Violent+Video+Games

Violent Video Games.

About 145 million people or 60% of americans play video games which makes them one of the country’s most popular entertainment activities. The average age is 28 and 43% of them are women. 61% of game players are the age 18 and over. There are many different genres of video games. Nine out of ten best-selling video games were appropriate for everyone. It is also adults, not kids, who purchase those nine out of ten video games.

Video game genres range from normal fun racing games, role-playing games, simulation games, and then you also have violent video games. Mostly action and shooter genres fall in that category. All shooter games fall 5th out of the 11 video game categories, for popularity. Shooter games are the most violent video games and there has been much controversy with the effect it has on the game players. There also has been controversy with parents not wanting their children to play such harsh games. Shooter games involve cursing, blood, stabbings, guns, and other violent weapons. This graphic violence is a lot for a young child to see and deal with. There are first-person shooter games, massively multiplayer online first person shooter games, light gun shooters, arcade shooters, tactical shooters, rail shooters, and third-person shooter games. There are also games with a lot of crime and violence such as “vice city”. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City is an example of a game controversy because it applies for racist hate crime. It involves a gang war between Haitians and Cuban refugees. The game uses phrases such as “kill the haitian idiots”. Haitian-American Coalition threatened to sue, so Rockstar removed the word “Haitians” from the game.

Some of the other violent video games include Resident Evil 4, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, God of Warn, NARC, Killer 7, The Warriors, 50 Cent: Bulletproof, Crime Life: Gang Wars, Condemned: Criminal Origins, and True Crime: New York City. These games involve gangster shootouts, serial killer hunters, murdering victims, kidnapping the presidents daughter, and finding her kidnapped up against a wall with a pitch fork in her face. All of these games are out of control when it comes to violence. The graphics in these games are horrendous.

There are many articles that think violent video games has an affect on children and then there are also many articles that think it has no impact on children. T here was a study done that included three groups of kids. There was 181 Japanese students ages 12 to 15, 1,050 Japanese students aged 13 to 18, and 364 U.S. kids ages 9 to 12. These children listed their three favorite games, how often they played them, and they also rated their own behavior in terms of physical aggression. Researchers took in account reports from the children’s piers. For the results of the study, the groups that were predicted to be more aggressive, were more aggressive. Researches even took in account how aggressive the children were in the beginning of the study. This study showed that video games do have an impact on aggression in children and that they are desensitized to violence. People seem to think it’s the context and the goals of the violent that seem to be doing the harm.

For some, violent video games can benefit them by working on their social skills by interacting other players. To others it can make them more hostile. It mostly depends on the personality type because those who seem to be uptight and easily angered, get affected a lot more by these games. There was another study done with 118 teenagers done, to see if they would become more aggressive by the video games they played. The results showed that it mostly depended on the persons personality.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_genres http://gamedev.cs.cmu.edu/spring2004/handouts/IDSA_video_game_violence.pdf http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_controversy http://articles.cnn.com/2008-11-03/health/healthmag.violent.video.kids_1_violent-video-video-games-game-genres?_s=PM:HEALTH http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100607122547.htm