Gaming Deaths [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

jlvm4

2010-05-14, 10:02 PM

The morality of killing game characters (for me at least) has often been tied to the morality of it in actuality. For example, a war game requires that you kill the enemy. In the 'real world' (a debate I'm not trying to get into), it is generally considered morally acceptable to kill an enemy that is trying to kill you. However, killing innocent civilians (say wiping out a village of women and children) would be a criminal order and something that was morally wrong both in game and in reality. As such, I wouldn't feel comfortable doing it as a player.

I believe if you play a moral character, even if it's played in a violent game, you shouldn't be concerned about the 'killing' aspect of it. Your morality, or soul if you will, is kept intact by the fact that your morals are consistant. Probably why I don't like games where evil acts are required for you to succeed/win.:smallsmile:

That said, games are rated M for a reason. I would not allow a child to play these games because their reasoning and ability to judge right and wrong are still developing. An adult will be able to separate real from pretend and right from wrong even when it is not clearly defined. A child cannot, and so I think it can corrupt sensibilities and desensitize them, especially if they play frequently enough that it outweighs their 'real world' time.

Not sure that helps, but good luck with your assignment anyway.

druid91

2010-05-14, 11:18 PM

ForzaFiori

2010-05-14, 11:24 PM

Killing in video games is about as morally questionable as eating a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich.

If you called it "Fligertling" the "Floogenspigle" Instead of "killing" the "Enemy" would it make much of a difference? All that is destroyed is, well in most games nothing really because you can always hit the reset button. So at most your opponent is disabled.

Kinda like how in Mortal Kombat and several other games, you get a "Knock Out" instead of a kill, even if you disintegrate the enemy. Just cause you call it something doesn't mean that is what it is.

In the same manner, just cause you claim that "killing" pixels on a screen is the same as actually killing someone in real life, doesn't mean it is. Even the actions describe by jlvm4 are no where near the same as doing it in real life. As long as one remembers that it truly is just a game, not acceptable in real life, and pixels on a screen, your fine.

golentan

2010-05-14, 11:37 PM

Short answer: No.

Longer answer: No. Come back with this when computers start getting to the point where we have to seriously consider giving them voting rights.

Further Questions for Extra Credit: Is it immoral to swat a mosquito? Most people I've observed doing so have derived some serious, vengeance driven satisfaction from the pain and death of a living creature. Why is it different (worse) if the thing dying happens to be humanoid? It still has less autonomy and intelligence than the mosquito, even if it is geared to use sound bites and visual cues to tug at players heartstrings. If a plant appeared like a baby, complete with wailing, as a defense measure, would it be immoral to cut it down? Why is it better if the creature isn't humanoid? I never see people complaining about gunning down bug aliens in Sci Fi games, for example, and they are supposedly representations of sapient creatures. Is it more or less moral to derive pleasure from the apparent but false death of another (fictional) human than it is to eat a roast beef sandwich (deriving pleasure from the actual death of an actual organism with a relatively developed nervous system) while doing the same? Is it more moral to "kill" a human being in a video game, watch it in a movie, play it in a pen and paper game, or read it in a book, and where does each fall on a scale of moral questionability? Food for thought.

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-14, 11:54 PM

It really depends on how you define moral and what makes something moral. If moral is just "right" or "wrong", why is what's "right" right? And unfortunatly, it's hard to go into that without violating the forum's bans on religious or political discussion.
When you shoot an enemy in the game, you do not destroy what causes that enemy to act how it does, only how that thing interacts with its world. Killing a person in the real world does destroy the brain. Even if you called AI a living thing (reacts to stimuli, changes its environment, ect) it is not killed when you shoot a mook. It's like in star trek with the borg, where the individual drones are not individuals but limbs of a hive mind. Killing a borg drone annoys the Collective, but doesn't kill it.
As for if its moral to enjoy, or not be disturbed by killing a game character(character, not mook, think party members in RPGs as opposed to nameless waves of enemies), it really depends on what set of morals you're going by. And the character is not really a person, it's an anthropomorphism. It'd be like freaking out over "killing" someone in a painting by damaging the painting. Or naming a pair of glasses and turing yourself in as a murderer when you break them.
As for someone deriving enjoyment from causing (simulated) harm to a "person" in a game, that's more of living out a fantasy of doing that to a person, in which case it's abnormal but not necessarily immoral (due to the whole "moral relativity" thing).

So, by going with the common set of morals in western culture, it can be immoral to kill or like killing things in video games, but it depends on why they're killing the things.

Edit: Golentan, I think the main reason why people act differently towards slaughtering giant talking bugs and baby-plant-things is the baby-things look more like people so the person playing the game is disensitised to humaniod cries of pain.

toasty

2010-05-15, 12:15 AM

My general answer:

Video Games are fantasy. The characters are fake. Much of our media (movies, music, art, books) display acts of violence. Many of these acts are not meant to be reenacted. In fact, if any video game or other such media seems to be actively encouraging others to enact acts of violence upon others then they should not be used or enjoyed.

If a person honestly believes, that Doom, for instance, is encouraging him to buy a shotgun and shoot people, then that person requires serious help. if a person believes that that Gangsta life of GTA is supposed to be followed as closely as possible, then that person should STOP PLAYING GTA. I can play GTA without being effected by the "evilness" of the gangsta life-style (or whatever it is, I actually don't really like GTA and don't play it that much), but maybe someone else can't: its Rated M for a reason. You don't let your little kids watch, Saving Private Ryan, do you? With that in mind you shouldn't let your kids play any video game.

I "kill" people in video games all the time. I play DotA and League of Legends a LOT with my friends. We kill each other a LOT in these games. Am I more violent as a result? No. In fact, playing dota has introduced me to some really cool, and really nice people. None of them are violent haters waiting to crack, they're normal young adults.

Superglucose

2010-05-15, 12:17 AM

One of the issues which came up was whether it was moral to kill other characters in game. And whether it was moral to enjoy such a thing.

Kill implies life. I submit to you that it is impossible to kill other characters in a video game. Any time you "kill" someone in a game it has about as much moral consideration as ripping a drawing of a person in half or breaking a stick against a tree.

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-15, 12:35 AM

Kill implies life. I submit to you that it is impossible to kill other characters in a video game. Any time you "kill" someone in a game it has about as much moral consideration as ripping a drawing of a person in half or breaking a stick against a tree.

It depends on how close the thing is to life.
A fly gathers information with its senses of touch, sight, ect. It then interprets this and acts on the info, creating a situation where it gathers new info then acts on that.
If someone programmed a computer program to recieve information fed to it in the form of and to react to that info the same way a fly might (ie, they created an artificial fly) is it not living? Video game characters react to info they recieve from the player, are they not "living" to a degree?

Superglucose

2010-05-15, 12:42 AM

You are wrong. Characters in video games aren't even remotely close to living.

Mr. Scaly

2010-05-15, 12:45 AM

I answer the question "is killing in video games immoral" with a question of my own: is knocking the croquet ball through a wicket in a game of croquet immoral?

Zevox

2010-05-15, 12:46 AM

Sadists get pleasure from pain/suffering/humilitation. I'm pretty sure that most people who play video games know that those lumps of pixels don't have families, loved ones, children, friends, etc. and aren't "hurt" by your "killing" them.
Pretty much this sort of thing.

Games are mere simulations - the things you do in them do not actually occur, the beings shown within them do not actually exist. From where I'm sitting, morality is utterly irrelevant to them. Until we reach a point where our technology can create true sapient AIs and someone starts putting those into video games and allowing you to destroy them, there's simply nothing to consider in my opinion.

Zevox

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-15, 12:51 AM

You are wrong. Characters in video games aren't even remotely close to living.

How do you define living? What's the difference between whooping when you kill someone over the internet in CoD and whooping when you kill an AI in singleplayer mode?
If it reacts to outside stimuli and changes its environment we can call it living, yes? Then AI in video games are living. They don't exist in the phisical world but they do in the world created by the software.

golentan

2010-05-15, 12:54 AM

Edit: Golentan, I think the main reason why people act differently towards slaughtering giant talking bugs and baby-plant-things is the baby-things look more like people so the person playing the game is disensitised to humaniod cries of pain.

Bah. Touchy-feely categorizations of what's right and wrong to do irritate the hell out of me when they boil down to "But it's okay to kill it because it's UGLY!" Starting at the humanoid end of the spectrum (It's an orc? Shoot on sight) and moving all the way to disembodied computer programs (it has no face, it's okay to wipe the AI's drive, and if it struggles for survival then it's really crossed the line).

It seems so wrongheaded to me. The sort of thing that leads to truly nightmarish projects. They're different -> they're impure -> they're inferior -> they're evil -> Rid the world of the Evil (group not speaking here) so that the Master (group speaking here) (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ANaziByAnyOtherName) may prosper and usher in a perfect society with the pretty people who look and think just like us. Until we narrow the parameters on "us" and widen for "them" just a little bit more next time...

I have nightmares about you people, have I mentioned that? Wake screaming and sweaty in the middle of the night nightmares. It's not helped by the fact that I have actually seen you people do things worse than I ever feared in my most terrible fever dreams to each other.

thubby

2010-05-15, 01:24 AM

is cops and robbers immoral?
how about enjoying shakespeare? characters get killed in those, and people enjoy performing and watching it.

the reality is, not only is videogame violence not immoral, those who argue it is are hypocritical.
i would go a step farther and say that the entire idea is simply a symptom of the bias against new media that all modern media have gone through.

there was actually a study done on this very subject, it found that violence was not a factor in the enjoyment of the game. they changed the weapons to more cartoon-y tazers and instead of kills players were teleported in a flash of light.
there's even an old nerf fps that is immensely popular

edit: for another example we have paintball and airsoft. you don't even simulate killing things!
i would speculate it satisfies some hunting instinct in people.

Strawberries

2010-05-15, 01:27 AM

I'm doing an assignment for school on video game violence and any issues that it raises.

One of the issues which came up was whether it was moral to kill other characters in game. And whether it was moral to enjoy such a thing.

What has morality got do do with killing characters in video games? We aren't advanced to the point where computers are sentient AIs. If I was doing the assignment, I won't argue that it's moral - I'd point out the issue doesn't apply.

On the other is that it could be considered a little sadistic because when you get enjoyment from killing an opponent you are essentially getting enjoyment from causing harm to something else, even if it doesn't exist.

This instead can be argued. I think you are making a rushed assumption here. When you kill an opponent you may get enjoyment from a number of different things

-The fact that s/he's an ass who deserves it (it's no different that cheering when the bad guy is defeated in a book or a movie)

-The fact that you managed to kill it even if the fight was difficult (It's less a case of getting enjoyment from causing harm and more a case of getting enjoyment for having devised a good strategy - not different than chess: should you feel sadistic when you tip the other player's king?)

-If you're playing an evil charachter, the fact that you killed them, full stop. This can be assimilated to the pleasure an actor gets for playing a "villain" in a consistent matter. No morality issues needed.

Long story short: video games are just that, games. If they manage to influence someone in real life, you may be certain that there where pre-existent psychological issues with this person, and the same effect could be obtained by reading a book, watching a movie or even the news on television. I'd like to think we as humans have a pretty good grasp of what's real and what isn't.

Zevox

2010-05-15, 01:29 AM

How do you define living?
I believe you're looking for this (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/life).

life
–noun
1. the condition that distinguishes organisms from inorganic objects and dead organisms, being manifested by growth through metabolism, reproduction, and the power of adaptation to environment through changes originating internally.
2. the sum of the distinguishing phenomena of organisms, esp. metabolism, growth, reproduction, and adaptation to environment.

What's the difference between whooping when you kill someone over the internet in CoD and whooping when you kill an AI in singleplayer mode?
Morally? None whatsoever if you ask me.

If it reacts to outside stimuli and changes its environment we can call it living, yes?
Not by the existing definition of the term. See above link/quote.

-The fact that you managed to kill it even if the fight was difficult (It's less a case of getting enjoyment from causing harm and more a case of getting enjoyment for having devised a good strategy - not different than chess: should you feel sadistic when you tip the other player's king?)
I do believe it would be more accurate to say that the enjoyment in that case comes from overcoming a challenge. Whether the fight involved strategy or not can vary, after all.

Zevox

MonkeyBusiness

2010-05-15, 01:50 AM

I think this is a really fantastic question. And I feel that as long as gamers ask this question of themselves and really try to answer it thoughtfully and honestly, then as a culture we're doing okay. That doesn't mean every gamer is going to be "perfect", however we define that.

For myself, I find violence in computer games, RPG's, and in movies very satisifying if it makes sense in the context of the story. For me, it is a way to release some stress. I don't actually play computer games at all unless I am feeling particularly angry over unfair treatment. That's a really specific set of circumstances, I know, but for me computer games are a chance to release my hurt and anger in a harmless way. And that's probably why I find it most satisfying to be the "good guy" in-game: in real life goodness is not always rewarded, and life simply isn't fair. That's also probably why context is important.

I'll tell you something else: in "real life" I am a petite woman. I put people at ease, and I come across as very gentle. I am in fact quite tough, and while I don't fight back I also don't back down. But most people don't realize the second part until they try to bully me. Most of that bullying washes right over me, because I don't respond the way people expect: I don't cry, nor do I yell back. I just keep being as polite as possible without giving ground until the aggressor gets tired and goes away.

But frankly non-violent negotiation in the face of (threatened) violence is exhausting. And it doesn't do away with the fact that what I'd really like to do is apply my boot to the bully's nether regions ... repeatedly.

To offset this urge, I play computer games where I can do some "butt-kickin' for goodness" and not worry about the consequences.

I see it as a cultural adaptation of the fight-or-flight instinct. When adrenaline is coursing through a person's body, you have to get rid of it somehow. Bashing a person on the head isn't accepable (or prudent, or legal, or typically ethical), and flight is often not a safe option in everyday circumstances. (Just to be clear: I'm talking about everyday workplace/domestic/neighborhood altercations, not fleeing from tigers, or a psychopath who's escaped Shutter Island and broken into your house, or an invading army, or an abusive family member.) Standing your ground and patiently trying to work things out without being snide, angry, concilatory, sarcastic, passive aggressive, etc is the most efficient (let alone ethical) way to try to resolve "issues". But try telling that to your adrenal glands! They don't care ... they're adapted to producing energy for the body when it's under stress. So that needs to get siphoned off somehow, or it gets chanelled elsewhere.

The ancient Greeks understood this ... that's why theater was such an important part of their society: theater was an acceptable way for grown men to emote in public. A truly great play allowed you to feel deep emotion - angry, sorrow, joy, whatever - and by expressing it, be free of it. They called it catharsis. And yes, grown men would weep in public during tragedies like Oedipus Rex or Medea.

I suspect that the gladiatorial games served the people of the Roman Empire in a similar way. The difference is that in Greek theater the blood and death was fake. (I also suspect it was more effective as a release, because the audience likely had an empathy with the actors that was deeper than the connection bewtween audience and gladiators. Ironically, the characters in the plays seemed "more real" than the real people being slaughtered in the arena.) I perceive games as being closer to drama than the gladiatorial circus.

I therefore also see computer games (as well as role-playing games and movies) as providing a contemporary method of acchieving catharsis. And as a means of expelling violent or sad feelings in a safe way, I see them as an essential part of our culture.

The one caveat I include in this is: if a person has only one method of catharsis and uses it constantly, it ceases to be effective. So a person who plays computer games every day is not working off more anger or unhappiness than someone who plays intermittantly. I have no evidence to back up this hypothesis, but I do know that a person will become habituated to what once gave release if it is used constantly.

Assuming my first hypothesis has some accuracy, I can further speculate that the link between games and violence, while correlative, is not necessarily causitive. In other words: games and violent behavior may be related, but it's not therefore proof that games cause the violence.

For example, if "Jane" plays violent games as a form of catharsis but has no other outlet, and if she uses games constantly and exclusively to relieve stress, over time it's possible that she might not get the same sense of release, and she'll need to find another outlet. Maybe she'll take up racketball, swimming, or horseback riding. Maybe she'll express her feelings through art. Maybe she'll use sex as an outlet. Maybe she'll suddenly watch scary or violent movies.

... Or maybe she'll take her feelings out on another person. That is one way of acchieving catharsis. But if she resorts to the latter, it will probably be very petty things (cattiness at the office, nagging a spouse, being impatient with her kids, being less-than-courteous while driving), rather than mass murder. But the results still are not fun for Jane. Unless she straightens up she'll alienate her kids and co-workers, and maybe get sacked from her job or divorced from a fed-up spouse, or wind up in a car wreck. Pull your head out of your butt, Jane!

Another thing that might happen to Jane is that she might take out her feelings on herself. Alcoholism, cutting, suicide ...

Most of the time, however, loss of catharsis is not going to lead to violent murder. A person has to be very damaged emotionally and socially before that can come to pass. And with a person who is that damaged, playing games won't be an effective outlet ... or a cause.

So to sum up: I think games are important as a means of releasing feelings that need an outlet, thereby restoring the adrenal surge to a state of equilibrium. Overuse of games, in my observation, does not cause violence. It might, however, result in less cathartic effect over time; and if a new method of catharsis is not found, that violence will find another outlet. For most people using games is fun and healthy, because games help release violence. They cannot cause it.

MBiz

Serpentine

2010-05-15, 02:19 AM

How do you define living? What's the difference between whooping when you kill someone over the internet in CoD and whooping when you kill an AI in singleplayer mode?
If it reacts to outside stimuli and changes its environment we can call it living, yes? Then AI in video games are living. They don't exist in the phisical world but they do in the world created by the software.Somewhat covered above, but more specifically, from Wikipedia:
Homeostasis: Regulation of the internal environment to maintain a constant state; for example, electrolyte concentration or sweating to reduce temperature. You might say the machinery of the computer does, but I don't believe you can say the same about individual "people" in a game.
Organization: Being structurally composed of one or more cells, which are the basic units of life. Again, I can't rule out the possibility that the hardware of a computer might be argued to be made of cell analogues, but it's pushing it.
Metabolism: Transformation of energy by converting chemicals and energy into cellular components (anabolism) and decomposing organic matter (catabolism). Living things require energy to maintain internal organization (homeostasis) and to produce the other phenomena associated with life. Unless you count the requirement of electricity, I doubt it.
Growth: Maintenance of a higher rate of anabolism than catabolism. A growing organism increases in size in all of its parts, rather than simply accumulating matter. I don't believe so. Maybe a custom-made program could accomplish this, sort of. But that's unlikely to be relevant to the discussion of videogame "baddies".
Adaptation: The ability to change over a period of time in response to the environment. This ability is fundamental to the process of evolution and is determined by the organism's heredity as well as the composition of metabolized substances, and external factors present. Arguably, but not in the context of video game characters.
Response to stimuli: A response can take many forms, from the contraction of a unicellular organism to external chemicals, to complex reactions involving all the senses of multicellular organisms. A response is often expressed by motion, for example, the leaves of a plant turning toward the sun (phototropism) and by chemotaxis. Alright, yes.
Reproduction: The ability to produce new individual organisms, either asexually from a single parent organism, or sexually from two parent organisms. Possibly, to an extent, in some games.

You could, conceivably, perhaps, create a program that meets all the requirements of life. Video game characters (at least at present...), do not.

Here's the thing, though: Video game characters are information. Information is not life, and cannot be "killed". You could, maybe, argue that all life is information, when it gets down to genetics, but you'd be seriously pushing it.

Dogmantra

2010-05-15, 06:00 AM

This really sums it up for me:
http://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/computer_problems.png

The "killing people" part of violent video games is just a design choice. You could quite easily replace it with anything, like throwing cookies at really high speeds towards your "enemies" so they eat them and get fat. The controls would be exactly the same, and to win, you'd have to do exactly the same thing, but instead of "killing" people, you'd be making them obese.

Capt Spanner

2010-05-15, 09:34 AM

I don't believe it to be immoral, nor sociopathic.

That said, sometimes I do have twinges of guilt if my video-game character inflicts a particularly nasty death, were it done in real life (i.e. CoD2: throwing a grenade to clear a guy out from behind cover, and accidentally shooting in him the leg as he ran, instead of getting a clean shot. I felt really bad watching try to crawl futilely away from the live grenade, unable to put him out of his misery due to the lack of rounds for my rifle...)

As long as someone is able to draw the line between real life and games, there isn't a problem.

I answer the question "is killing in video games immoral" with a question of my own: is knocking the croquet ball through a wicket in a game of croquet immoral?

The answer to your question is yes. Croquet is the Game of Satan, and has done more for (real-life) humans wanting to take a (real-life) mallet to the skull of a (real-life, living, breathing) person than any other "civilised" activity.
:smalltongue:

waterpenguin43

2010-05-15, 10:03 AM

Kill implies life. I submit to you that it is impossible to kill other characters in a video game. Any time you "kill" someone in a game it has about as much moral consideration as ripping a drawing of a person in half or breaking a stick against a tree.

I agree. So long as you don't mimic it OUTSIDE the game, it's fine.
Also, people only PLAY the games to "kill" those lumps of pixels, and they don't get sadistic pleasure from THAT: They get pleasure from the fast-paced action and speed of the fighting.

Umael

2010-05-15, 10:54 AM

The "killing people" part of violent video games is just a design choice. You could quite easily replace it with anything, like throwing cookies at really high speeds towards your "enemies" so they eat them and get fat. The controls would be exactly the same, and to win, you'd have to do exactly the same thing, but instead of "killing" people, you'd be making them obese.

Except that the storyline and the setting might make "killing" more enjoyable and more suitable than "fattening" your enemies.

There are any number of games where instead of "killing" you can "fatten" and the game play would not be affected as long as the game play is defined as removing the "enemy" from play. If game play is defined by enjoyment of playing a game, then "fattening" would not be considered satisfactory for many.

Fan

2010-05-15, 11:00 AM

zeratul

2010-05-15, 11:06 AM

I would argue that violence or killing in video games can actually help diffuse violent tendencies in the real world. I know a lot of people feel that killing characters in games or playing violent video games is a great form of stress release. Me and a few friends of mine played a d&d campaign in which we played as evil characters doing unspeakabley horrible things, killing civis, breaking into the houses of villagers and taking them out in amusing ways and stuff, lots of black comedy. Now while any of this stuff in the real world would be considered reprehensible, doing it in a game is fine, and if it keeps a person from doing violent things in the real world, then that's even better.

I agree. So long as you don't mimic it OUTSIDE the game, it's fine.
Also, people only PLAY the games to "kill" those lumps of pixels, and they don't get sadistic pleasure from THAT: They get pleasure from the fast-paced action and speed of the fighting.

I wouldn't say that's entirely true. Most of the gamers I've seen playing shooters especially (myself included) do get a sort of macabre satisfaction out of getting a perfect head shot, or knee shot or whatever. I think the prevalence of the phrase "BOOM, HEADSHOT" is sort of a testament to this :smalltongue:.

Serpentine

2010-05-15, 11:21 AM

I define living as having 3 out of the 5 traits of life they teach you in High School Biology.Although the definition of life is debated (see: viruses) and acknowledged to be based on our own planet (i.e. life on other planets might be completely different), all of the traits are required to be considered life.

2xMachina

2010-05-15, 11:38 AM

Well, if you think 'killing' in games is immoral, you better be a vegetarian/vegan too. You're indirectly killing real living things if you're not!

Oh, and don't support pesticides, nor treated water, cause it kills bugs/germs.

In fact, turn off your immune system. It's killing bacteria. How you're gonna do that, IDK.

Cristo Meyers

2010-05-15, 11:52 AM

...On the other is that it could be considered a little sadistic because when you get enjoyment from killing an opponent you are essentially getting enjoyment from causing harm to something else, even if it doesn't exist.

For that argument I usually use this counter-example: is watching an episode of Criminal Minds similarly sadistic? You are, after all, being entertained by a story that essentially requires someone or several someones be killed, sometimes brutally.

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-15, 12:07 PM

I define living as having 3 out of the 5 traits of life they teach you in High School Biology.

A conglomerate of pixels, and light that would, without our influence not even exist...

Does not fit the definition of life, and does not match even any of the traits as they are only barely physical.

The not existing without our influence point is not really debatable on these forums from the bans on religious discussion.

If they are barely physical, then people are barely physical. Not their bodies, but the person , the thing existing within their brains that you talk to when you shout words at their ears. The computer program exists as software within hardware, very similar.

TSGames

2010-05-15, 12:41 PM

There exists nothing morally wrong with killing in video games. There are exceptions, of course, and we do have the technological ability to make it morally wrong, but video games simply haven't gone that route. For the former statement, someone with a weak sense of reality or a certain mental illness probably should not play violent, realistic video games anymore than a manic depressant should be allowed to drink and listen to Ozzy Osbourne all the time.

For the latter statement, picture Second Life. Let's say someone works really hard in their virtual world and, through a process of years, accumulates a substantial amount of digital wealth. Now, let's modify Second Life with one small change:characters can be killed, and just like in real life, they stay dead. If I log onto to Second Life and kill said character, then what I have done is morally wrong. It is nowhere near as wrong as the murder of a real human being, but it is still definitely morally reprehensible. Clearly, we have the technology to create such a situation, but I've yet to see any video game do this. Generally, death is a minor setback in games, and when you kill a character, at best, you've ruined the effort of the last few minutes, maybe hours of progress, not years.

It also helps that most games that allow you to kill other characters expect you to kill other characters. The logical implication is that you should also expect to be killed. This is substantially different from real life, where you now have rights to expect not to be killed, and you will be seriously inconvenienced by death, not just set back a few seconds/minutes/hours.

waterpenguin43

2010-05-15, 01:43 PM

I wouldn't say that's entirely true. Most of the gamers I've seen playing shooters especially (myself included) do get a sort of macabre satisfaction out of getting a perfect head shot, or knee shot or whatever. I think the prevalence of the phrase "BOOM, HEADSHOT" is sort of a testament to this :smalltongue:.

Maybe, but the people I know don't do that.

Rutskarn

2010-05-15, 01:49 PM

GolemsVoice

2010-05-15, 02:23 PM

I agree with what the posters above me said, and add my own opinion. What makes the difference is that almost everything is OK as long as it's justified by both the story and the player doing it. So, if I play, say, a Sith Lord, than I will naturally do more evil things than if I am playing a Paladin, and, since I AM a Sith Lord, and evil is what I do, it's no problem when the game forces you to do evil.
If I play a soldier in a war, and I actively try to round up and kill as many civilians as possible, despite this not being the game's objective, I would at least find this disturbing. I would also find a game disturbing that would force you to do (very) evil things in a context where these evil things are not required.

Again, if I play a necromancer, killing people and raising them is what I do. If you ahve to slaugther escapoing civilians as Arthas in WCIII, you do that as Arthas, who is a bad guy. As long as I do evil from the bad guys motivation, not from my own, I don't see much of a problem.
And even then, it depends on the players motivation. If the palyer playing the soldier in the game I made up would gain pleasure from killing innocents, he IS to blame to an extend. If you kill an enemy in a muliplayer game in an amusing fashion and it is clear that you are doing it for fun, not for the act of killing per se, no problem. I'm sure many of us have killed a few Sims, or dropped a few innocent visitors in the water in Rollercoaster Tycoon (the panda entertainers were hilarious, the way they waved in their suits, but I disgress).

Toastkart

2010-05-15, 04:34 PM

I'm doing an assignment for school on video game violence and any issues that it raises.

One of the issues which came up was whether it was moral to kill other characters in game. And whether it was moral to enjoy such a thing.

I've been unable to find anything on the interwebz and so I now turn to the playground for your opinions.

I for one am entirely unsure. On one hand you have the fact that its all 'just a game'. On the other is that it could be considered a little sadistic because when you get enjoyment from killing an opponent you are essentially getting enjoyment from causing harm to something else, even if it doesn't exist.

Please help me.

Thank you all in advance.

As others have mentioned, it largely depends on what moral system you're using as a standard. If you mean moral in general, then it still largely depends on what you consider reprehensible.

I'm of the opinion that engaging in fiction is not, in fact, immoral. Video games are a type of fiction, ergo, engaging in the playing of video games is not immoral.

If you want to say that your actions within a video game context (a fictional environment) can be judged morally, then you might as well say that your thoughts, even those that don't lead to action, can be judged morally. Some people would agree with that, but I think most people who believe that would agree that you can think bad thoughts and still be an essentially good person.

Whether or not video games have an effect on the player as some people have talked about is, I think, immaterial to the question. As someone else mentioned, some actors' greatest roles were villains. Does this have any bearing on their moral fiber? On their well-being? On their potential to commit acts of violence? Likely it doesn't.

That being said, an mmo is an entirely different matter. Why? Because then the game is merely a medium for an interaction with another person, and we can be right nasty to someone if we have anonymity to protect us. Even in this case, then, the action within the game (pve) can't be considered moral or immoral. The action that affects another person (pvp) can be.

Johel

2010-05-15, 04:50 PM

Serpentine

2010-05-16, 12:03 AM

For that argument I usually use this counter-example: is watching an episode of Criminal Minds similarly sadistic? You are, after all, being entertained by a story that essentially requires someone or several someones be killed, sometimes brutally.There is a group, mostly of family of murder victims I think, who are against the use of murder for entertainment.
I'm not one of them, just throwing that out there.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-16, 12:38 AM

The way the media seems to like to link every killing by youth with some form of gaming is despicable fearmongering. However, I am not absolutely sure virtually destroying virtual humans in bloody and brutal ways is basically healthy either. Graphics and animation keep getting better and better. We are already at the point where an in-game screenshot can look pretty much human. Getting the animation right is much harder, but it is been worked on.
Is a form of entertainment where you are rewarded for the appearance of killing creatures your subconscious will not be able to tell from actual humans a good thing?
I don't know the answer, and I admit it frightens me a little.

CarpeGuitarrem

2010-05-16, 12:55 AM

I'm not one of the majority here, I know that for sure...

...but, being an artist and writer, I don't quite agree with the "it's not real" argument. Not completely. Lemme explain a tad.

It's quite obvious that the world of video games, and, in fact, fiction of all sorts and types, is indeed something that exists apart from our own reality, in a sense. It is not our reality. Things that happen in there do not happen here as well; they're just modeled after things that happen here. Even if sometimes "modeled after" includes a healthy dose of funhouse mirror distortion.

Does that mean that this fictional world doesn't have some sort of reality unto itself? In the vein of Tolkien, I personally believe that fiction holds a sort of subreality. I think that's the quality which enables us to connect to it, which enables us to empathize with its characters, which lets us find meaning in stories. That's what makes it a bit better than mere stimuli. There is something real to that. So I think there can be a sort of reality to fiction. Which in itself invites a whole bunch of questions and thoughts about that...

...even without my (potentially crazy, depending on your viewpoint) theory, there's still a case to be made for at the very least caution regarding death in entertainment. It's the time-old idea of desensitization. When humans are exposed to any extreme phenomenon, they naturally start to adjust their perceptions in order to cope with it, to prevent it from shocking them. Because shock is bad when you're exposed to the thing that shocks you...very frequently. Your mind copes by increasing your tolerance for the shocker.

Death initially enters human life as a very shocking thing. End of the line. Bam. Dead. Cold stone gone. Whammo. This starts to erode as humans experience deaths of people around them. Now, witnessing and causing virtual death certainly doesn't have the same impact, but that doesn't mean it won't have any impact at all. Being exposed to it over and over again slowly alters perceptions, IMO. Is there data for or against this? I don't know. I don't know of any reliable way to test this theory, ethically. It's not something that can be readily quantified. I'm just left with a little observation and common sense, no experimental data.

I'm not thinking that playing Halo is going to make you a serial killer, or someone with no compunction about pulling the trigger on a person. I do think, however, that the effects of death in video games need to be considered. They certainly don't leave the human person in the exact same state as before the gaming. There is a change going on. It's up to us to figure out exactly how much this change is okay, and when we should start being worried.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-16, 01:29 AM

Does "killing" in video game put permanently a stop to a sentient being's existance ? No.
After each kill, the AI of bots are simply restarted rather than erased.
And I have never eard of human players being murdered because somebody killed their avatars.
A few suicides maybe but those are not the stable kind of humans. They could have suicided for any other kind of failure, really.

Does "killing" in video game cause any kind of pain or suffering, either physical or psychological ? No.
If you kill the avatar of a human player rather than an bot, said player might feel a childish frustration for having lost the game but that's it.
We can't assimilate repetitive "kills" of an AI with torture, since their current code doesn't allow them to feel, let alone reflect on the meaning of their existance (which would make them wish to end that unending cycle of death but since it's not the case...)

Therefor, there's nothing morally wrong about killing in video games.
It's not more wrong than a game of tag (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tag_%28game%29).
How do know you feel? How do I know you have pain or suffering? You might just be a meat puppet, no real feelings under the hood, Pinocchio, merely saying you feel. Just like an AI can be coded to play a sound file saying 'I'm hit, I'm hit!" when it's virtual life is depleted. How do I know turning your brain into bloody guacamole is actually ending something?
I don't.
I don't believe that by the way.But it is a mtter of faith and empathy, not discernible fact. What if a game was so real you, at least subconsciously, couldn't tell the difference between a bot and real human? That's where games are trying to go, at least visually and AI wise. What is the difference then, from the perspective of the player, of temporarily destroying a bot and permanently ending a human life. I am not saying they are morally equivalent, I am saying they could become emotionally equivalent to the participant.

SharpWolf

2010-05-16, 01:41 AM

I'm a video game programmer and, having sometimes been faced with this question (someone even told me I was a "pusher of virtual death" or something to that effect once), I've got this to say:

A bunch of electronic data, represented on a computer or TV screen is not life, and is not a person either. "Person" implies sapience. We're not even close in the slightest to that, even with the most advanced AIs.

So it all comes down to this: fiction is not reality. The "people" killed in a computer game are pretty much abstract constructs designed to (sometimes) simulate parts of our reality. They're the work of imagination -- an illusion -- nothing more. I can imagine myself killing imaginary people with imaginary tools as much as I want, it's not reality. What you see on the screen is an illustration representing various electrical currents going through electronic circuits.

It is true that fiction does influence sometimes reality in some ways or others, by making us feel various emotions about various issues. But even then, video game "death" doesn't come even close to the real thing. There isn't the smell, nor the feel, nor the touch. There isn't anything with sentience, nor sapience, nor loved ones, nor thoughts, nor dreams, nor feelings. It's only a bunch of pictures in a box, and when I'm playing, even when I'm seemingly completely immersed in it, some part of my mind knows it and knows the difference between it and reality. And if an adult doesn't the difference (I give some leeway to young children because their minds are still forming), then they're in a serious need of psychological help.

So I pretty much see the whole thing as a non-issue. There are neither persons nor lifeforms involved, so morality is not a factor. It's a game, a set of arbitrary rules, codified and represented in such a way as to exercise the mind. It's like chess or go. Nobody would claim it's immoral to "kill" the piece of your opponent (and I would be very scared of someone who would). Everyone knows it's just a lump of wood or plastic that the players have agreed to move around in various ways. It's the same thing with video games, just with electricity instead of these materials.

Myatar_Panwar

2010-05-16, 01:43 AM

Regardless of "graphics", video game violence is still very unrealistic, and in my opinion, will never reach that true point of realism. Because that is not fun. Its sick. Sure, if possible, someone may create a true simulation. But that will be for demonstration purposes, not entertainment.

Your average player does not want to shoot a man in the lung and go through the ramifications of watching what transpires after that.

And I think that people really underestimate their own ability to discern reality from the virtual kind. People are not stupid.

Serpentine

2010-05-16, 01:57 AM

...even without my (potentially crazy, depending on your viewpoint) theory, there's still a case to be made for at the very least caution regarding death in entertainment. It's the time-old idea of desensitization. When humans are exposed to any extreme phenomenon, they naturally start to adjust their perceptions in order to cope with it, to prevent it from shocking them. Because shock is bad when you're exposed to the thing that shocks you...very frequently. Your mind copes by increasing your tolerance for the shocker.

Death initially enters human life as a very shocking thing. End of the line. Bam. Dead. Cold stone gone. Whammo. This starts to erode as humans experience deaths of people around them. Now, witnessing and causing virtual death certainly doesn't have the same impact, but that doesn't mean it won't have any impact at all. Being exposed to it over and over again slowly alters perceptions, IMO. Is there data for or against this? I don't know. I don't know of any reliable way to test this theory, ethically. It's not something that can be readily quantified. I'm just left with a little observation and common sense, no experimental data.
Not agreeing or disagreeing, just want to see your thoughts. How does this relate to the fact that, nowadays, most people (in our parts of the world, alas) have far less contact with death than we used to? Fifty years ago, I would have had to deal with my baby nephew dying. Five hundred years ago, most people would have had most of the children they bore die before adulthood, and many mothers along with them. 1500 years ago, murder was* near-commonplace.
Public executions, war on home soil, plague, famine: People in the past were just far more likely to see people die, and more likely to see them die in very nasty ways, than we are now. Some people think it's a good thing, others think it's bad that we're now so sensitive to it, others just make the observation.
So, in this context, very arguably videogame and media violence is to an extent restoring us to our past desensitisation. In any case, if we are being desensitised, it's nothing new, and far more gently than it used to be. So is it a bad thing?

*something I heard recently, not sure about its actual general accuracy, but it's safe to say it was far more common than it is now.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-16, 02:04 AM

_Zoot_

2010-05-16, 02:05 AM

Because I was interested to know his response I asked my Father (A former infantry officer (and thus someone that had to be prepared to do what the games in question are all about)) what he thought on the matter. He said that it's about a persons ability to distinguish reality from a game. So long as the person knows that they are playing a game and that the 'people' are not real then there is little harm in it.

I felt that an infantryman's point of view would be interesting in the discussion. I feel much the same way as he does.

GolemsVoice

2010-05-16, 02:25 AM

I don't believe that by the way.But it is a mtter of faith and empathy, not discernible fact. What if a game was so real you, at least subconsciously, couldn't tell the difference between a bot and real human? That's where games are trying to go, at least visually and AI wise. What is the difference then, from the perspective of the player, of temporarily destroying a bot and permanently ending a human life. I am not saying they are morally equivalent, I am saying they could become emotionally equivalent to the participant.

Yes, games are getting more and more realistic, but, as SharpWolf said, while they may one day achieve a level of almost fotorealism, they will likely never achieve ANYTHING that can be called sentience.

And I doubt any game will be as real to any normal human as you mentioned. You forget, you still have to start up your PC, klick on the icon for "Chainsawfest III", click "Load Game", watch a loading screen giving you amsuing and helpful chainsaw-related infos, etc. All these things act as filter that make you aware that you're entering a digital world that is not real.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-16, 03:31 AM

Yes, games are getting more and more realistic, but, as SharpWolf said, while they may one day achieve a level of almost fotorealism, they will likely never achieve ANYTHING that can be called sentience.
Not my point, at all. It doesn't matter if the on-screen bots are people, anymore then a collection of words in a story is an actual person. People still react. Only in a game, it's interactive.

And I doubt any game will be as real to any normal human as you mentioned. You forget, you still have to start up your PC, klick on the icon for "Chainsawfest III", click "Load Game", watch a loading screen giving you amsuing and helpful chainsaw-related infos, etc. All these things act as filter that make you aware that you're entering a digital world that is not real.
On a concious level, yes. But again ,that's not the issue.

thubby

2010-05-16, 04:22 AM

That may be part of the problem. You have a human looking creature. And you shoot them, and it's fun. What are the emotional ramifications of that?

why focus on just the killing of characters?
I would imagine most people feel just as dispassionate about blowing up the house the enemy is in, but would find the idea of blowing up someone's home reprehensible.
should we start questioning the morality of damaging virtual property as well?

On a concious level, yes. But again ,that's not the issue.

if your unconcious perceived the events as real you would be traumatized every time your character was killed

Ravens_cry

2010-05-16, 04:28 AM

why focus on just the killing of characters?
I would imagine most people feel just as dispassionate about blowing up the house the enemy is in, but would find the idea of blowing up someone's home reprehensible.
should we start questioning the morality of damaging virtual property as well?

Maybe we should. But present games have, due to present graphic and budget limitations, limited ability for property destruction on a personal level.

if your unconcious perceived the events as real you would be traumatized every time your character was killed
The game over screen assures you this 'death' is temporary and tosses you out of immersion. The same can not be said of every time you enact a kill on-screen.

thubby

2010-05-16, 04:51 AM

The game over screen assures you this 'death' is temporary and tosses you out of immersion. The same can not be said of every time you enact a kill on-screen.

so without a game-over screen people would be getting traumatized by videogames?

we already know the psychological impact of actually killing people. police officers and soldiers are frequently in need of counseling and ptsd plagues the military.
the distinct lack of these damages from videogames should be a good indication that our subconscious gets the idea.

Yarram

2010-05-16, 06:18 AM

It depends on how close the thing is to life.
A fly gathers information with its senses of touch, sight, ect. It then interprets this and acts on the info, creating a situation where it gathers new info then acts on that.
If someone programmed a computer program to recieve information fed to it in the form of and to react to that info the same way a fly might (ie, they created an artificial fly) is it not living? Video game characters react to info they recieve from the player, are they not "living" to a degree?

If this is the case, then aren't we obligated to kill them, before they become self-aware and skynet takes over?

Moving on though, was anyone else disturbed by the way that you casually killed police men in Mirror's Edge? Just a *little* bit creepy.

Johel

2010-05-16, 06:20 AM

How do know you feel? How do I know you have pain or suffering? You might just be a meat puppet, no real feelings under the hood, Pinocchio, merely saying you feel. Just like an AI can be coded to play a sound file saying 'I'm hit, I'm hit!" when it's virtual life is depleted. How do I know turning your brain into bloody guacamole is actually ending something?
I don't.
I don't believe that by the way.But it is a matter of faith and empathy, not discernible fact. What if a game was so real you, at least subconsciously, couldn't tell the difference between a bot and real human? That's where games are trying to go, at least visually and AI wise. What is the difference then, from the perspective of the player, of temporarily destroying a bot and permanently ending a human life. I am not saying they are morally equivalent, I am saying they could become emotionally equivalent to the participant.

I wrapped the part where you sound like Devil's advocate. I see the point but I'm more smiling than thinking when reading that.

For your point about the difficulty to emotionally discern fiction from reality, you are perfectly right : it can be difficult for young minds to make a difference between virtual killing (let's call it "tagging") and real killing (let's call it "murder").

I won't go over the explanation of how different a murder is from a tagging, since we don't want people to experience that difference : if they do, then it's already too late and somebody died for real...
Therefor, yes, we should make sure players understand that tagging has no real consequences outside the game while murder has dire consequences and should not be done "for fun", if at all.

People should be taught not to cross the line. Make sure the player understands there's no "respawn" IRL, that any murdered person is lost forever for everyone and that this applies to the player too if he is murdered. If he doesn't refrain from killing out of empathy for others, then he'll do it out of self-preservation : the law might be a aspect to consider, the wrath of the victim's relatives might be another.

If despite this, some people still can't make a difference between tagging and murder without crossing the line first, then these people have a serious mental problem, as they have no notion of both empathy and self-preservation, two things that are kinda basic for any sane person.

This should represent a tiny minority, however.
And a society shouldn't shape itself to cut the enjoyment of an overwhelming majority of its citizens because a tiny minority of them can't fit.

AslanCross

2010-05-16, 06:23 AM

Video game characters are simply representations. They have no free will, and cannot truly feel emotion--all of those are programmed into them by writers.

As such, killing in video games cannot really be wrong in itself. It's like writing the deaths of characters in stories.

However, enjoying killing representations of people for killing's sake, especially when it gets to obsessive levels, might argue to the state of the player's mind.

Closak

2010-05-16, 06:59 AM

GolemsVoice

2010-05-16, 09:22 AM

What if a game was so real you, at least subconsciously, couldn't tell the difference between a bot and real human? That's where games are trying to go, at least visually and AI wise.

Not my point, at all. It doesn't matter if the on-screen bots are people, anymore then a collection of words in a story is an actual person. People still react. Only in a game, it's interactive.

Well, that's what you said. You said that humans might react to killing virtual enemies in a way that at least comes near the way they would feel after a real-life killing, because they subconsciously can't keep those two seperated, am I reading ths correctly?

I said that I don't believe it will ever come this far. There might be some, as Johel said, that react in this way, but I believe it's more of a willful immersion, knwoing that their killing isn't real but ignoring the fact, if you get what I want to say. But I'm no psychologist.

But you might be right if the story is told very well, as Yarram said with his comment on Heavy Rain (which I haven't played). THe better the story is told, the more real your character and the characters of your enemies become, the more you may identify with the protagonist, or immerse yourself in the story. The better it is told, and videogames have ways to construct an atmosphere that books simply don't have, the more tragic, I'd say, a killing feels.
So: shooting average mooks in Serious Sam or any other true shooter won't ever damage somebody who isn't already damaged in some way, as few of the enemy soldiers will ahve any personality at all. You also aren't meant to identify with the protagonist in other ways than "I direct where this guy goes"

In games that place more value on storytelling, building your cahracter, getting to know him etc., a killing might have a bigger shock value.

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-16, 09:43 AM

Video game characters are simply representations. They have no free will, and cannot truly feel emotion--all of those are programmed into them by writers.
/fear
As such, killing in video games cannot really be wrong in itself. It'fs like writing the deaths of characters in stories.

However, enjoying killing representations of people for killing's sake, especially when it gets to obsessive levels, might argue to the state of the player's mind.

The free will part is debatable, not everyone agrees whether animals or people have true free will. As is emotion part. What is the difference between feeling and demonstrating emotion? If agame AI has been programmed to attempt to avoid something that kills or harms its bots, is that fear of pain?

And while I don't disagree that it's not wrong, killing a game character is different from writing the death of a character in fiction. In a book, the author is using the characters to tell a story and will generally only include events they feel contributes to the story. Game makers sometimes feel the same, but they're not the ones who caused the character to die, the player is. In the book example, if the reader was given a conscious choice whether to kill the character or not and how tol kill them, it would be a better analogy.

thubby

2010-05-16, 09:56 AM

And while I don't disagree that it's not wrong, killing a game character is different from writing the death of a character in fiction. In a book, the author is using the characters to tell a story and will generally only include events they feel contributes to the story. Game makers sometimes feel the same, but they're not the ones who caused the character to die, the player is. In the book example, if the reader was given a conscious choice whether to kill the character or not and how tol kill them, it would be a better analogy.

I'd think actors would work as an analogy. while they generally follow the script, that is their choice.

CarpeGuitarrem

2010-05-17, 03:05 PM

Not agreeing or disagreeing, just want to see your thoughts. How does this relate to the fact that, nowadays, most people (in our parts of the world, alas) have far less contact with death than we used to? Fifty years ago, I would have had to deal with my baby nephew dying. Five hundred years ago, most people would have had most of the children they bore die before adulthood, and many mothers along with them. 1500 years ago, murder was* near-commonplace.
Public executions, war on home soil, plague, famine: People in the past were just far more likely to see people die, and more likely to see them die in very nasty ways, than we are now. Some people think it's a good thing, others think it's bad that we're now so sensitive to it, others just make the observation.
So, in this context, very arguably videogame and media violence is to an extent restoring us to our past desensitisation. In any case, if we are being desensitised, it's nothing new, and far more gently than it used to be. So is it a bad thing?

*something I heard recently, not sure about its actual general accuracy, but it's safe to say it was far more common than it is now.
You've got a good point. There was a lot more death in the past then now. On the other hand, death back then had a sort of gravity to it, because it was in that reality, there. I think there's a difference between accepting death as a part of life and being desensitized to the death in life. When you experience death as a virtual thing with no consequences, I would think it starts to "tone down" the gravity of death in the mind. When you experience death as a day-to-day thing, that doesn't tone it down. It just cements death as a part of reality.

So I do think there's a difference.

Gamerlord

2010-05-17, 03:07 PM

Ravens_cry

2010-05-17, 03:34 PM

The trouble I see is not what people are doing to the bots, it's transferring what they are doing to the bots to people. So far the bots are still, at best, stuck in the uncanny valley. But what about when they are not?

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-17, 03:58 PM

They are just a bunch of ones and zeroes, you are a human being, supreme, I think one should be allowed to do anything they want to to a bunch of ones and zeroes (Barring some of the more.....extreme cases.)

The ones and zeroes are just a way of expressing information. We're just a bunch of info stored in tiny machines that work together to use it. They (the computurs) are just a bunch of info in bigger machines that work together to use it.

Pyrian

2010-05-17, 05:07 PM

The difference is that the entities we "kill" in computer games - up to and including our own avatars - simply re-spawn. There's no "death" going on at all.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-17, 05:20 PM

They difference is that the entities we "kill" in computer games - up to and including our own avatars - simply re-spawn. There's no "death" going on at all.
Do we really want to install the idea in our heads that it doesn't matter if we murder messily something that can look and sounds almost, and someday, ixnay on the almost, like a living human being, they will just come back?

Pyrian

2010-05-17, 06:24 PM

Ravens_cry

2010-05-17, 07:03 PM

Brewdude

2010-05-17, 10:19 PM

It is no more immoral to kill in a video game than it is to set up a 6 woman lesbian bondage fetish house in some whacked out version of The Sims, or to take drugs to increase performance in a fallout game.

Now, does it DESENSITISE those who do it to violence and violent images? Yes. In that those who commit and see virtual violence are less likely to freeze and be unable to respond when confronted with real violence. I like to think that this is actually a good thing.

Tricksy Hobbits

2010-05-17, 10:51 PM

Do we really want to install the idea in our heads that it doesn't matter if we murder messily something that can look and sounds almost, and someday, ixnay on the almost, like a living human being, they will just come back?

I agree with Pyrian here. The bots you shoot at are controlled by the AI programs. If we want to make the analogy to a person, the AI determining how they react is the brain and the bots doing the reacting are the limbs. When you kill a mook, the program controlling it isn't deleted. It'd be like two people staging a war with puppets, when one side wants to attack the other it attacks the puppets, not the person moving them. So, even if we qualify the AI as an organism, "killing" enemies in game does not kill it and is not immoral.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-17, 11:58 PM

I agree with Pyrian here. The bots you shoot at are controlled by the AI programs. If we want to make the analogy to a person, the AI determining how they react is the brain and the bots doing the reacting are the limbs. When you kill a mook, the program controlling it isn't deleted. It'd be like two people staging a war with puppets, when one side wants to attack the other it attacks the puppets, not the person moving them. So, even if we qualify the AI as an organism, "killing" enemies in game does not kill it and is not immoral.
I agree it isn't immoral in and of itself. It is the desensitisation to the appearance of killing things that appear human that worries me.

GolemsVoice

2010-05-18, 12:07 AM

I agree it isn't immoral in and of itself. It is the desensitisation to the appearance of killing things that appear human that worries me.

YOu COULD be right. I believe there have ben some studies on this, but as many studies on controversial topics, each says something differently. I think the general consensus however is that there might be a desensitisation. The question is how much, and if it affects everybody, and if it is outweighed by the agression you can let out.

I woudl argue that players only engage in this killing because they know that, no matter what they do to the virtual representations, they do not harm anybody. I don't know how strong desensitisasion is when you know that none of this all is real, and instead hapenning in some weird parallel world. And I say again that I don't believe video-games will ever be realistic enough to mistake them for the real thing, unless we produce every game like the movie Avatar.

Maybe comparing playing video games to dreaming isn't too bad an analogy. You go to sleep (start the game), and even if you have a pretty intense dream that you might think was real (you play a pretty intense video game that draws yourself into it) you'll wake up and realize "it was all just a dream" you save, quit the game, and realize the game was really immersive.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-18, 12:29 AM

YOu COULD be right. I believe there have ben some studies on this, but as many studies on controversial topics, each says something differently. I think the general consensus however is that there might be a desensitisation. The question is how much, and if it affects everybody, and if it is outweighed by the agression you can let out.

I woudl argue that players only engage in this killing because they know that, no matter what they do to the virtual representations, they do not harm anybody. I don't know how strong desensitisasion is when you know that none of this all is real, and instead hapenning in some weird parallel world. And I say again that I don't believe video-games will ever be realistic enough to mistake them for the real thing, unless we produce every game like the movie Avatar.

Maybe comparing playing video games to dreaming isn't too bad an analogy. You go to sleep (start the game), and even if you have a pretty intense dream that you might think was real (you play a pretty intense video game that draws yourself into it) you'll wake up and realize "it was all just a dream" you save, quit the game, and realize the game was really immersive.
As I said earlier, dreams are actively forgotten by our brains. I have heard theories that this is so precisely so they don't contaminate our waking lives.
A simulation does not do that.
As for realism, look how far games have advanced in the last 10 years. 10 years ago, I in game graphics generally had mitts and mouths that weren't much more then animated textures.
Perfect Dark N64
http://img200.imageshack.us/img200/745/example1yc.th.jpg (http://img200.imageshack.us/i/example1yc.jpg/)
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
http://img99.imageshack.us/img99/389/example2u.th.jpg (http://img99.imageshack.us/i/example2u.jpg/)
And that's in 10 years.
I know this is a bit of a controversial place to stand, and I am not sure of it completely myself. I just want us to stand back and look and say "what are we doing here?"
Thank you for your time.

Pyrian

2010-05-18, 01:28 AM

A dream has its own mechanisms for keeping itself distant from reality, such as the amnesia upon waking. A designed simulation does not.It does, though. We think that way. We inherently distinguish between real and imagined, fact and recreation. It's not some abstract concept that's taught; we're hard-wired for it, a fact which shows up in quite a few ways, some of which are deeply inherent to rational thought.

So far our interactive simulations have been fairly crude, but they are improving.When we reach the point where we don't know, we'll have also reached the point where it no longer matters.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-18, 01:39 AM

It does, though. We think that way. We inherently distinguish between real and imagined, fact and recreation. It's not some abstract concept that's taught; we're hard-wired for it, a fact which shows up in quite a few ways, some of which are deeply inherent to rational thought.
Please explain further. I see a frog. How can it matter to the brain whether that frog is an object in space, or a cunning collection of polygons and textures. Both can present the same image to my retina, if the artifice is done well enough. So far, 3D in interactive medium is still restricted to a 2D image. But 3D as in visual depth is being done increasingly in film, and I Have partaken in demos for 3D computing. This is a whole new level of immersion, if done right.

When we reach the point where we don't know, we'll have also reached the point where it no longer matters.
OK. . .now you've really lost me.

Toastkart

2010-05-18, 06:15 AM

I agree it isn't immoral in and of itself. It is the desensitisation to the appearance of killing things that appear human that worries me.

You've got a point, but video games aren't the only source of this. Aside from other types of media, there's also the news and real life (especially in the form of domestic and gang violence) that contributes to desensitization.

Please explain further. I see a frog. How can it matter to the brain whether that frog is an object in space, or a cunning collection of polygons and textures. Both can present the same image to my retina, if the artifice is done well enough. So far, 3D in interactive medium is still restricted to a 2D image. But 3D as in visual depth is being done increasingly in film, and I Have partaken in demos for 3D computing. This is a whole new level of immersion, if done right.

Yes, both can present the same image to your retina and even to most of your occipital lobe, but when the image goes to your temporal lobe for object recognition processing there would likely be contextual details that would allow you to distinguish them. Things like how it moves and how it acts. How it interacts with its environment.

Cleverdan22

2010-05-18, 11:47 AM

I agree it isn't immoral in and of itself. It is the desensitisation to the appearance of killing things that appear human that worries me.

The thing is, though, is that it isn't really desensitizing. I have played tons of shooter/violent games in my time, and anytime I see real carnage, or real death, or real war, I don't think "Oh, cool, headshot, +50 points," I stay just as affected by it as I would have without video games. As for younger kids, there's always a bit of confusion there, but we can trace that back generations, with games like Cowboys and Indians, even. Mostly, nobody is going to get majorly desensitized to violence through video games, and if they would, it's already happened to them through TV, movies, or other media.

Strawberries

2010-05-18, 12:25 PM

The thing is, though, is that it isn't really desensitizing. I have played tons of shooter/violent games in my time, and anytime I see real carnage, or real death, or real war, I don't think "Oh, cool, headshot, +50 points," I stay just as affected by it as I would have without video games.

Allow me to second that. I'm a gamer since I was 7 (my first computer was a Intel 80386). I'm 26 now, I'm still a gamer, and I still get close to tears if I see a cat or dog run over by a car.

I don't think video games have affected my perception of reality in any way except for my hand-eye coordination, which is excellent. :smalltongue:

ApeofLight

2010-05-18, 12:37 PM

I've also played games since I was a little kid, some of them very violent. I HATE seeing people get hurt. I sometimes go out of my way to avoid confrontation whether it's physical or verbal. Hearing of all the terrible things going on in the world nearly make me sick.

The way I kind of see it is like this. In Monopoly you become a cut throat real estate tycoon and banker driving your friends and family out of business and you find it fun. Now most people wouldn't do that in real life. Now put that to violent video games. If violent video games cause murders and what not then Monopoly caused the banking crisis.

Ravens_cry

2010-05-18, 12:44 PM

Cleverdan22

2010-05-18, 08:35 PM

Maybe, I am wrong. Humans are quite good a putting things into compartments, little rules that say 'if in this situation, this is reasonable behaviour' and so forth.
I just really, really, hope I am wrong.
Thank you everyone, this has been a wonderful discussion and I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I have. I am sorry I couldn't reply to you all individually, but I would make a total hash out of that if I tried. Sorry.
Thank you and have a nice day.

I shall indeed. I thank you for that statement, it's always really great to have a discussion where everyone is intelligent and people will concede things, and it doesn't turn into a flame war. Hooray for the awesome people at the playground!

poisonoustea

2010-05-18, 08:51 PM

I felt really guilty when I 'tried out' some particularly evil choices in Mass Effect 2. Still, I can slaughter a thousand civilians in GTA and have lots of fun.

Realism is important. Realistic, endearing characters tend to blur the line between the two worlds of fiction and reality. You'll have a hard time mistreating/killing them/letting them die. I think it's the same empathic link as that between a reader and the protagonist of a novel.

A kid is usually limited in developing such a link. Kids usually develop a link with kids. They don't still understand life in its complexity, and they find it easier to 'kill' fictional characters who don't represent them.

Archpaladin Zousha

2010-05-18, 11:33 PM

edit: for another example we have paintball and airsoft. you don't even simulate killing things!
i would speculate it satisfies some hunting instinct in people.

Those things freakin' HURT! :smallannoyed:

thubby

2010-05-19, 01:48 AM

Those things freakin' HURT! :smallannoyed:

not after the first few times :smalltongue:

Lillith

2010-05-19, 02:04 AM

To the part of the question about if it is bad or not that people take delight out of ´killing', my answer would be 'It's normal'. I'll explain why of course.

Over the time I have been studying history, I have witnessed humans do lots of gruesome things, but I have witnessed a lot of clues in that love death and a good show, especially when combined. In Europe it has been well into the 19th century where (public) dead penalty was normal. It was also normal to hang people, dismember them or chop off their head with a crowd watching. This crowd would love it 'as a show'. The punished would either say prayers, give speeches or just act plain crazy. For most people back in the time, especially in the middle ages, it was their only 'day out'.

It was normal in those days that you'd take your whole family, including kids and infants, to see it. People would love it. I think that 'killing' pixels these day derives from that time, because I think in one form or the other people like to feel superior but also have that gruesome factor they're looking for. Just like people who stand there watching at an accident, we can't look away from it.

Now do we as humans need to feel bad about this? I don't think so, it's normal as far as I can see. It is behaviour that has been present for centuries and will still be here centuries. Just in modern day society, rules and norms state that we should be 'peaceful' and not enjoy the death of others. We don't want to enjoy the death of others cause it feels wrong. But we can enjoy wiping out an entire screen of pixels and feel skilled at finishing a game at 100%. Like has been said before, those pixels don't have family or loved ones. For us it serves as recreation, to unwind and relax. I say as long as we relax by killing game chars without thinking that we should do it in real life, it isn't that bad.

(Also I've never really been able to relate with Koopa's anyways. :smallwink:)

poisonoustea

2010-05-19, 02:08 AM

There's a very interesting (and quite lengthy) thread (http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/forum/526559-glorification-of-killing.html) about this on the Chronicles (http://www.sffchronicles.co.uk/). It's definitely worth reading.

Quincunx

2010-05-19, 03:30 AM

No matter how realistic a dream may be, a sane, adult human being wakes up understanding that it's not real. The same is true of recreational activities. I suspect we're hardwired to comprehend the difference between simulation and reality; indeed, I think the distinction is inherent to the way we think about life.

Even if the wakeful human wakes up believing that the dream is real (perhaps a dose of sleep paralysis has scrambled her senses between dreaming and waking), that snip of psychosis doesn't matter unless and until she convinces other people that the dream was real. This can happen without the dreamer's volition, but usually it does not.

What do you do when you set your fingers to the keyboard? Do you try to retell a dream as vividly as you can? Do you try to make others feel what you are feeling? Do you share a memory of last week? (Are you sure the memory was a memory and not a dream?) The game design team does in large scale what we do in small scale with fingers and keyboard: fantastic games try to share a dream, roleplaying games try to make you feel specific emotions, and every game has its internal truths which they want you to accept for the duration of the game. When the person posting, or the game, wants to change my internal truths for longer than it takes to read the post or play the game, then I start to worry.

There's already some exchange of ideas between myself and the games. I've absorbed the vocabulary of NPC control and can apply those to real-world situations. (Overhear a boyfriend say something which he never ought to have said to his girlfriend. Remark, "Aggro incoming!" and laugh, and be well understood.) I've played educational games, solved the simulacrum of a real-life puzzle twenty times on the screen, and then solved the real-life puzzle of the same type with unusual speed. The games have influenced vocabulary, sense of humor, and logic. Have they touched my morals, when morals are what prevents me from killing?