in books, movies, tv, video games, advertising, etc. Claiming that violence functions totally differently, psychological studies notwithstanding, is just not a position the left can consistently or comfortably make without completely revising their account of how culture functions in society. And speaking personally, even entirely disregarding their effects, I would no more let my son play a murder simulator than a rape simulator.
posted by chortly at 9:03 AM on March 20, 2018 [8 favorites]

I always played games to vent frustrations that might lead to less social actions in the real world.
posted by Samizdata at 9:24 AM on March 20, 2018

I actually just picked up Ultima Online again because I really wanted a nice, peaceful game where I could gather resources, make cool things, decorate my house, and maybe do some exploration in hazardous dungeons, rather than just killing everything in sight. My god, that game is *so fucking deep*. Twenty-odd years of feature creep and I can do anything I goddamn well please, and never murder anything if I don't want to.
posted by restless_nomad at 9:52 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

There's tons and tons and TONS of games that are FPS. I also prefer games that aren't all stressful shooty shooty fighty fighty (though Subnautica is stressful as shit, but part of that stress is because you can't really kill most of the monsters, you just have to swim away as fast as you can). If a law was passed tomorrow that outlaws FPS (which it won't be, nor should it be necessarily) there would still be so many fun games.

You can also sign me up for Sim Inkeeper. That sounds awesome!
posted by soren_lorensen at 10:13 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

Here's the rub: If you can't actually prove that rape flicks encourage young people to rape, you may intuitively suppose that it may legitimize the act by showing the deed primarily from the viewpoint of the rapist. I can't think how a definitive study might be organized. Some scientist maybe can.

Couldn't shooters be affected in a similar way? Even if you don't get infected with the desire to actually shoot other humans in real life, activities such as paint-ball and Call to Duty can at the very least give the gamer a basic set of skills in that respect. If all Zombies are nails, you learn to wield your hammer, because developing a cure has little going for it in the way of a constant rush. Faceless enemy troops get mowed down even better with practice, and you don't have to go through their pockets to see if they carry diaries or pictures of their wives and kids. In a game, you cut out the parts that kill the buzz.

Learning to shoot paper targets or realistic outlines with a gun does what? Does that always make a good guy into a mass murderer? I don't know. I was a competition small bore shooter in high school. But having served eight years in the military has sort of muddied that water as far as any conclusions can be drawn. All I can say is that as a civilian I'm just another guy, no mass anythings to report.

I'm pretty sure you can slow down the murder rates in crowds by restricting the number of cartridges in your magazine, although the conscientious shooter will carry several magazines to insure that he can continue his quest with only the small bother of changing magazines; cut down the numbers of dead in a given crowd by eliminating the full-auto switch on your rifle. But before we use stats from Australia and Japan can we maybe figure out if Americans suffer from an ailment other than a plethora of assault rifles?

I am inflicted with a bias. When I came back from Vietnam my high-school buddies, right off the bat, kept asking me to tell them what it was like, in combat. At first I was more than willing. I wanted to get it off my chest. But after a few minutes I realized that they just wanted to watch the movie, and didn't want to have to smell the blood, or think about it later. Several decades passed before I was ready to revisit Vietnam on purpose, but I did have a few feedback loops that ran unbidden through my brain in the wee hours of the morning.

I played a few video games: Silent Service was the one I liked best, but the arcade game where you sat in a booth and strafed things with a helicopter gunship was lots of fun. I like to shoot guns, and I've always wanted to fly, so how could that be bad? The helicopter game suddenly went sour for me-don't know why. In the Silent Service game, I stopped torpedoing Japanese freighters because they were used to transport POWs during the war. I guess this doesn't make much sense, but it does hang together in my internal attic, where I keep all the good stuff.

I used to play one of the vintage SIM City games. After I made a few interesting cities, and cruised the landscape until I got bored, I enjoyed dropping comets at random, then putting the city back together before I ran out of funds.

Maybe I secretly feel that nobody should be eligible to have the adrenalin rush of killing somebody unless they earn it later on, in the midnight hours.
posted by mule98J at 12:00 PM on March 20, 2018 [5 favorites]

Claiming that violence functions totally differently, psychological studies notwithstanding, is just not a position the left can consistently or comfortably make without completely revising their account of how culture functions in society.

This hot-take on the last decade of digital game criticism on the left isn't even wrong. To make it clear, one can criticize the go-to use of violence as a coded game mechanic without adopting the simplistic culture-war contagion rhetoric of the radical right, which has been in a moral panic about something for the better part of a century now.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 12:11 PM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

I'll go so far as to suggest that getting dragged into the methodological quicksand of "this causes that" is a mistake that cuts off many other criticisms of media. And I'm unconvinced that most of the moral issues of digital gaming are categorically different from other mass media or traditional gaming.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 12:54 PM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

This hot-take on the last decade of digital game criticism on the left isn't even wrong. To make it clear, one can criticize the go-to use of violence as a coded game mechanic without adopting the simplistic culture-war contagion rhetoric of the radical right, which has been in a moral panic about something for the better part of a century now.

"Hot take" and "isn't even wrong" are cliches that I wish would release their grip on certain folks around here. What makes what I wrote a "hot take," or makes you think I'm unfamiliar with the literature? Heck, I've written on this even on Metafilter for almost a decade, let alone the two decades before that that this has a been an active topic. And what qualifies it as "not even wrong," given that it is primarily making a normative argument about moral equivalence? What would even be the falsification criteria for normative arguments that are absent here?

Anyway, cliches aside:

I'll go so far as to suggest that getting dragged into the methodological quicksand of "this causes that" is a mistake that cuts off many other criticisms of media. And I'm unconvinced that most of the moral issues of digital gaming are categorically different from other mass media or traditional gaming.

This is exactly what I was arguing. There is no special role for violence in video games, but nor is it distinct from critiques from the left of depictions of misogyny or racism in cultural artifacts either. Evidence that playing video games depicting violence against women or watching videos about the same did not lead to immediate or short-term increases in ideation about violence towards women would never be accepted as sufficient proof that these sorts of cultural products are normatively acceptable, but as you point out, the main defense of violence video games seems to be pointing to a few short-term causal studies of the sort that would never be accepted to justify racism or misogyny in a cultural product.

No one who actually cares about these critiques cares about what Trump or the right say, except when we have to repel their brief and usually quickly-forgotten forays into the issue. The interest on the left -- normative, empirical, sociological, or literary-critical -- is its own thing, and if you'd like to give a better précis of the literature (other than the usual well-trodden psych experiments), that would be great. But in the meantime, give a little more benefit of the doubt to your fellow interlocutors. Many of us have been discussing this stuff since long before the "last decade of digital game criticism."
posted by chortly at 1:56 PM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

No one who actually cares about these critiques cares about what Trump or the right say, except when we have to repel their brief and usually quickly-forgotten forays into the issue.

We're currently in those moments of misbegotten foray and corresponding repelling, is the thing. I noted in my comment yesterday how tired I am of even treading that ground, and how my interest in the topic is far more toward what Austin Walker was writing about than in all the Trump-orbiting bits under the fold in this post, but those bits, the current performative fervor of Video Games Are The Cause America's Gun Violence Problem bullshit, are in effect and structured into the post we're conversing in, so folks are gonna react to that.

So I don't think that what you're arguing is really much at odds with where other folks are coming from either, but I think you may be misreading the degree to which people are responding to your position vs. responding to the other, dumber position being loudly espoused by Trump et al.
posted by cortex at 2:13 PM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

chortly: You didn't just make a normative claim. You framed it as something that "the left" (who exactly?) has been ignoring in, oh 30 years of criticism on this very topic. I think if you're going to make such a claim, it would be best not to pretend that the supporting art for your case doesn't already exist.

An important "defense" here isn't just that the causal studies are inconclusive. It isn't even of a defense of violence per se. It's that demands for legislative regulation or industry self-regulation tend to rely on folklore and stereotypes about what a digital game is, how it's produced, and who are the consumers of that specific product. The first-person shooter is a specific genre that's created to satisfy certain audience expectations. We need to be looking into how that works, rather than mumble our way through a general "games."

I will make the same defense of violence in digital games that I do in defense of violence in cinema and literature. Criticism of it needs to be considered via a close read of how that violence is treated by the work in question. Otherwise we risk making false equivalences between frank criticism of violence and celebration of it. When that happens, it's usually the minority voices that are considered the bigger risk.

I also care what kind of culture-war bullshit Republicans sell from year to year. That bullshit is used to sell Republican candidates in elections and can translate to policy and dollars at any level of government. As I suggested above, I think "games cause violence" is likely going to be the way Republicans derail even the most trivial gun-control advocacy or legislation.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 3:16 PM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

In short, one can't seriously examine the influence of digital games ON culture without taking them seriously AS culture on the same level as other mass media. A large chunk of criticism wants to hold that games are both highly influential on the player's development but so trivially superficial as to be unworthy of examination.
posted by GenderNullPointerException at 6:06 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

I don't know how much general relevance this anecdote has, but for what it's worth:
I rarely play FPS but when I do I tend to binge on them. I've noticed with at least a couple of them they start to bleed into my off-game life. For instance, I clearly remember feeling a sense of panic when driving, and then realising that the shape of the intersection I was approaching reminded me of Half Life 2, and I was subconsciously expecting to be attacked. I'm certainly not arguing that similar games are bad for everyone, but I'm pretty sure they're bad for me.
posted by Joe in Australia at 6:27 PM on March 20, 2018

Yeah, its good that none of these violent games are available or sold outside the USA or we would be seeing these mass shooting events in a bunch of other Countries too!
posted by Iax at 10:38 PM on March 20, 2018

chortly: You didn't just make a normative claim. You framed it as something that "the left" (who exactly?) has been ignoring in, oh 30 years of criticism on this very topic. ... In short, one can't seriously examine the influence of digital games ON culture without taking them seriously AS culture on the same level as other mass media. A large chunk of criticism wants to hold that games are both highly influential on the player's development but so trivially superficial as to be unworthy of examination.

Since my position was that the left/academia has been struggling with this topic for decades and that we should treat games as seriously as we do other artistic depictions of hate and violence, you appear to be arguing with someone other than me, so I'll follow cortex's implicit advice and demur from further argument.

We're currently in those moments of misbegotten foray and corresponding repelling, is the thing. I noted in my comment yesterday how tired I am of even treading that ground, and how my interest in the topic is far more toward what Austin Walker was writing about than in all the Trump-orbiting bits under the fold in this post, but those bits, the current performative fervor of Video Games Are The Cause America's Gun Violence Problem bullshit, are in effect and structured into the post we're conversing in, so folks are gonna react to that.

Yeah, the shame of it is that, for those of us with pre-existing interests in ethics and politics, every topic of discussion is utterly ruined by Trump. Current events are usually the trigger for public discussions of interesting political topics that are otherwise not closely discussed except by specialists. The fact that we have to basically endure 4-8 years where no current-event-based conversation can actually engage in the interesting (essentially, intra-left) questions raised by some political topic without the presumption that one side or the other is speaking either for or against the imbecilities of Trump, is a sad state of affairs. Yet another casualty of Trump.
posted by chortly at 10:44 PM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

This is an issue that is impossible to discuss after the death of nuance. Between the dolts that don't want to discuss games in that manner (or any other manner that isn't set by them), those that simply deny that games do anything and those who think everyone that plays games will eventually turn into a shooter or a rapist, there's barely any room left for sensible discussion.

All I can say is that when I was deep into Saints Row 3, a game that features a mission where the player has to blow up 50 Smart-like cars, when I was walking down the street and saw a Smart car, there was something in the primal part of my brain that lighted up, at that moment, Smart cars were prey. The game also rewards you for blowing it up (I mean, the game rewards you for doing all sorts of stupid shit), but my reaction was "hah", not instinctively reach for my pockets to get a grenade and blow it up. Otherwise, I would have lost a ton of wallets.

Games (and their more serious versions, simulators) can be used to train conditioned responses, familiarity to situations and improve response time because, I mean, that's how we're wired to work. Beyond that, things get muddled because there's a lot of secondary and tertiary factors involved and it's likely making studies on this is complicated because every person is different, and even each person might not produce consistent results. I've finished sessions of the same game angrier or more mellowed out, and this independently from doing well on it or not.
posted by lmfsilva at 9:01 AM on March 21, 2018 [2 favorites]

Passive video game where everyone wins:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Di-qMtNw6Bk

#videogames #idm
posted by zippercollider at 10:09 AM on March 21, 2018

I wonder if VR will make an impact on how people play and think about shooters?

I think so. People want to play Space Invaders with a better story and graphics, not actually be in a fire fight. That's not fun.
posted by fshgrl at 11:49 AM on March 21, 2018