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John Gibson

Video Game Violence Stories thread

Post a link to a news story about video game violence, or post your own account?

Myself? Here's my story.

I saw this mother buy her kid a rated M game without asking the retail employee questions, like "Is this game appropriate for my son?" I don't recall her reading the back of the game box. These are the kind of parents who just want their kids to pick out something quick so they can shut their kids up for a few hours while they get some time to themselves. Their kids will beg, and scream to the parents "mommy, I want this game. Timmy told me this game is awesome. I gotta get it".

First off, your mother doesn't know who the hell your friends are, so she doesn't give a rats ass who Timmy is, or his thoughts on "Massacre of the Dead part 7".

Second, have you actually seen a parent (first and foremost not some kind of activist) read the back of the game box, ask game retail employees or other parents questions about a games content? I sure as hell haven't.

Third, upon purchase of Massacre of the Dead part 7, would a parent actually sit down for 10 minutes and watch the kid play the game, and see if his eyes light up with insane rage as he maims and kills zombies, or Jehovah witnesses?? Absolutely not. And if you are one of those parents, I hope you would immediately turn off the game, return it to the store, then sit down and have a nice long talk with Timmy and his parents. Because I will bet any amount of money Timmy's parents haven't a clue what's going on, and you, having learned about the content within "Massacre of the Dead part 7" are a parent who is more intelligent and aware than you were 3 hours ago at your local Gamestop.
Black Flag NC

Don't you think, as gamers, we will be a bit more aware of the content that has always been in these games? We've been hearing this video game violence debate our whole lives.

I like to make the analogy of Looney Toons. Generations of American kids grew up watching Looney Toons going all the way back to our grandparents and great grandperents. Did your granny ever drop a safe on someone? Did your dad ever rig up a cake with dynamite candles and give it to you? No? Then why does Doom and Mortal Kombat get blamed for the shooting spree at Columbine?

Like John said, the parents of those bastards took just enough interest in their kids to know what it would take to shut them up so that they could get back to doing whatever mattered to themselves.

I was raised on Doom, Mortal Kombat, and I love me some Bugs Bunny. Guess what? I've never killed anyone! I was raised by intelligent, caring parents and was taught to act like I had some sense.
John Gibson

I played plenty of Doom, Wolfenstein 3D, plus lots more violent material. Despite the fact that occasionally when I fire an explosive weapon and kill the enemy and he blows into a dozen pieces, I spout "OH YEAH", but what immediately follows is NOT "I should kill someone". The games are for entertainment. Try listening to my review of Rocky on the Gamecube on the radio show. I even admitted that punching your opponent was a great way to vent. But I'm not about to punch a random person on the street.

It all depends on how we were brought up, like Black Flag said. If our parents spent time with us, loved and cared for us, taught us right from wrong, we didn't kill anyone. But take these kids who are plopped in front of the TV all day with a steady diet of Yu-Gi-Oh, Pokemon, and cartoon violence that goes beyond Looney Tunes. What do you got?
Splodge

I was in GameStop yesterday buying a christmas present for the sister. I was third in line for the counter. This kid walks up to the guy in front of me with a handful of money and asks him to buy two copies of San Andreas. Fortunately the guy said no.

My friend works in that particular shop and I know that they always ask for age if the customer looks young. Still there are always ways around that, if you're desperate.

I guess I wasn't much different though. I remember when I was about 7 or 8, I had to get my dad to rent out "Critters 3" for me.

I'm not sure of my view on violent games. I guess I'd be against sports games with violence in them. I remember when I was a kid I played a hockey game with fist fights (I don't know the rules of hockey so if that's part of the sport, please correct me). I'd be against that because it's not a part of the sport or the aim of the game, and it is something kids probably would copy in real life.

Still, like everyone else, I was raised on violent games. I grew up playing Streets of Rage and Street Fighter and I turned out Street Fighter.
kakashi1049

I'll never get people it's not video games I mean come if you watch the news you see worse stuff people just need something to blame because some people are psychos
NecroVMX

I've had random kids ask me to buy M rated games for them after store clerks refused to sell them, on at least 3 occasions.

On the latest occasion, after my refusal the kid, who seemed to be about 12 or so, started whining. You know all that "aw c'mon" stuff.  I explained to him that the ratings are put in place for a reason, not to stop him from playing bloody violent games, but to prevent government censorship of the gaming industry.  He just whined "that's what the guy a the counter told me" and slunk off.
Erikjust

I honestly can´t see the problem whit kids buying Mature games, most kids today are perfectly capable to seeing the difference between videogame violence and normal stuff.

Saying that kids will grow violent from playing violent games, is like saying well now you played racing games for several years, and though you are only 10 years old, you have played it whit a steering wheel and so forth so you are more then capable of driving a racing car.

Or you have played boxing games for several years so now you can enter the professional boxing league.

I recently read an article in a game magazine comparing most first person shooter games to a snowball fight; in a snowball fight it mainly is all about hitting the opponent beating him.
Same whit most first person shooter games like counter strike and other such games, it is basically an electronically snow ball fight.
Your objective is to defeat the opponent nothing else, and most kids today are perfectly able to see it as such.

That some kids runs amok whit a gun in school, really has nothing to do whit the videogame itself, but rather the kid him/herself.
That videogames is blamed of it is just a more recent way of putting the blame on everyone else but the one who did it.

Take it as this if videogames didn’t exists then it would be violent movies who would be getting the blame, and if it didn’t exist then some violent play or book or whatever.

See the paten here? This argument about violent things inspiring violent acts is going as far back as ancient Greece, where the Greek philosopher Herodotus or something like that complained about how violent poems and plays where inspiring violence and so forth.

So this argument is really nothing new, the only thing that have changed is the fact that instead of Greek plays and poems its violent videogames and movies.  

So if the kid is acting out some mortal combat move on his sister or something like that, it is really the kid who is screwed up in his head, and not the game itself.
launchpad25

Black Flag NC wrote:
I like to make the analogy of Looney Toons. Generations of American kids grew up watching Looney Toons going all the way back to our grandparents and great grandperents. Did your granny ever drop a safe on someone? Did your dad ever rig up a cake with dynamite candles and give it to you? No? Then why does Doom and Mortal Kombat get blamed for the shooting spree at Columbine?
This all goes back to when television first became widely used in American households in the 1950's. All the funny cartoon shorts that use to be shown in movie theaters in the previous decades were sold to TV stations because their broadcasting rights were relatively cheap, and were scheduled in time slots (either during the afternoons, or saturday mornings.) where kids would watch them. Sometimes, stations would hire a kid friendly mascot to showcase these cartoons in these timeslots. (This would be the archetypical inspiration for Krusty The Clown on 'The Simpsons'.) As a result, this would cement the stereotype that cartoons were 'kids stuff' for the next couple of decades. Also, most commercials for video games would be shown during said cartoons, and that would also cement the stereotype of video games being 'kids stuff' as well. Whenever we started getting games, and cartoons that pushed the envelope, they become a 'target' for controversy.
Black Flag NC wrote:
Like John said, the parents of those bastards took just enough interest in their kids to know what it would take to shut them up so that they could get back to doing whatever mattered to themselves.
I was raised on Doom, Mortal Kombat, and I love me some Bugs Bunny. Guess what? I've never killed anyone! I was raised by intelligent, caring parents and was taught to act like I had some sense.
The problems is that we have generations of parents, and news reporters who think that video games, and cartoons are nothing more than 'kids stuff', and must not, nor could they ever be held in the same status as movies, sitcoms, dramas, and thrillers. (What alot of people tend to forget is that 'The Flintstones', and 'Rocky and Bullwinkle' originally aired in prime time. Predating 'The Simpsons' by at least two decades, and that the Warner Bros. cartoons were originally made for adults.)
John Gibson wrote:
That's amazing that a kid would ask an adult to buy a M-Rated game for them. Doesn't surprise me, though. These kids have friends who already own the game somehow, and their friends go on and on about how they should get it (mainly because of the rule that if you don't have this game, you're not cool like I am)
That sounds like how some people i knew from high school would brag about how they can do things that only some of us could dream of, or were to young to do. I remember being in elementary, or middle school, and most of the people i knew at that time were into horror movies, though i wasn't ready for them at the time.
Erikjust wrote:
Take it as this if videogames didn’t exists then it would be violent movies who would be getting the blame, and if it didn’t exist then some violent play or book or whatever. See the paten here? This argument about violent things inspiring violent acts is going as far back as ancient Greece, where the Greek philosopher Herodotus or something like that complained about how violent poems and plays where inspiring violence and so forth.
Very good point. It seems as if there's always something bad that people will go after simply because it's there, and that by doing so, they'll get the instant gratification that they're doing 'gods work', or some other 'feel good' nonsense. I'm sure if Madonna, Britney Spears, or Linsay Lohan were either choir girls, or never existed, people would be looking for something else to go after. (Well, some people, anyway.)
Talonluck

Not sure if this works for this topic but I think its at least somewhat relevant.

Since they can't win the violence war, they're starting one about sex. Keep in mind, I own the game and I have seen the "sex" scene. I saw less boob than Mystique in the xmen movies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YEzRJ5ojtg
launchpad25

Talonluck wrote:
Not sure if this works for this topic but I think its at least somewhat relevant.

Since they can't win the violence war, they're starting one about sex. Keep in mind, I own the game and I have seen the "sex" scene. I saw less boob than Mystique in the xmen movies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YEzRJ5ojtg

I'm surprised nobody raised a skink over how Rebecca Romijn's makeup job  as Mystique in the 'X-Men' movies made her look nude on screen. Though i kinda wished she wore a special suite that 'morphed' with her.
Erikjust

Here is the so-called sex scene in the game

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pvj6D3HnN_s&feature=related

Now I have seen my shear of porno movies heck i am even a proud member of Wwoec (wacky world of erotic cartoons)

What I just saw here in this scene is pretty much what you would see in any Hollywood movie, heck there was more nudity in Terminator 1 where Sara and kyle where having there special moment.

You are seeing her face and the outline of her body that is in full shade.

Come on I know full damn well that a lot worse is being showed in movies rated for normal teens, and nobody seem to complain about those.

Honestly they are making a mountain out of a molehill or something like that.
Black Flag NC

Dude, thats it? They are REALLY making something out of nothing.
John Gibson

I can't see a damn thing, guys. I think I said it before, these people don't really look at the game. They're going by the research, and probably the box bullet points on the back of the game box, or whatever.

The media is pathetic. Hell, this could be why I'm here doin this show, to demonstrate the ignorance of today's news.
launchpad25

John Gibson wrote:
The media is pathetic. Hell, this could be why I'm here doin this show, to demonstrate the ignorance of today's news.
This is why i think local stations should cut back on newscasts, and try to profit from other kinds of programing like they way it use to be during the 70's, and 80's. Newscasts have expanded way too much, and have taken away time that could be filled with something better to watch because they want ratings so bad that they'll go out of their way to make a mountain out of a molehill mostly because they're sucked into this notion that anything non sensational, or remotely good isn't 'sexy' enough for their newscast because by golly, 'they'll make the world a better place!' Even if it means putting the animation, videogame, and sci-fi industries out of business. Which is exactly what they're doing weather they know it, or not. And they wonder why the networks are filled with nothing bit tired, formulaic sitcoms, and cheap, boring reality shows.

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