8 Myths about Videogames

[Dones]

http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolutio...pact/myths.html

 

An interesting piece about videogame myths and why they are false. The author tries to debunk the following myths:

 

1. The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence.

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

3. Children are the primary market for video games.

4. Almost no girls play computer games.

5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

7. Video game play is socially isolating.

8. Video game play is desensitizing.

 

Check it out.

[Famicoman]

Amen.

[J.Max]

This is a great article, but I wish someone besides Henry Jenkins had written it. I'm not questioning his scholarship, but he seems to be the only one who ever writes POSITIVE studies on gaming.

[Gregory DG]

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

981859[/snapback]

Not sure that's a myth. I've seen it first hand...

 

A few years back I showed my 4 year old nephew DOA2 on the Dreamcast. Afterwards (and during) gameplay, he was running around the house kicking and punching everyone.

 

Now, I've not shown him the game again, and I doubt any aggression he might currently have (now at age 7) has anything to do with that single moment of playing DOA2. But I promise you that if I so much as mention that game, he'll starting kicking and punching people again.

[joeybastard]

It really depends on how you look at it because there's always other stimulus besides the videogames like movies, TV, cartoons, football,violent dads or siblings, etc

4 year old boys kick and punch people regardless of if they ever see a videogame. Perhaps your nephew was inspired at that instant to start up but unless you can say he NEVER kicked or punched prior to seeing DOA, that's not sound proof of anything.

Edited December 13, 2005 by joeybastard

[awsomo3000]

I agree with all of these except for this one

 

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

 

 

I dont know, I just don't see how a video game can express the feelings of the creator, well, not to a great extent any way...maybe im wrong but thats my two cents..

[Flojomojo]

The "games cause violence" argument is tiresome and I don't believe it either.

 

I would, however, agree with

4. Almost no girls play computer games.

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

7. Video game play is socially isolating.

981859[/snapback]

No girls playing games is pretty much true from where I sit. I know of a few Bejeweled addicts, but no one who would go out and buy a Gameboy or expend any effort or money to play.

 

Did anyone ever claim that video games are a "meaningful form of expression?" Probably not, though I feel that playing games is more "meaningful" than watching TV or a video. The message board blather I'm in right now is probably more "meaningful." Let's face it, most gaming is reflex-based thumb-twitching with occasional light puzzles.

 

Socially isolating: I'd say yes to this one, too. XBOX Live, the hookup spot for anonymous gamers, is also full of juvenile sociopaths. I believe that's because the population consists of these people, not because they were made that way by games.

 

How about some more arrows to sling at gaming?

 

Games are addictive. Most of them are time sinks, and most "gamers" want a purchased title to last 30 hours or more. During that time, the game typically controls the rate of progress, and determines when and how the game is over. There's a huge body of work out there, and tons of websites and discussion boards about any kind of game that might interest you. It's hard to control oneself, especially around this time of year, when hype and quality are at their highest points.

 

Games are expensive. Probably one of the worst financial "investments" a kid could make is a brand-new game. Most dairy products have a longer shelf life.

 

People who play lots of games are stupid. I know I am. I think about this stuff all the time, and I spend too much money and time on it. I'm reasonably intelligent, have a good education/job etc, but I feel like this monkey on my back often gets in the way of my real-life goals.

 

There you go. Now link your blogs to my life-changing insights. You're welcome.

[maibock]

http://www.pbs.org/kcts/videogamerevolutio...pact/myths.html

 

An interesting piece about videogame myths and why they are false. The author tries to debunk the following myths:

 

1. The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence.

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

3. Children are the primary market for video games.

4. Almost no girls play computer games.

5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

7. Video game play is socially isolating.

8. Video game play is desensitizing.

 

Check it out.

981859[/snapback]

 

Some of those could easily fall into the true category, depending how you look at it.

 

example 5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

 

By making this statement, you're saying that soldiers will kill because of a games. Why are kids immune to his point but soldiers are not?

 

 

and how about an easier one? 7. Video game play is socially isolating.

 

It most certainly can be isolating just as easy as it can be social..

[joeybastard]

example 5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

 

By making this statement, you're saying that soldiers will kill because of a games. Why are kids immune to his point but soldiers are not?

 

 

I think that's a bit oversimplified. Wouldn't they have to be playing the exact same games and being instructed in the exact same way to have equal effect? I guessing the soldier is trained by an superior on a military base and plays a different version of the game than the kid. The kid is playing in his room or the family room withoout a drill sargent over them and not the same game. Different controls in an experiment lead to different conclusions.

 

and how about an easier one? 7. Video game play is socially isolating.

 

It most certainly can be isolating just as easy as it can be social..

982001[/snapback]

 

On the 2nd one I agree with 100%, game scan be used in either way.

Edited December 13, 2005 by joeybastard

[vdub_bobby]

I agree with all of these except for this one

 

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

 

 

I dont know, I just don't see how a video game can express the feelings of the creator, well, not to a great extent any way...maybe im wrong but thats my two cents..

981976[/snapback]

I disagree. I just finished writing Reindeer Rescue and, while it certainly isn't great art or anything, it still expresses something from me, I think. I made plenty of decisions while making the game to send a certain message. Nathan gave me a couple of Santa animations to choose from; I chose the tubbiest because I thought it was more amusing and I thought it would be more amusing - and humor, while not the highest form of art, can still be meaningful.

 

Nathan would probably say that the artwork he did for it, while not high art, certainly has some kind of meaningful expression in it. I wrote original music for the Minigame Multicart, is that music not a meaningful form of expression just because it is on a videogame?

[NightSprinter]

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

981859[/snapback]

Not sure that's a myth. I've seen it first hand...

 

A few years back I showed my 4 year old nephew DOA2 on the Dreamcast. Afterwards (and during) gameplay, he was running around the house kicking and punching everyone.

 

Now, I've not shown him the game again, and I doubt any aggression he might currently have (now at age 7) has anything to do with that single moment of playing DOA2. But I promise you that if I so much as mention that game, he'll starting kicking and punching people again.

981961[/snapback]

 

 

Well.. you DO have to realize this is a little kid, and not the 13-17 year old teenagers that the study is referring to. A lot of kids under the age of 10 (especially if they're 4) don't have an easy time discerning fantasy from reality. I'm no parent, but young kids in this dage of photo-realistic videogames need to be strongly-taught what's the difference between what happens in a game, and what happens in real life.

[davepesc]

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

981859[/snapback]

Not sure that's a myth. I've seen it first hand...

 

A few years back I showed my 4 year old nephew DOA2 on the Dreamcast. Afterwards (and during) gameplay, he was running around the house kicking and punching everyone.

 

Now, I've not shown him the game again, and I doubt any aggression he might currently have (now at age 7) has anything to do with that single moment of playing DOA2. But I promise you that if I so much as mention that game, he'll starting kicking and punching people again.

981961[/snapback]

 

 

Well.. you DO have to realize this is a little kid, and not the 13-17 year old teenagers that the study is referring to. A lot of kids under the age of 10 (especially if they're 4) don't have an easy time discerning fantasy from reality. I'm no parent, but young kids in this dage of photo-realistic videogames need to be strongly-taught what's the difference between what happens in a game, and what happens in real life.

982069[/snapback]

 

True, but I know my 3 1/2-year-old daughter learned about "fighting" when she caught me playing Guild Wars.

I'm sure she would have been exposed to violence at some point, but the game rewards it in a way that makes it seem good to her. She now understands that she can't hit people, but she likes to sit on my lap as I play. I fight the monsters and she collects the treasures they drop.

 

Even still, she'll jump on me and say "Let's fight" and put up her dukes. Kinda cute, yeah, but somewhat depressing as well, like a piece of her innocence was lost.

[JimmydelaKopin]

1. The availability of video games has led to an epidemic of youth violence.

2. Scientific evidence links violent game play with youth aggression.

3. Children are the primary market for video games.

4. Almost no girls play computer games.

5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

6. Video games are not a meaningful form of expression.

7. Video game play is socially isolating.

8. Video game play is desensitizing.

 

1. This is like saying the availability of Monopoly has led to an epidemic of youth greed. also, most videogames have had nothing to do with violence. Pac-Man and most subsequent maze games aren't violent; neither are puzzle games.

People who propagate this myth are relying on the ignorance of the masses concerning popular videogames.

 

2.This one is true--but in a symtomatic, not a causative, way. But, given that the propagators of this myth are seeking a causative connection as the basis of this remark, this also must sadly be called a myth.

In other words, yes, violent kids play violent games. That's because the violent games reinforce their own disturbed worldviews, not because said worldviews were created by said videogames. The fact that such kids play such games a lot is ready proof of that: if their worldviews were fully-formed by the videogames, why do they have to frequently return to said "sources" for their worldviews? That would imply a wavering in their views--which is not evident in such people.

 

3. No, people with money are the target of videogames.

Seriously, they are games. However, as games become more complicsated to play, the learning curve--and thus target age--also rises. Kids understand pretty colors and pushing buttons; they don't understand complex gameplay.

The fact that more graphically-advanced games have more graphic violence is also proof--as the target audience of horror flicks are the older-teen-to-young-adult market. Such videogames are merely catering to that demographic.

 

4. Well, this has been true for the longest--but because videogames had things that girls didn't like: level markers, easily-remembered score goals, things like that.. In other words, in many games, part of the gameplay is metagaming: getting the extra life, the highest score, the shortest time, and so on.

Girls preferred games where scores, extra lives, and such are de-emphasized and gameplay is promoted. No surprise that the first shooter to de-emphasize the metagame was codesigned BY A WOMAN.

Thanks to retrogaming (which has attracted women as men have moved on to the newer eye candy games for the most part) and touchscreen games with all their puzzle games, girls and women have embraced videogaming.

(Oh, and no offense to the lady gamers who've been gaming since the beginning.)

 

5. This one is based on two other myths: that kids are the target market for graphically-violent videogames (which I discussed previously), and that kids treat videogames as trainging sessions instead of as games.

Please. Where are the kids running around mazes eating everything? Where are the ones shooting aliens from above? I could go on, but I've made my point. Just because the DoD decided to use videogames as training exercises doesn't mean that videogames ARE training exercises or that all who play them treat them as such.

 

6. Games aren't a form of expression.

The idea behind Space Invaders is "Breakout as a shooter with a 'wall' made up of aliens based on H. G. Wells's Martians". ...pretty expressive to me, but I am a comics fan.

Do I really need to continue?

 

7. Well, most people do play games singly. However, people who play videogames are part of a community whose common factor is playing videogames. Thus, videogames is a social uniter: it brings all sorts of people together.

This very threadcity--and others like it--disprove the myth without breaking a metaphorical sweat.

 

8. Videogames desensitize.

Well, people can forget how much time has passed and put out of their minds bodily functions like food and bathroom while they're playing...but I don't think that's the idea here.

The myth here is that people confuse videogames with reality. Yes, there are such people. Then again, there have always been people who confuse fiction with fact.

Indeed, the propagators of these myths fall into that category. But why should those of sound mind be punished because of the nutbars in society?

This phenomenon is not triggered by fiction; it merely feeds on it. There will always be fiction in one form or another, so blaming fiction on the phenomenon is ridiculous...and a large scapegoat.

 

There. Can we get back to the important myth in gaming? I want to know where E.T. is buried!!!

[classicgamingguy]

I'd have to agree with certain points, but the violence "caused" by videogames has never been proven 100%. Alot of things can promote violence, but don't blame it all on video games. If you're trying to keep your kids from getting exposed to this level of interaction, teach them from a young age that this is JUST a game, that it depicts violence but should never promote it.

 

My stepson has been playing games all his life, and seems fine to me. He's never been arrested for a violent crime, and he's played some of the most violent of games. I say it's a trigger to a deeper problem, as I'm sure others have said as well.

 

As far as isolation, our whole technological leaps have been doing that since the creation of the first chat room on the internet. When virtual reality gets perfected and we can all "plug in" to our computers and interact with eachother THAT way, then things will get really dicey in the social department.

 

As far as girls not playing games, that's probably true to a certain extent. They just don't necessarily appeal to them. There are certain games that girls/women really enjoy, but what the guys are playing might not be their idea of a great video game.

 

Games can be a very artistic form of expression, coming from those that designed it. At least, this was true back in the day when they designed games like Ms Pac Man and the like. I'm sure there are stories behind these games, as to why they are they way they are. Then there are the games (E.T. for the 2600) that I can't possible think WHY someone would take the time to produce at all.

 

Steve

[maibock]

example 5. Because games are used to train soldiers to kill, they have the same impact on the kids who play them.

 

By making this statement, you're saying that soldiers will kill because of a games. Why are kids immune to his point but soldiers are not?

 

 

I think that's a bit oversimplified. Wouldn't they have to be playing the exact same games and being instructed in the exact same way to have equal effect? I guessing the soldier is trained by an superior on a military base and plays a different version of the game than the kid. The kid is playing in his room or the family room withoout a drill sargent over them and not the same game. Different controls in an experiment lead to different conclusions.

 

982011[/snapback]

 

You're making assumptions that the author didn't include and that's my problem with this whole article. It can be looked at many different ways geared to whatever point you're trying to make.

 

For instance in this same paragraph that we're discussing, he mentions that "There are consequences for not mastering those skills. That being said, a growing body of research does suggest that games can enhance learning." Since games can increase learning, why can't games be a tool to learn how to kill?

[classicgamingguy]

They can be used for that purpose, of course. There was a "study" involving video games increasing:

 

Dexterity

Reaction Time

Overall clarity of thought processes attributing to learning association skills

 

So, they aren't all bad. I have pretty good reflexes thanks to video gaming, and rarely drop things. If I do, I can snatch them again before they hit the ground.

 

As far as games desensitizing...well, that could be true, but games aren't always on my mind to the point of excluding everything else about life that goes on around me. I do, however, think of them from time to time.

 

Steve

Edited December 14, 2005 by classicgamingguy

[joeybastard]

You're making assumptions that the author didn't include and that's my problem with this whole article. It can be looked at many different ways geared to whatever point you're trying to make.

 

Actually, we agree on that.

 

For instance in this same paragraph that we're discussing, he mentions that "There are consequences for not mastering those skills. That being said, a growing body of research does suggest that games can enhance learning." Since games can increase learning, why can't games be a tool to learn how to kill?

982408[/snapback]

 

They can, my point was that it's impossible to prove one way or the other without controls such as you would find in any decent research experiment. It can't be proven the game made a kid kill because it made a soldier kill becuase they didn't get stimulus from the game under the same circumstances. Different controls, different results.

Edited December 14, 2005 by joeybastard

[reesclissold]

You can't blame the media for the state of society. I often watch old black and white cowboy or pirate filns and they're all shooting, beheading, mistreating women, etc. and the previous generation weren't a load of psycho, violence obsessed sociopaths like a lot of kids are today.

 

It's probably more to do with the fact that nowadays, everything is always someone else's fault. Adults go around blaming everyone else for all their problems, the government, the state of society, etc. and kids pick up on this. They learn that whatever they do, it's always someone else's fault. You only have to walk down the street in a town centre now to get spat at / shouted at / barged into by obnoxious little kids. They're shooting and stabbing each other in school all the time. But of course we know all this.

 

Oh, and video games socially isolating? Tell that to the 7 other people I had over my house last Friday night, when we were having a great time playing Halo until 4am. This is a regular occurence. I very rarely sit on my own in my room playing games - I have a girlfriend and I'd rather spend all my waking hours with her (even after 5 years together). But your mileage may vary.

 

Edit: Oh, and this isn't a rant aimed at AA members, I know you share a lot of the same opinions as me. It's just strongly written because it's on subjects I feel strongly about, and I wanted to add my thoughts on the argument.

Edited December 15, 2005 by reesclissold

[MegaManFan]

Even still, she'll jump on me and say "Let's fight" and put up her dukes. Kinda cute, yeah, but somewhat depressing as well, like a piece of her innocence was lost.

982175[/snapback]

 

Nah. "Magic circle" came from the referenced article, and I think that is entirely appropriate here. I actually think the fact she wants to play fight with you IS innocent and cute, and breaks down the walls of gender stereotypes to boot. She'll grow up to be a strong intelligent woman who doesn't take shit from anybody and probably be a great gamer to boot.

[classicgamingguy]

Amen to that. She will be more than capable of handling herself when she gets older.

 

Now, onto the topic at hand, I do have a wife, and have known her for 16 years prior to marrying her. She does complain once in awhile that I like games "too much", but our marriage hasn't suffered for my passion..I love her dearly, she knows that, and I always make time for her before anything else.

 

She IS a very busy woman with her job, and most often I'm alone, so I play games to while away the time. Yes, sometimes I get involved, but I've always been able to pull myself away from them. My wife, the house, and my doggies come first (in that order, more or less).

 

Steve