Videogames: Breeding evil?
Monday, December 5th, 2005There’s no solid evidence that video games are bad for people, and they may be positively good.
Source: The Economist, July 2005
It IS an evil influence on the youth of our country." A politician condemning video gaming? Actually, a clergyman denouncing rock and roll 50 years ago. But the sentiment could just as easily have been voiced by Hillary Clinton in the past few weeks, as she blamed video games for "a silent epidemic of media desensitisation" and "stealing the innocence of our children".
The gaming furore centres on "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas", a popular and notoriously violent cops and robbers game that turned out to contain hidden sex scenes that could be unlocked using a patch downloaded from the internet. The resulting outcry (mostly from Democratic politicians playing to the centre) caused the game’s rating in America to be changed from "mature", which means you have to be 17 to buy it, to "adults only", which means you have to be 18, but also means that big retailers such as Wal-Mart will not stock it. As a result the game has been banned in Australia ; and, this autumn, America’s Federal Trade Commission will investigate the complaints. That will give gaming’s opponents an opportunity to vent their wrath on the industry.
Scepticism of new media is a tradition with deep roots, going back at least as far as Socrates’ objections to written texts, outlined in Plato’s Phaedrus. Socrates worried that relying on written texts, rather than the oral tradition, would "create forgetfulness in the learners souls, because they will not use their memories; they will trust to the external written characters and not remember of themselves." (He also objected that a written version of a speech was no substitute for the ability to interrogate the speaker, since, when questioned, the text "always gives one unvarying answer". His objection, in short, was that books were not interactive. Perhaps Socrates would have thought more highly of video games.)
Novels were once considered too low-brow for university literature courses, but eventually the disapproving professors retired. Waltz music and dancing were condemned in the 19th century; all that twirling was thought to be "intoxicating" and "depraved", and the music was outlawed in some places. Today it is hard to imagine what the fuss was about. And rock and roll was thought to encourage violence, promiscuity and satanism; but today even grannies buy Coldplay albums.
Joystick junkies
The opposition to gaming springs largely from the neophobia that has pitted the old against the entertainment’s of the young for centuries. Most gamers are under 40, and most critics are non-games-playing over-4os. But what of the specific complaints-that games foster addiction and encourage violence?
There’s no good evidence for either. On addiction, if the worry is about a generally excessive use of screen-based entertainment, critics should surely concern themselves about television rather than games: American teenage boys play video games for around 13 hours a week (girls for only five hours), yet watch television for around 25 hours a week. As to the minority who seriously overdo it, research suggests that they display addictive behaviour in other ways too. The problem, in other words, is with them, not with the games.
Most of the research on whether video games encourage violence is unsatisfactory, focusing primarily on short-term effects. In the best study so far, frequent playing of a violent game sustained over a month had no effect on participants’ level of aggression. And, during the period in which gaming has become widespread in America, violent crime has fallen by half. If games really did make people violent, this tendency might be expected to show up in the figures, given that half of Americans play computer and video games. Perhaps, as some observers have suggested, gaming actually makes people less violent, by acting as a safety valve.
Neophobes unite
So are games good, rather than bad, for people? Good ones probably are. Games are widely used as educational tools, not just for pilots, soldiers and surgeons, but also in schools and businesses (see pages 61-63). Every game has its own interface and controls, so that anyone who has learned to play a handful of games can generally figure out how to operate almost any high-tech device. Games require players to construct hypotheses, solve problems, develop strategies, learn the rules of the in-game world through trial and error. Garners must also be able to juggle several different tasks, evaluate risks and make quick decisions. One game, set in 1930s Europe, requires the player to prevent the outbreak of the second world war; other games teach everything from algebra to derivatives trading. Playing games is, thus, an ideal form of preparation for the workplace of the 21st century, as some forward-thinking firms are already starting to realise.
Pointing all this out makes little difference, though, because the controversy over gaming, as with rock and roll, is more than anything else the consequence of a generational divide. Can the disagreements between old and young over new forms of media ever be resolved? Sometimes attitudes can change relatively quickly, as happened with the internet. Once condemned as a cesspool of depravity, it is now recognised as a valuable new medium, albeit one where (as with films, Tv and, yes, video games) children’s access should be limited and supervised. The benefits of a broadband connection are now acknowledged, and politicians worry about extending access to the have-nots. Attitudes changed because critics of the internet had to start using it for work, and then realised that, like any medium, it could be used for good purposes as well as bad. They have no such incentive to take up gaming, however.
Eventually, objections to new media resolve themselves, as the young grow up and the old die out. As today’s garners grow older-the average age of garners is already 3o-video games will ultimately become just another medium, alongside books, music and films. And soon the greying garners will start tut-tutting about some new evil threatening to destroy the younger generation’s moral fibre.
CHASING THE DREAMS
IS IT a new medium on a par with film and music, a valuable educational tool, a form of harmless fun or a digital menace that turns children into violent zombies? Video gaming is all these things, depending on whom you ask.
Gaming has gone from a minority activity a few years ago to mass entertainment. Video games increasingly resemble films, with photorealistic images, complex plotlines and even famous actors. The next generation of games consoles-which will be launched over the next few months by Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo-will intensify the debate over gaming and its impact on society, as the industry tries to reach out to new customers and its opponents become evermore vocal.
Games consoles are the most powerful mass-produced computers in the world and the new machines will offer unprecedented levels of performance. This will, for example, make possible characters with convincing facial expressions, opening the way to. games with the emotional charge of films, which could have broader appeal and convince sceptics that gaming has finally come of age as a mainstream form of entertain ment. But it will also make depictions of violence even more lifelike, to the dismay of critics.
This summer there has been a huge fuss about the inclusion of hidden sex scenes in "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas", a highly popular, but controversial, game in which the player assumes the role of a street gangster. The sex scenes are not a normal part of the game (see above for a typical image). But the offending scenes can be activated using a patch downloaded from the Internet Senator Hillary Clinton and a chorus of other American politicians have called for federal prosecutors to investigate the game and examine whether the industry’s system of selfregulation, which applies age ratings to games, is working properly. Mrs Clinton accused video games of "stealing the innocence of our children" and "making the difficult job of being a parent even harder".
As a result of the furore, "Grand Theft Auto" had its rating in America changed from "M" for mature (over 17s. only) to "AO" for adults only (over-18s)-by the industry’s rating board. But since most big retailers refuse to stock "AO" titles, of which very few exist, Rockstar Games, the maker of "Grand Theft Auto", is producing a new "M" rated version without the hidden sexual material. This is merely the latest round in a long-running fight. Before the current fuss over "Grand Theft Auto", politicians and lobby groups were getting worked up over "Narc", a game that depicts drug-taking, and "25 to Life", another urban cops-and-robbers game.
Ironically, the "Grand Theft Auto" episode has re-ignited the debate over the impact of video games, just as the industry is preparing to launch its biggest-ever marketing blitz to accompany the introduction of its new consoles. Amid all the arguments about the minutiae of rating systems, the unlocking of hidden content, and the stealing of children’s innocence, however, three important factors are generally overlooked: that attitudes to gaming are marked by a generational divide; that there is no convincing evidence that games make people violent; and that games have great potential in education.
Start with the demographics. Attitudes towards gaming depend to a great extent on age. In America, for example, half of the population plays computer or video games. However most players are under 4o-according to Nielsen a market-research firm, 76% of them-while most critics of gaming are over 40. An entire generation that began gaming as children has kept playing. The average age of American garners is 30. Most are "digital natives" who grew up surrounded by technology, argues Marc Prensky of games2train, a but do not necessarily want to commit themselves to an epic quest that will take dozens of hours to complete.
The industry, in short, is doing its best to broaden gaming’s appeal, which is of course in its own best interests. For the time being, however, the demographic divide persists, and it does much to explain the polarisation of opinion over gaming and, in particular, worries about violence. It also provides the answer to a question that is often asked about gaming: when will it become a truly mainstream form of entertainment? It already is among the under-40s, but will probably never achieve mainstream status among older people.
But aren’t critics right to worry that gaming might make people violent? Hardly a week goes by in which a game is not blamed for inspiring someone to commit a violent crime. After all, say critics, acting out violent behaviour in a game is very different from passively watching it in a film. Yet surveys of studies into games and violence have produced inconclusive results, notes Dmitri Williams, who specialises in studying the social impact of media at the University of Illinois
. And, in a paper on the subject published in June in Communication Monographs, he notes that such research typically has serious shortcomings.
For example, studies have examined only the short-term effects of gaming. There have been no studies that track the long-term effects on the players themselves. Another problem, says Mr Williams, is that it is meaningless to generalise about "game play" when there are thousands of games in dozens of genres. It is, he notes, equivalent to suggesting that all television programmes, radio shows and movies are the same. Better-designed studies that measure the long-term effects of specific types of games are needed.
They’re beginning to happen. In his paper, Mr Williams describes the first such study, which he carried out with Marko Skoric of the University of Michigan. The study concentrated on a "massively multiplayer online role-playing game" (MMORPG) called "Asheron’s Call 2".
This firm that promotes the educational use of games. He describes older people as "digital immigrants" who, like newcomers anywhere, have had to adapt in various ways to their new digital surroundings. Just getting by in a foreign land without some grasp of the local language is difficult, says Mr Prensky. Digital immigrants have had to learn to use technologies such as the internet and mobile phones. But relatively few of them have embraced video games. The word "game" itself also confuses matters, since it evokes childish playthings. "What they don’t understand, because they’ve never played them, is that these are complex games, which take 30, 40 or loo hours to complete," says Mr Prensky. Games are, in fact, played mainly by young adults. Only a third of gamers are under 18.
"It’s just a generational divide," says Gerhard Florin, the European boss of Electronic Arts, the world’s biggest games publisher. "It’s people not knowing what they are talking about, because they have never played a game, accusing millions of garners of being zombies or violent."
Digital natives who have played video games since childhood already regard them as a form of entertainment on a par with films and music. Older digital natives now have children of their own and enjoy playing video games with them.
The gaming industry is trying to address the generational divide. It is producing games designed to appeal to non-gamers and encouraging casual garners (who may occasionally play simple web-based games, or games on mobile phones) to play more. This has led to the development of games with a wider appeal. Some of them replace the usual control pad with novel input devices: microphones for singing games, cameras for dancing and action games, and even drums. In addition, the industry has, stared to cater : more to women, who seem to prefer social simulation:vmes such- as w Me Sims", and to older people, who (if they play games at all) often prefer computerised versions of card _games and board games. Other promising avenues include portable gaming, mobile gaming and online downloads -of simple games. Many_ people enjoy gaming type of game requires the player to roam around a fantasy world and kill monsters to build up attribute points. It is "substantially more violent than the average video game and should have more effect, given the highly repetitive nature of the violence", the researchers noted.
Two groups of subjects were recruited, none of whom had played MMOAPGs before and many of whom had never played video games at all. One group then played the game for a month, for an average of nearly two hours per day. The other group acted as a control. All participants were asked questions about the frequency of aggressive social interactions (such as arguments with their spouses) during the course of the month to test the idea that gaming makes people more aggressive.
Moral choices
Game players, it turned out, were no more aggressive than the control group. Whether the participants had played games before, the number of hours spent gaming, and whether they liked violent movies or not, made no difference. The researchers noted, however, that more research is still needed to assess the impact of other genres, such as shoot-’em-ups or the urban violence of "Grand Theft Auto". All games are different, and only when more detailed studies have been carried out will it be possible to generalise about the impact of gaming.
But as Steven Johnson, a cultural critic, points out in a recent book, "Everything Bad Is Good for You", gaming is now so widespread that if it did make people more violent, it ought to be obvious. Instead, he notes, in America violent crime actually fell sharply in the 199os, just as the use of video and computer games was taking off (see chart 2). Of course, it’s possible that crime would have fallen by even more over the period had America not taken up video games; still, video gaming has clearly not turned America into a more violent place than it was.
What’s more, plenty of games, far from encouraging degeneracy, are morally complex, subtle and, very possibly, improving. Many now. explicitly require players to choose whether to be good or evil, and their choices determine how the game they are playing develops.
In "Black & White", for example, the player must groom a creature whose behaviour and form reflects his moral choices (get it wrong and the results can be ugly (see the illustration on the next page). Several games based on the "Star Wars" movies require players to choose between the light and dark sides of the Force, equivalent to’ good and evil. Perhaps most striking is the sequence in "Halo 2", a bestselling shoot ‘em-up, in which the player must , take the role of an alien. Having previously. seen aliens as faceless enemies, notes Paul
