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Game Use To Outpace TV Watching In England

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the entertaining-the-brain dept.

wiredbeat2000 writes "A new study found that video game use may outpace television watching in England, according to an article at the BBC. Along with some squishy figures, the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association report said that Grand Theft Auto: Vice City sold a million copies in two months leading up to Christmas, the same as Robbie Williams' number one album, Escapology. This on the heels of the group's last report in March, which outlines the growing game market in more detail."

4 of 26 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Ironic, ain't it. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I suggest you take your blindfold off and take another good look at the game.

    Sure, you can kill some 'bitches', but you'll find people do a lot more killing in games like Unreal Tournament.

    The GTA series are great, believed to have been thought up by lemmings.

  2. Re:Ironic, ain't it. by pmz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Sure, you can kill some 'bitches', but you'll find people do a lot more killing in games like Unreal Tournament.

    GTA, Unreal, whatever. If I were to celebrate the Christmas holiday, one day, with kids old enough to play video games, I would think twice about giving them any of these games. I suppose this is where Nintendo used to shine for kids' games (squashing gels and koopas and such). Once the kids are in their 20s, I'll let them get GTA, if they want it.

    --
    Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
  3. mandatory tv tax part of the cause? by Artifex · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I wonder whether the rise in alternative entertainment like this is bolstered by the huge recurring tv licensing tax there. There isn't one for games or consoles, at least not unless you hook them up to a tv set.

    --
    Get off my launchpad!
  4. Re:Ironic, ain't it. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful
    If you've raised your kids in such a manner that being able to make a pixelated character shoot a pixelated prostitute with a shotgun on TV is going to mess them up, you might want to examine how you're raising your kids. If your kids can't differentiate right from wrong and reality from fantasy, you need to look at why that is. Growing up playing Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, etc. didn't make me want to shoot everyone in my school, even though I hated the place. See, my parents made sure I knew that what I see on TV and on the computer isn't real, and doing the things that happen on either is not right.

    It's your decision how you want to raise your kids, and I'm not saying a 6 year old should play Vice City, but I am saying that if a 12 year old goes over a friends house and plays the game and then he comes home and starts collecting an arsenal in his closet, he's got other issues. Unreal Tournament is so far from reality (see it even hints at that in the title) that if playing it makes your kids run around shooting their friends, you really might want to get them in therapy sooner rather than later.

    Not letting your children view what they want is going to make them want it even more. If you prepare them properly for what they might see on TV or in a video game they're going to be shocked a lot less later in life when they're on their own. In saying this I'm not saying every 13 year old needs a subscription to Hustler or something like that, but that if you haven't given your children the ability to determine what's good and bad or fact from fiction on their own, they're screwed.