The Impact of Violent Gaming

An anonymous reader writes "IGN has an article up looking at the impact of violent videogames. It discusses some of the rationale on the gaming industry side for having violent images in their games, and the reactions from politics and lawmakers to these games." From the article: "Despite the large body of evidence that supports a link between playing violent videogames and aggression, lawmakers still have a difficult time convincing the courts that they should be removed from children's hands. One of the reasons for this is that most of the work done is correlational studies which look for a link between two factors. That is, if we see an increase in violent videogame play, is there also an increase in violent behavior?"

Comments

Remove the violence

[saskboy]

I'm all for taking violence out of video games. There's no reason games can't be modified to have non-violent outcomes. But then Jack Thompson would whine that realistic consequences aren't being depicted which will train cold blooded killers.

Think of Super Mario jumped on mushrooms and they turned into happy angels instead of dead pancakes? Or in Unreal Tournament you fire paintballs, or tickle people at close range? Or in Mortal Kombat you have a tickle fight, and instead of ripping out a heart, you read the woozy opponent a bedside story. I think it would sell just as well. A game doesn't have to be violent, it can be funny and still be as fun.

The real cause

[Rob T Firefly]

It's not violent games that lead me to violence.

It's being assaulted with the same hyped-up news "story" about video game violence on every slow news day for 20 years that makes me want to hit somebody.

Re:Yes and no...

[zenmojodaddy]

So, if you actually involve yourself in your kids' lives and activities, they might turn out okay, but if you let a computer babysit them, they'll be little gits? Who'd have thought it?