So I am (sort of) happy to announce that I have been accepted to the Level Up Conference put on by the DIGRA this November in the Netherlands. Honestly, I didn't expect to get accepted. When I checked airfare to the Netherlands back in April, it was less than $600, now it is like $1200! Not sure if I can swing. that. Have to see how much money for travel expences I can con IU out of. I really want to go, but man, that is a lot of money.

I bought Command and Conquer: renegade for cheap a coupel of weeks ago. I've never played any of the traditional C&C games, so teh whole bakstory is sort of mysterious, but honestly, good guys and bad guys, not too tough. I'm enjoying it a surprizing ammount. I like the additon of the extra goals as it goes along. Don't like the stupid AI of the occasional allies that have a habit of running in front of me.

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 6:23 PM

 

I finished Masters of Doom. I really recommend it for a light fun read. It's a great behind the scenes look at the people who popularized the first person shooter genre.
Books I feel I need to read before I go back to school in August: Hamlet on the Holodeck by Janet H. Murray, Computers as Theatre by Brenda Laurel, Textual Poachers by Henry Jenkins and Reading the Romance by Janice Radway, as well as reread, The Practice of Everyday Life by Michel De Certeau. I probably won't get them all read, but I think they will help me in my dissertation.

Lately I've been thinking about the fact that in First-Person SHooters, there is a kind of grey area between play and game, informally (as in don't hold me to this) defining play as informal non-goal oriented activity, and gaming as more goal oriented structured type of play. Basically, when I play a game, there is what the game tells me to do, go here, shoot this person, not that, escort this moron. However, there is also an area of unstructured play/exploration where I often find myself trying to do things that the game designers obviously didn't intend, be it exploiting the AI or trying to find a shortcut. It seems that this kind of activity has an element of De Certeau's notion of making do in it, but can we be making do in an activity that is primarily designed for leisure in the first place? Of course there is the notion that even our recreation is dictated to us, in that we are all slaves of cultural oppression (Hello Adorno!) This practice of playing in the middle of a game seems also similar to textual poaching and it brings to mind notions of variable literacy as well. Its all a big jumble in my mind at the moment. However, I feel that there is something in those small moments where we aren't playing a game but are simply playing.

Speaking of playing a couple weeks ago a friend of a friend had a party and there were jarts there. Ever since I have been dying (ha! a pun!) for a set of my own illegal lawn darts. Anyone have a set gathering dust they want to part with cheaply?
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:42 PM

 
the Masters of Doom book is really fun. it's a great read. as one who has played nearly all the games mentioned in it, it is cool to read about how they were made. not really academic at all, but worth reading. Also worth reading is the old classic Game Over by David Sheff which is a history of Ninetendo. Those of you who are especially attentive readers may pick up a mention of my old school Bowling Green.
Some folks have been calling for shorter games. Let me point you to my latest gaming obssesion, Strange Adventures In Infinite Space , a game whose tag line is Explore the galaxy...in 20 minutes or less! I've been playig the heck out of their demo. It's great fun and intend on buying the full game as soon as remember to bring my credit card upstairs to where the computer is.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:29 PM

 

ScreenPlay: cinema/videogames/interfaces edited by Geoff King and Tanya Krzywinska (ISBN 1-903364-23-X) is described by its publisher with the following:

What is the relationship between cinema and videogames? Hollywood film franchises are routinely translated into games. Some game titles make the move onto the big screen, none more prominently than Lara Croft, iconic star of the Tomb Raider series. Games often depend on recognized film genres, milieu or devices for branding and marketing. Some aspire to a film-like quality of graphics and action. But games also offer markedly different experiences, especially in the realm of interactivity.
And what happens in the interface between cinema and games console or PC? Is there a merging of languages as games influence movies and movies influence games? Are some films becoming increasingly like games, and to what extent do they draw on the characteristics of Hollywood or other forms of cinema? ScreenPlay investigates all these issues and explores the extent to which the tools of film analysis can be applied to games, in particular how the pleasures (and frustrations) of computer games can be compared with those of cinema.

Screenplay isn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, I thought it was a pretty good book. The central unifying concept of the book is exploring the ways in which videogames draw from films. This is a very different and much more reasonable approach than the more common found approach of applying film theory to videogames.

Authors in the book include articles by both King and Krzywinska as well as names familiar to me such as Andrew Mactavish, Jo Bryce & Jason Rutter, and Sue Morris. Other authors include, Wee Liang Tong & Marcus Chen Chye Tan, Sacha A. Howells, Paul Ward, David Bessell, Steve Keane, Margit Grieb, Diane Carr, Derek A. Burrill, and Leon Hunt.

As far as the articles are concerned, to be honest, some of them seem to be much more on the film side than the videogame side. Keane's “From Hardware to Fleshware: Plugging into David Cronenberg's eXistenZ” is mainly about how videogames are used in films, Grieb's article, “Run Lara Run” seems to be arguing, “Run Lola Run was inspired by videogames! No Really!! It was!” I haven't seen Run Lola Run so this whole article was pretty lost on me. Hunt's “I Know Kung FU!” is about the authenticity of various forms of martial arts in videogames and modern films like the Matrix and how they influence each other. I like kung fu movies and fighting games, but didn't really find much of interest here.

The article that I found most out of place was Burrill's “Oh, Grow Up 007” which, as one might guess from the title, is about James Bond films and, at least superficially, games starring the character. I say superficially because it feels as if this has once been a perfectly good article about James Bond and had some brief comments about videogames tacked onto it. The article is really about recent James Bond movies, and there is does pretty well. It is in his comments about the James Bond videogames that he goes astray. For example, he notes that in the Bond games that women hardly appear at all and when they do it is as either villains or as liabilities. Ummm.... isn't that true of just about every First-Person Shooter with the exception of the No One Lives Forever series? And isn't that true of nearly all of the men in games as well??? He also makes a big deal about the player inhabiting Bond and such, but I'm not buying that. Is the fact that you are playing as Bond that essential to Goldeneye? Wouldn't it be just as fun if you were playing as 008 instead of 007 or something like that? Isn't it the setting that is important? Not the role you play? This article does seem to make some good points about James Bond, but would have been better served if the videogame portion had been left out.

For me, the most interesting portion of the book is the first part. These are the articles that deal most directly with videogames and the experience of playing them. Andrew Mactavish starts off the collection with, “Technological Pleasure: The Performance and Narrative of Technology in Half-Life and other High-Tech Computer Games,” an intriguing article that, basically, explores the notion that part of the reason why we play games is to experience spectacle. He writes that “For many gamers, the pleasure of computer gameplay is substantially composed of admiration for, and participation within, the game's exhibition of advanced visual and auditory technology” (34). It is an interesting idea, and one that does have some merit, at least for the first timewe play a particular game. However, it does not explain why we come back to some games and play them more than once. Surely once we have played them we have become immersed into the game and do not really notice the visuals and sounds. My main bone of contention with this article is that its description of pleasures seems to imply that we can only experience one kind of pleasure at a time. The article discusses the fact that the spectacular elements disrupt our immersion in the game by their sheer “wow” factor, but I'm not so sure that we can't remain immersed if not within the game world then at least immersed within the act of playing while simultaneously appreciating the technological wizardry.

The next two articles are by Geoff King and Jo Bryce & Jason Rutter and discuss spectacle in videogames. While both articles make some interesting arguments about the nature of videogames, I am just not convinced that videogames really are about spectacle. I don't know what it is, but it just doesn't feel like spectacle is the right word for it. Maybe we don't have a word for it yet, whatever it is. The articles are worth taking a look at though.

Sue Morris's article “First-Person Shooters – A Game Apparatus” lays out a lot of interesting territory. It discusses not games so much, but the players, which is a project close to my heart. It does a good example of describing the unique situation of gamers in that they are immobile, yet highly active and immersed. It takes the notion of the apparatus, one that is unfamiliar to me, and applies it to gaming, complete with a detailed chart detailing the differences between movies, TV, and games and the ways in which they are consumed. One major quibble with her article is that it seems to me, at least from my perspective, that what she is talking about is Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's concept of flow but without using that term. Had she done so, it might have provided a different slant to her article that would have been intriguing.

To conclude, this is one of the better books about videogames. While I do not agree with their focus, I find much of interest in it. There were a few times where an author was attempting to argue that something in a videogame was appropriated from films when there were other equally plausible explanations that don't involve cinema in any way. In many cases, even when I do not agree with an author, it makes me think about why I do not agree with them and in that way reading it helped me to further refine my own thoughts about what videogames really are and what their place is. Any work that makes me think and defend my own ideas is worthwhile and, judged by that standard, Screenplay is a success.

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:16 PM

 
So Masters of Doom (I start a lot of posts with so don't i?) is getting a lot of press lately. However, some people are taking issue with some of it. The seemingly ever grumpy and IMHO nearly always off track Wagner James Au has written a review of the book. The review is valuable where Au tries to set straight the chain of events that led id software to create a First-Person Shooter. But from there he goes off on a rant (something I've never ever done!) about basically how FPS games are crap and if only we had all followed in Ultima Underworld's example we would all be happy shiny people.

He uses facts that Doom sold fewer copies and that FPS games don't sell as many copies as say, Harry Potter games, to try to make the point that they aren't really that important. A couple of other blogs have already countered Au in probably better fashion than I. Joho the Blog does a good job of saying most of what I would have said, and Jonathan Peterson's entry is pretty good reading as well.

However, being that I am never one to withhold opinions, let me babble. Au's whole deal about how FPS games don't sell well is interesting. We game studies people (almost said ludologists, but that word is getting a bad name lately...) know that the most popular games sell to casual gamers. Most people who play FPS games are hardcore. There is a distinct subculture built up around these games, there is a community. For people who play these games, they are important, much more important than a Harry Potter game is to most of the people who play them. Now of course I am sure that there are some who cherish and love Harry Potter and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire games just as much as I love Thief or Soldier of Fortune. I'm talking generalities here and i'm sure that a larger percentage of people who bought and played Doom remember it more fondly than a percentage of Harry Potter game consumers (not to pick on Harry. never got around to reading the books so i don't really have an opinion on Harry). So (to use that word again) these games are important on a subcultural basis. (man somebody should do a study of that subculture!) Also I would add that the fact that, as he notes, there are several hundred FPS games out there, Doom started an industry at the very least. And these games wouldn't be continually made if there didn't appear to be an sure bet of a profit being made (again because of the built in audience of the gamer subculture. They are a much safer bet than trying to make a sims knock off)

Also I would add that Ultima Underworld reputation is not as prominent as if should be simply because it is so damn hard to play now on modern hardware. I've tried to get it to work, but no go. I have heard that there is a hack that makes it work for modern windows os's but have yet to try it.

Now in Au's defence, he does make a point about the casual gamers. they don't get the attention or respect from us games studies people that perhaps they should. It seems that there is a wealth of research that could be done on casual gamers. what attracts them? (for the life of me i don't get what is so attractive about the sims) why do they stay casual? what are their gaming habits? (i know people who still play civilisation2 daily and windows solitaire, why?) I have a feeling that part of it is that most of the hardcore games are like sports in that there is a learning curve to them. they take a while to get good and there is a great deal of frustration when the level of play is so far above one's skill level. It drives them off when they can't get into the flow.

Of course I study FPS games, so I am biased. I like them. I love them. I even buy crappy ones. However, Au in this case does seem to be spitting out some grapes here. They must be sour.

One last thing, another book is coming out, and guess who has an article in it? Wagner James Au! It's called Power to the Players. There is a listing of the articles in it but not much else. It sounds interesting though.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:44 AM

 
Still working on the screenplay review. It's already getting longish so i may see what i can do to trim it up.
i bought the Aliens versus predator 2 expansion pack off the clearence rack and am finding it mildly entertaining. I'm 2/3 through it. played the human and the predator parts. I realized that really, the predator doesn't need to be in this series. the human section made me jump a couple of times, but in both this and in one and two, i found the predator's weapons to be very infuriating. i want to shoot things darn it! Oh and by the way the first AvP from Rebellion was head and shoulders better than the sequel from monolith. if you don't agree you're wrong. sorry. no really. you are. really.
Looking forward to teh matrix sequel. will probably buy the game. I'm assuming that the x-box version will have better controls than the pc one, but not sure. I really wish that there were more reviews of cross platform games that coverd teh differences between things like visuals and controls on various platforms. I feel like i should buy splinter cell, but wich format pc or x-box? I don't really care about the "extra" content and I am, again, assuming that since it started on a consol it plays better on one.
I graduate officially from Bowling green friday, so i'm looking forward to that. honstly though looking more forward to only working one day this week!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:39 PM

 
There's one other book coming out that I forgot to mention. Masters of Doom by David Kushner is coming out this summer and it is a bio about those masters of DooM themselves, John Carmack and John Romero. This month's issus of Computer Gaming World (the one with Everquest 2 on the cover) has a small blurb about it. And interestingly enough there will also be an ebook version that seems to be available right now.
Wow, two posts in two days. Somebody give me a webby for best blog!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:30 PM

 
I mentioned in a previous post that I have been accepted into a PhD program. Well, it is after the April 15th deadline for acceptance, so I am proud to announce that I will be part of Indiana University's Department of Communication and Culture My dissertation will be an ethnographic based study on gamers. I will be taking a subcultural approach and looking at the ways they form a community, the reasons why the gaming community consists of who it does (typically middle class young white straight males) with an eye on why people who aren't like that aren't attracted to gaming, as well as why some people who don't fit that mold are part of the scene.

I always feel weird talking about issues of race, gender, class, age, and sexuality, not because they aren't important, but because I am pretty squarely in the dominant demography of white middle class straight males. So I am always afraid of "othering" when I talk about people that aren't of the same demographic.

I am very much looking forward to getting back to school though. I am sick to death of this crappy casino job. I even went so far as to download a countdown clock so i can know evacuate how many days it is until i quit.(although to be honest, working here has given me tons of appreciation for just how lucky i am to be able to leave. Among the people I know from grad school I feel every blue collar and i'm not sure that the majority of those in academia know how lucky they are not to have a job with a time clock. And I have also got a great deal of research material for what may be my next project after my dis. is done.)

The Communication and Culture program at IU has 3 different tracts. Rhetoric, Ethnography and Media. Honestly, I'm not even sure what rhetoric is, so i plan on staying as far away from that as possible... I think I will have to wait and see if I will go ethnography or media, since my project seems to fit in both. I'm sure that there will be lots of overlap in coursework anyway.

THey also have a minor requirement. not sure what I'll go for there. They have an American Studies program which might be good, but they also have an interesting T-Com program. ANd I'm also thinking about maybe a Folklore minor, which would be very ironic considering how much I struggled with it at Bowling Green. There is also a language requirement, so I guess it's time to dust of the German. Let's see what I remember? "Fich dich!" I'm sure that will go over well if I say that on the first day of German class!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 10:38 PM

 
There are a few books coming out this year that I'm keeping my eye on. I don't know what it is but I seem to have a desperate need to own pretty much every book related to videogames as soon as it comes out.
Coming out from MIT press is First Person: New Media as Story, Performance and Game. I don't know much about it, but it has an interesting title.

Also from MIT press is Handbook of Computer Game Studies. Of course this is not to be confused with the Video Game Theory Reader which I believe is being edited by Mark J. P. Wolf, whose last collection The Medium of the Video Game I was not impressed with, but he does have a pretty good list of contributors.

Barry Atkins brings us More than a game: The computer game as fictional form
which, according to the publisher is, "...The first academic work dedicated to the study of computer games in terms of the stories they tell and the manner of their telling. Taking its cue from practices of reading texts in literary and cultural studies, it considers the computer game as a new and emerging mode of contemporary storytelling..." To which I say, "Run! Run Now!" I kid because I love. ..or something like that. He does have a chapter on Sim city which should be interesting.

James Newman writes the simply titled Videogames (which at amazon.co.uk is listed as the less simple, Computer and Video Games) seems to be an introductory text that doesn't seem to be aimed at us heap big academic types but more of a casual crowd. not that there's anything wrong with that.

The last book coming out this year is Digital Play. I don't know much about it since all I could finr out about it was the amazon.co.uk listing. The listing says "From Atari to Microsoft, Space Invaders to The Sims, the authors uncover the successive crises that forced game makers, faced with constant instabilities in the global entertainment sector, to become increasingly innovative." so not sure what kind of slant this book has.

You might think it odd that descpite being american, i refer to the uk amazon site. Well, I have found that the uk site seems to list books earlier than the US one and that when doing a rendom search on books in the same catagories as other gaming books I get better results. go figure

One book that seems to have been published last year, but I can't really justify buying is Mariosofia. I can't justify buying it mainly because it seems to be in Finnish. I know from my site stats that there is at least one Finnish speaker who visits here, so perhaps you can check it out.

So, much reading lies ahead of us in the coming year. but right now I have to go watch Farscape reruns on SciFi.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 9:00 PM

 
Hey all this is a test. I'm trying to be all kool & the gang and use a blogging tool. I'm using w.bloggar. Let's see how it works...
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:38 AM

 

So for the record, I am not Brian Mitchell. I don't go around kidnapping little Mormon girls. ...I much prefer 7th Day Adventists....

Anyway.....

Rant ahead, get ready. leave now if you aren't ready. It's late and I'm probably not going to edit this, so it will probably be much more than semi-rambling. Let's just aim for coherent, shall we?

This war thing. everybody's talking about it. I guess I should too. Whether its right or WRONG isn't really my point. we've got one, so we need to make the best of it.

I'm sure that some willl call this a videogame war. THe level of technology being used to present this conflict to us is facinating. I work nights, so since Iraq is 8 hours ahead of the US's east coast, when I go on break I get to see stuff that is happing over there as it happens. The other day there was a battle being broadcast live, as it happened. The CNN guy was talking to the reporting in Iraq and they were describing the events as they unfolded. Halfway around the world people were being killed and wounded and I was watching it happen live.

Bush likes to call this the shock and awe war. well that's what i felt. shock and awe. (OK here comes the reason why this is relevent to a videogame blog...) Because so many videgames are combat related, because we now have the abilities to watch combat as it happens, and because of the so called smart bombs, certainly some will call this a videogame war. but as i sat there watching this battle (issues of how the media presents to us what is "real," hyperreality, the implications of fact that it takes 2 seconds or so for the broadcast to travel from iraq, and scopophilic pleasures/masculine gaze aside) I realized it was nothing like a videogame.

Games are supposed to be fun first and formeost and if anyone thinks that war is fun, you are a sick bastard. secondly, games are about being in control and exerting your will over events. Watching that standoff, I felt totally powerless. the immediacy of the actions, this is happening NOW as you watch and there is nothing you can do. then realizing that it isn't happening NOW but because of that pesky speed of light, it really happened a couple seconds ago and right NOW over there the person on screen could be dead and that we won't know about it for two seconds so we could be watching this person "live" even though he isn't.

Anyone who has read my work knows I am all about players versus watchers. This is where bush's "shock and awe" comes in. this isn't a videogame, it is shock and awe. This war is about spectacle. This war is about, "Holy shit, look at that!" It is about our powerlessness to prevent it, and our inability stop it as well as our inability to influence it. We are spectators in this passion play, not participants. we can shout either boos or cheers as loud as we like, but like the images on a screen (and in a way for the vast majority of us that is all this war will EVER be, really) nothing we do will influence what happens. No matter how much I want the girl in the horror movie not to look in the closet, she will.

Watching the battle unfold I came to realize what this ware really was. The camerarok, the seemiingly random zooms, the unpredictability. This is not a videogame war. It is the reality tv war. the networks are using remarkably similar techniques to film and report this war as they are using to give us Survivor and Joe Millionairre. They way it is being filmed and the way it is presented is taken straight from reality tv so much so that I expect it to be a Mark Burnett production.

And guess what? the networks are cashing in on it just a much as they do on "real" reality tv shows. for the networks they are both easy and cheap to produce and result in audiences that can't bear to look away.

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 2:24 AM

 

As I read Screenplay, I find myself becoming more and more convinced that using film theory really does a diservice to what games are. The relationship between player and game is much different than that of viewer and film. It seems that this makes any similaritys between films and games to be very superficial at best.

While I cannot disagree with much of what the authors included in Screenplay are writing, I constantly find myself asking, "So What?" and feel that the authors are really missing the point. I am not deneying that they have a point, but it just feels like they point they are making is not very significant. To use a totally random analogy, it seems that some people (some not all certainly) are judges at a diving competition and focusing on thw swimsuits the divers are wearing rather than the dives themselves.

Call me crazy, but I feel that a lot more attention needs to be paid to ther relationship between the games and the players, than the games themselves. I don't really want to discount anyone's work here, I mean come on, I'm a videogame scholar, not the world's most important profession here, but it just seems that some are on the wrong track. This is not a retraction of my prior recommendation. I still thinkit is worth picking up, but I am still not down with their project. I will write a more full review when I finish it. I will say that as I get past the halfway point, the essays included seem less interesting to me personally. A couple of them seem sort of out of place in this collection. Oh well, isn't EVERY collection like that though?

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:26 AM

 

Some random notes.

I finished Jet Set Raido Future, and found the end (heck the whole game) to be really Japanese, in that the main bad guy changed his name and appearance for no apparent reason. (at least I assume that it was the same bad guy, if not who the heck was that final boss?) It seems that this is a common theme in japanease popular culture. In Digimon (which as a cartoon I find VASTY superior to Pokemon) the creatures are constantly getting new looks and names. anyone know why that is? or am I just taking two disparate examples and declaring them a trend?.

I got accepted to a phd program, so i will be able to do my gamer ethnography project. Yeah Me! I haven't heard back from the other schools that I applied to yet, so I'm not which school I will be going to just that I WILL. SO now of course I am trying to think of ways to milk my current employer out of as much money as possible while doing as little work as possible...

I got the Geoff King and Tanya Krzywinska edited Screenplay (ISBN 1-903364-23-X)(although I think I have seen her listed as Tanya King on some online book sellers, not sure if that is a typo or what). I'm about 1/3 the way through and find it a whorthwhile read. The collection is subtitled cinema/videogames/interfaces and is mostly about where videogames intersect with films. Of course if you have read any of my stuff, you know I am pretty much anti that approach. What I've read so far isn't horrible, some of it is pretty good, but there are certainly a lit of places where I find myself saying, "Well, yeah, but that is also true of things besides film" and or "NO! That has nothing to do with film!" However, I am saying it a lot less than I thought I would, which is some sort of backhanded complement implying that I think it is worth buying.

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:17 AM

Here again with my "not-so-frequent" "ramblings" So I went over to the dark side of the force and bought a new consol. I have an original playstation. have like 4 games for it. got bored with it, went back to computer games. Now I bought an X-Box. I bought it mainly for Halo, and Splinter Cell. I haven't bought Splinter Cell yet. A bit let down from all the hype around Halo. Found it pretty blaa. The guys from penny arcade were right about all the buildings looking the same. The vehicles handle like crud. I hated driving every one of them.

Jet Set Radio Future, which now comes with the x-box, is pretty darn good. I like it quite a bit. I find the notion that they put a "do not do graffiti" warning on the front of the game interesting. Also interesting is the fact that they talk a lot about culture and art in the game itself.

I am tempted to say that this is a japanese equivelent of Grand Theft Auto. However, I am not willing to make such cultural generalizations. Anyone know how sucessfull GTA3 is in Japan?

I did finally play a little bit of GTA, have to say, wasn't real impressed. I was more ticked off by the things you couldn't do, like go inside most buildings, than the things you could do. Also seemed like every time I tried to go one one of these famous random acts of violence, the cops were on me in seconds. I was playing a friends saved game though, so perhaps he had already irritated the cops or something. I will try to pick up the PC version and give it an honest play through though before casting me (oh so highly regarded) verdict.

I've noticed traffic on the site has gone up quite a bit lately. Thanks for stopping by!

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 9:14 PM

Since games and art is being discussed quite a bit lately I thought I might post an article I wrote a couple months ago, but never got around to posting.

But is it Art?

In recent years many advances have come to the world of videogames. The visuals have become ever more photorealistic and the gameplay has become more refined to name just two. However, there has been at least one area where videogames have not advanced, and that area is, as one may guess from the title is, “Are videogames art?”

The answer to this question really depends upon whom you ask. This,of course,is part of the problem in coming up with a definative answer to this question. Ask ten people to define art and you will get ten different answers. As one saying goes, “I can't define art, but I know it when I see it.” Art is subjective and so each person has their own definition of what art is, and depending upon that definition, they will draw their own conclusion as to whether videogames are art. By looking at both sides of this question, it may be seen that it is not videogames that are flawed, but rather the question itself. Instead of asking, “Is it art?” perhaps we should ask ourselves, “Why do we care?” and “Why do they need to be?”

On one side of the “Is it art?” issue, there are those who would say, “No.” A person who claims that videogames are not art most likely has a narrow definition of art. A narrow definition of art typically includes only the most “high culture” and refined styles. Mona Lisa and Motzart are likely to be their standards of art. They are not interested in “art”,but “Art” with a capital “A,” the kind that has velvet ropes in front of it, and people with snooty accents.

Obviously, what such a narrow and stuffy definition of art does, however, is to clasify things. What is decreed as being Art is good and distinguished, what is not Art is trash, lower class and common. However, this attitude serves a broader purpose of classifying the classifier. If a person passes judgemnet on a work by decreeing that it is or is not art, what is really happening is not a passing of judgement on the work, but the classifyer is really attempting to prove that they have a more refined taste than others, that they are better than other people. So to say that something is not art really says more about the person who is making the distinction than the actual distinction itself. So to say that something is not art is an elitist move that only serves to reinforce the closed culture of old money and snobbery. Besides, do you think that the majority of people who regularly partake of high Art would ever acqnowledge the artistry of Quake?

To say that videogames are in fact art is to take a wider, more pragmatic view of the term art. It is to say that art is a term that is subjective. A wider definition of art implies that nearly anything can be art and that art is any creative human act. However, this definition still classifies beteen art and not art, even if only in broader manner. To call something art is still to pass judgement on it.

This is why it seems that the question, “Are videogames art?” should be thrown out. There are other questions that are more pertanant. Why does it matter if it is art? What does it get the gaming community? Who benefits from calling it art and why? All of these are questions that need to be asked when one tries to argue the “Is it Art?” question. It does not seem that much if anything is gained by videogames being classified as art. A bit of respect perhaps, but there are those that will never accept the form as art, because they are too narrow minded, and too entranched in the old ways of defining art.

If one feels strongly that videogames need to be considered art in order to gain respect, perhaps what is really going on is that someone feels a bit ashamed of their hobby and is in need of something to help raise their self esteeme. If that is the case, then there are more serious questions than whether or not videogames are art. And if it is true that one of the reasons that the gaming community wants to be considered art is for respect or a self esteme boost, then I sincerely doubt that being considered art will solve those problems. A question that needs to be asked then, is not “Is it Art?” but “Why do we care?”

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 8:47 PM

In response to my prior post, Lars Konzack writes,

I'm not sure this statement is true, because the computer as medium is much more than just gaming. It's the world wide web and databases, desk top publishing and e-mails as well. A combination of these types of computer media would in fact make the difference between fantasy and reality blurred like in the Blair Witch Project.

I would have to say that, while such a project sounds incredibly fun (Like Majestic was supposed to be. Although it got horrible reviews, I regret not playing it before it was discontinued). I would have to argue that things like Majestic, and what Lars suggests, would not be a videogame. It would be a new kind of game that used computers.

of course this raises the issue of defining things. What is a videogame and what is a game that just uses computers of some sort?
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:26 PM

Think about the notion of a documentary videogame. not a documentary about a videogame, but a videogame that is a documentary. Such a thing doesn't seem possible does it? Think about the implications of that. There can never be the equivelent of a Blair Witch Project for videogames. Think about that for the implications on a reality versus fantasy debate.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 7:37 PM

Happy holidays to those the celebrate those sorts of things. I have my thesis finished, passed my test. all i have left to do is get phd apps out (not real hopefull about getting in though) and physically give the graduate college a copy of my thesis.

Since i would like to publish my thesis at some point, i won't post it here. (drop me an email at jccalhoun at homail.com if you really want to see it). But i thought that i might post my bib to give folks interested a peek into what i think are usefull videogame related sources.

Aarseth, Espen J. Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.

Berger, Arthur Asa . Video Games: A Popular Culture Phenomenon. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 2002.

Bourdieu, Pierre. "Distinction & The Aristocracy of Culture." Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader. Ed. John Storey. Atlanta: University of Georgia Press, 1998. 431-441.

Buecheler, Christopher. “Cut the Cutscenes.” Gamespy.com. Apr. 18, 2002 http://www.gamespy.com/cynic/april02/cut/

Cameron, Andy. "Dissimulations: Illusions of Interactivity." Millenium Film Journal. 28(1995): 33-47.

Children Now. "Fair Play?: Violence, Gender and Race in Video Games." April 28, 2002 http://www.childrennow.org/media/video-games/2001/fair-play-2001.pdf

Cover, Scott and Gaston Lahaut. “John Romero.” December 9, 1997. Five Years of Doom. July 4, 2001 http://5years.doomworld.com/interviews/johnromero/

Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. Beyond Boredom and Anxiety. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1975.

---. “The Flow Experience and Its Signifigance For Human Psychology.” Optimal Experience: Psychological Studies of Flow in Consciousness. Ed. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Isabella Selega Csikszentmihalyi. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988.

Darley, Andrew. Visual Digital Culture: Surface Play and Spectacle in New Media Genres. New York: Routledge, 2000.

Dumazedier, Joffre. Towards a Society of Leisure. Trans. Stewart E. McClure. New York: The Free Press, 1967.

Dunniway, Troy. “Using the Hero's Journey in Games.” November 27, 2000. Gamasutra. April 27, 2002 http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20001127/dunniway_01.htm

Dyer, Richard. “Entertainment and Utopia.” The Cultural Studies Reader. Ed. Simon During. New York: Routledge, 1993. 271-285.

Faludi, Susan. "Rage of the American Male." Newsweek August 16, 1999: 31.

---. Stiffed: The Betrayal of the American Man. New York: Perennial, 2000.

Frasca, Gonzalo. "Ludology Meets Narratology: Similitude and Differences Between (Video)Games and Narrative." September 11, 1999. Ludology. April 27, 2002 http://www.jacaranda.org/frasca/ludology.htm

"Game On." June 16, 2002 http://www.gameonweb.co.uk

“Gamespy Stats.” Gamespy.com. May 21, 2002 http://www.gamespy.com/stats

Greenfield, Sonia. “Are Games Too Sexy?” March 29. 2002. Extended Play. April 10, 2002 http://www.techtv.com/extendedplay/videofeatures/story/0,24330,3378294,00.html

“The Half-Life Story.” Planet Half-Life. 12 July, 2001 http://www.planethalflife.com/half-life/guide/overview.shtm

Jackson, Susan A. and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Flow in Sports. Champaign: Human Kinetics, 1999.

Juul, Jesper. “A clash between Game and Narrative.” November 1998. February 3, 2002 http://www.jesperjuul.dk/text/DAC%20Paper%201998.html

Kent, Steven L. The Ultimate History of Video Games. Prima Publishing: Roseville, 2001.

King, Geoff. Spectacular Narratives: Hollywood in the Age of the Blockbuster. New York: I. B. Taurus Publishers, 2000.

Messner, Michael A. “Power at Play: Sport and Gender Relation.” Signs of Life in the USA. 3rd ed. Eds. Sonia Maasik and Jack Solomon. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2000. 460-471.

Mulvey, Laura. "Visual Pleasure in Narrative Cinema." Cultural Studies Reader: History, Theory, Practice. Eds. Jessica Munns and Gita Rajan. New York: Longman, 1995.

Nachbar, Jack. "Songs of the Unseen Road: Myths, Beleifs and Values in Popular Culture." Popular Culture: An Introductory Text. Ed. Jack Nachbar and Kevin Lause. Bowling Green: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1992. 81-109.

"Online Gaming Habits." April 3, 2002. Game Research. June 11, 2002 http://www.game-research.com/art_online_gaming.asp

Platt, Charles. “Interactive Entertainment: Who writes it? Who reads it? Who needs it?” Wired. September, 1995: 145-149, 195-197.

Poole, Steven. Trigger Happy. New York: Arcade Publishing, 2000.

Provenzo Jr., Eugene F. Video Kids. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991.

Saltzman, Marc. Game Design: Secrets of the Sages. 2nd ed. Brady Publishing: Indianapolis, 2000.

Slovin, Rochelle. "Hot Circuits: Reflections on the 1989 Video Game Exhibition of the American Museum of the Moving Image." Medium of the Video Game. Ed. MarkJ. P. Wolf. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001. 137-154.

Starker, Steven. Evil Influences: Crusades Against the Mass Media. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 1989.

Takahashi, Dean. “Games Get Serious.” December 2000. Red Herring. May 3, 2002 http://www.redherring.com/mag/issue87/mag-games-87.html

Tractenberg, David. “Hollywood is the Name of the Game.” Adrenaline Vault. April 12, 2002 http://www.avault.com/developer/getarticle.asp?name=tracten1

Turkle, Sherry. The Second Self. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1984.

Turner, Victor. “Frame, Flow and Reflection: Ritual and Drama as Public Liminality.” Performance in Postmodern Culture. Madison: Coda Press, 1977.

Wolf, Mark J. P. The Medium of the Video Game. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2001.

Wolf, Michael. “Playing Great Stories.” PC Gamer. 8.5(2001): 105.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 7:35 PM

So i was checking my log of hits today and found out that some people use some pretty interesting search terms to find my site. some of the more interesting terms used include:
heart attacks as a result of fps, diablo 2 strong stratgy (I've never played Diablo, let alone mentioned it. i've no idea what a stratgy is!), fps groin (wonder what this person was trying to find!), is it justifiable for children to play videogames, enjoyment + csikszentmihalyi (kind of proud that this one showed up!), andrew darley, scene or paly on horror (?), flow stateexperience sports gender women (again nice to see something resasonable show up even though they probably didn't find what they were looking for), find older people playing fps (This person must not watch the news, because the news says that only kids play videogames! and the news is never wrong!), if a tree falls in the woods who wrote (?), metal does not cause violence (?),

Of course the irony that by posting these search terms that they will be more likely to appear in search engine results is not lost on me. Why do you think i did it? ;-) (must be in a good mood. need to go play more killing simulators to get angry and depressed and gloomy)
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 1:42 AM

What? You mean the media was WRONG and the snipers weren't gamers? welll surely they will all come out and admit that they wre wrong.

what? you mean they haven't? *shock*
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 4:44 PM

 
So it seems that the heirarchy of blame comes out into the open. In the sniper shootings, now that the witness who claimed to have seen "an olive skinned" man turns out to have been lying, we turn to blaming videogames. From CNN,"Florida lawyer Jack Thompson speculated on NBC's Today show Friday that the shooter might be a gamer. Thompson surmised that an inscription on a Tarot card found near one of the shootings -- "Dear Policeman: I am God" -- might have links to gaming.
"You go to video game chat rooms and you have the proclamation 'I am God' all over the place," said Thompson, an advocate of regulations to keep violent video games out of the hands of minors.
The expression is sometimes used by gamers to declare victory and players commonly say they're in "God-mode" when their characters shield themselves or don protections that make them invincible. "
so when we can't blame non-whites, we blame gamers. never mind that this lawyer seems to be proud that he was part of the 2live crew obsenity case, and represented an oliver north funded group and currently "represents the parents of three girls who were shot and killed in the Paducah school shootings in our federal lawsuit against entertainment giants whose violent products, including video game Doom, encouraged and trained Michael Carneal to kill." but most of what he said is totally wrong.
"I am God" is a popular phrase among gamers? since when? and since where are gamers really into chat rooms? aren't they playing games?(oh I'm sorry killing simulators...) I thought they made us anti-social, so how can we be chatting? and of course the explanation of "God mode" is completly off target. God mode, for anyone that does not know is a cheat code that makes one invinsible. but it has nothing to do with sheilds or doning protections.

but why do did he say chat rooms, rather than the more plausible in game chat? because chat rooms are a scary hot button issue too. remember chat rooms are where people seduce your children. or at least that is what the majority of non-computer people (of which it is probably safe to assume make up the majority of an early morning show like Today) think of when they hear about chat rooms. so this lawyer managed to masterfully put both videogames and chat rooms into a sentence in order to maximize his scare tactics. Which of course was all a plan to help increase his chances of winning that court case.

but none of this stops nearly every major news outlet from picking up on it and reporting it. lies mistruths and moral panics. over and over.

There are also other articles that can be found at google's news search about "sniper games." of course with the exception of counterstrike, i've either barely heard of them or never heard of them at all.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 4:09 PM

 
it seems that my thesis is done. From 'llama' to 'l33t:' a deconstruction and reconstruction of a first-person shooter videogame aesthetic is done. i'd like to try and get it published, since the body of literature on videogames is still very small. otherwise i would post it here. if anyone really wants to take a look, drop me an email and i'll give you a copy.

i have officially started my one year leave from acadamia. i have went back to work at the casino. so not a lot of gaming work is being done. still looking for a school to apply to next year. so if anyone knows of one, drop me a line.

one final note of interest. i was at wal-mart reinforcing corporate monopolies today and noticed soemthing that i found signifigant. Where are the videogames located in your store? typically the electronics section (with films and music and consumer electronics) where are the board games and sporting equipment? in the toy section. that little difference speaks volumes about culture's perception of videogames, i think. something to ponder...

funny how you know things like where videogames are, but never stop to think about the implications of them. damn you hegemony. you're a harsh mistress!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 6:53 PM

 
so, since joystick101.org is down for a while, i will post a short review of the CGDC Confernece Proceedings. Basically, this is the best "book" on videogames published to date. The book consists of all of the papers presented at the CGDC confernece in June 2002. There are quite a number of good analytical videogame essays here. I must admit that I did not read every single one, as not all of the subjects covered are of great interest of me, but I did read most of them and was very pleased with the majority of them.

Names I recognize that are included here are Lars Konzack, Julian Kücklich, Geoof King & Tanya Krzywinska (whose book, ScreenPlay I eagerly await since it seems to be about movies and videogames, something I am completely against!), and jesper juul.

it's not available in bookstores, but I highly recommend you get it. It is only available (as far as I can tell) online from the University of Tampere Bookstore. The adress is http://granum.uta.fi/cgi-bin/book.cgi?6901 They do not accept credit cards directly, and ask you to fax your card info to them, but as I said, it is the extra bit of hassle. Get this book if you are interested in videogame studies.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 7:16 PM

 

Here is a quick repost of a coment I made over at joystick101.org regarding the segment on the Donahue show about violence in gaming and what I think would be a solid responce to issue of violence in gaming as it regards to the pubilc.

Here are some of my thoughts on how I feel the gaming industry should be addressing these issues. I am in a bit of a hurry so there are probably all kinds of spelling errors.

first of all, what is going on here with all of these issues of violence and videogames is pure moral panic. Television, rap, rock and roll, and films have all been hit with similar claims in their early years. Even the popularization of the newspaper was met with fears by the cultural elite that it would lead to the masses wanting to particiapte in government. As such, I think we need to call people out on these tactics of trying to scare people. Say this is a moral panic and all you are doing is trying to scare people.

A related issue is who decides what is violent and why? There is far greater violence at a hockey game than there is in many videogames. People have died as a result of altercations that are directly related to sports. and yet I have not herad anyone say that perhaps the kinds of sports we encourage children to participate in could lead to violence. I have made this argument previously so I will not elaborate on it more here.

Another thing that needs to be done is to point out that these games are directly participatory in nature. While there is a kind of participatation that occurs in watching a film or reading, as we are all aware, what goes on while playing a game is on a whole other level of participartation. because of this, it is not possible to judge a videogame without playing it. One issue I constantly find myself returning to is that videogames have players not watchers. What people are talking about is what might happen to people who play these games. therefore showing a clip of a game, as donahue and most other shows do, simply cannot tell the watcher what it is like to play the game. Whenever we find someone talking out about these games, we need to ask them, "Have you ever played the game?"

Expecially since the St. Louis decision, it seems that a lot of videogame scholars have tried to defend videogames with the tactic that even though videogame x, y or z is really violent, if only people would look at game a, b or c they would see how great they can be, or have said, that videogames are a maturing industry and maybe someday they will grow beyond the need for violence in videogames. Not to step on anyone's toes, but I feel that statements like these are not only ineffectual, but are actually detrimental. We've heard of the phrase back-handed compliment, well, it seems to me that these kinds of staements are back-handed defences.

Statements like that seem to be an eleitist move where we say, "yes these games are trash but not all of them are." It serves to stratify and create a situation of "art" vs. "not-art" How is this a helpfull situation? If videogames are to every be accepted as 'art" (even though I fail to see why we should even care if they are or are not 'art") then we must argue that every game has elements of brilliance and beauty, that what is going on in these games is artistic communication in small groups. in this I agree with judge limbaugh who made the St. louis decission when he wrote that either all games are art or none of them are. By saying that maybe one day games will be more, all we are really saying is that today they aren't and this game they are attacking really is as bad as people says it is.

As others have said, we as academic-type people cannot do everything. The videogame industry really needs to step up and educate people. They need to educate retailers about the ratings and they also need to educate parents. Why can't they air a commercial in primetime explaining the ratings. Even if it doesn't do any good at raising parent's awareness, at least when they come under attack, they will be able to point at the commercial and say, "look, we are trying to educate the public!"

Ok. I have rambled on enough here.

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 10:01 AM

 
Hopefully I am just about done with my thesis. When I am I will update the papers on here. I have used most of them in one form or another. I am kind of embarased by the old ones posted on here. I think they are so horribly written! Oh well, I am sure that most people have similar reactions to their old work. I am not going to be in school next year. NYU is just too expensive. So if anyone reading this knows of a PHD programm that I should go to in 2003 let me know!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 10:11 AM

 
I just added one of those fancy commenting things. so leave a comment!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 9:01 AM

 
I hate html.
So I'm hopefully getting close to finishing my thesis. my advisors want to get together and discuss their suggestions to make sure that they all agree. I value one of their comments more so i have already started to implement his suggestions. soo i will be done. then its on to the glamorous world of academia. weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 8:57 AM

 
OK, so I've made the plunge and transferred my web site over to a blog. Now I am totally cool. I only made the front page look cool, I figure that if anyone actually want to read my papers they will do like I do and print them out, so I will leave teh html generic for my papers. The old front page can be found here for those who like old non-updated web pages.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:25 PM

 

I have two things to write about today. First, Lars Konzack dropped me an email recently to let me know that he had read my article, First-Person Shooters Are Not Like Movies and That is a Good Thing" and liked at least one of my points enough to quote it and mention it on his site, Ludologica. Its always good to be some recognizion for strangers!

Unfortunately, I have also recently had my work used without my permission! I got a post in my message book encouraging me to participate in another site. Imagine my surprize when I went to http://mediaculture.org/ and found out that I already had participated! It seems that somone who goes by the name of Barkin had posted my Gender in First-Person Shooters article without asking my permission or giving me credit for the story.

I've talked to the person in charge, however and the situation has been cleared up. The story is part of a paper I did about identification in First-Person Shooters that I am using in my thesis. The excerpt was an article I have posted at joystick101.org. So while some people like my stuff and give me credit others like it and take credit! Oh well, karma is a bitch!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:52 AM

I have two things to write about today. First, Lars Konzack dropped me an email recently to let me know that he had read my article, First-Person Shooters Are Not Like Movies and That is a Good Thing" and liked at least one of my points enough to quote it and mention it on his site, Ludologica. Its always good to be some recognizion for strangers!

Unfortunately, I have also recently work used without permission! I got a post in my message book encouraging me to participate in another site. Imagine my surprize when I went to http://mediaculture.org/ and found out that I already had participated! It seems that somone who goes by the name of Barkin had posted my Gender in First-Person Shooters article without asking my permission or giving me credit for the story.

I've talked to the person in charge, however and the situation has been cleared up. The story is part of a paper I did about identification in First-Person Shooters that I am using in my thesis. The excerpt was an article I have posted at joystick101.org.
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:52 AM

 
I am sick of writing my thesis!!! I want it to be over!!! I have just a little over a month to get it and everything else stressfull in my life over with and I want it done with! I just finished drafting my last chapter and I don't want to think about it anymore!!
I know, I know, nothing worth doing is ever easy, but I am stressed out.
I am going to NYU next year and at this point I am not sure if I want to go through this stress again. Arggggggg.
I'm sure I will get over it. I just hope I get through it in one peice!!!
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 12:10 PM

 

I posted this rant on joystick101.org as well as, in a slightly different form, at kuro5hin.org. But here is it again. My thoughts on a recent bill to outlaw the sale of "violent" videogames to minors.

On May 2, Congressman Joe Baca (D-California) introduced H.R. 4645, The Protect Children from Video Game Sex and Violence Act of 2002. The bill would penalize those who sell or rent "violent" video games to a minor. Some of their reasons for proposing this are: the video games aren't free speech ruling, the Germany shooting (even though that man was 19 and thus not a minor as well as the fact that there is already a similar law in Germany) and a report that "found" that "violent" videogames cause violence (despite the fact that there other reports that found no link).

The language Baca used in the press release is pure moral panic. "I'm a parent and grandparent, and I've had enough of the violence we're experiencing among our youth," Baca said. "We saw it at Columbine High School, and we saw it last week in Germany." "Do you really want your kids assuming the role of a mass murderer or car jacker while you are away at work?" And referencing the St. Louis decision he says, "The courts have finally decided what every parent already knows - that video games containing ultra violent depictions of murder, rape, and assault have no place in the hands of our children."

The ignorance evident in the St. Louis decision as been discussed elsewhere. However, the ignorance of this proposed law bears discussion. Whether or not children should be allowed access to these games is not the issue I wish to discuss. The issues are whether or not the government should be the one to decide this debate and what is considered "violent" and why.

To the best of my knowledge (and I would be thrilled if anyone can prove me wrong) there is no federal law enforcing movie ratings. The movie ratings board is a self-imposed regulatory body. It is the movie theaters and video renters/sellers who decide who can see a "violent" film and who cannot, not the federal government. If this is true, the videogame industry already has ratings. The industry simply needs to enforce them. Why should the film industry be allowed to self-regulate and the videogame industry should not?

By outlawing the sales of "violent" videogames to minors, the government will nullify these ratings. What is "violent" and who gets to decide? Is Madden 2002 violent? How do we know if they consider that violent or not? According to the proposed law it might be considered violent under the "aggravated assault or battery" limitation. This law opens up the floodgates and makes it very hard for a game development company to make sure that they do not make a game that is considered "too violent." With the industry regulated ratings board there is prior knowledge. The makers and retailers find out that the game is "violent" before it goes to the store, and therefore know what they are getting themselves into. With a law, the makers, and perhaps more importantly, the retailers will not know if a game is "too violent" until they get busted by some undercover police officer with nothing better to do.

This issue of violence gets to a deeper issue. In all likelihood, Madden 2002 would not be considered "too violent." Why? Because it is "just football." In American society (and probably in much of western society as well, although I am no expert on international culture), sports are naturalized. We consider them harmless. Even more than that, we encourage children to participate in them saying that they will be morale builders and the like. However, let us stop a moment and think about what actually happens during a contact, "masculine" sport like football (both kinds), basketball or hockey. How do players hype themselves up for the game, how to they refer to their opponents? "Let's kill 'em! Let's rip their heads off! Let's destroy them!"

So here we have an activity that involves actual real violence, hitting one another and face to face trash talking and yet we do not seem concerned that this will lead to other acts of violence? But we have these mediated, virtual enactments and we are concerned? Real violence does not cause more violence, but virtual violence does? The worst injury I have ever heard of at a LAN party is carpal tunnel! How often do fights break out at LAN parties? How often do they break out at sporting events? Remind me again which one of these causes violence?

This is not to suggest that I think we should outlaw sports. Not at all. It is to show a point. Sports are considered part of our society. They have been since ancient times. So the thought that these may cause violence does not even occur to most people. However, these damn kids and their videogames. Now that is another story. Videogames are a new medium and they are a new entrant into our culture. Hence the moral panic surrounding them. Remember what rap was supposed to do to our kids? Remember what heavy metal was supposed to do? Remember rock and roll? There have been moral panics about technology dating all the way back to the popularization of the printing press. What is going on here is nothing different and as such we should try to see through the moralistic, "what about the children!?!" hype and see that the real issues here are not "should children be prevented from buying violent videogames?" but "Do we need a law to prevent children from buy violent videogames?" "Who decides what 'violent' is?" and "Why is that considered violent when there are so many other things in society that aren't?"

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 2:47 PM

 

So there are some interesting issues going on with gaming. A judge in St. Louis decided that videogames don't contain ideas and so aren't provided free speech protection. According to one article Judge Limbaugh (yes he is related to Rush Limbaugh although I don't think we should be punished for who we are related to) didn't even play the games he just watched films of them. In his ruling he said that videogames showed, "no conveyance of ideas, expression or anything else that could possibly amount to free speech. ... Video games have more in common with board games and sports than they do with motion pictures."

Now anyone who knows my research should know that I totally agree with his observation that they don't have much in common with films. However, the notion that videogames don't contain ideas is silly. Similarly that board games don't contain ideas and expressions is probably news to the makers of the Life As a Black Man Game. There are some interesting takes on this available at joystick101.org and penny arcade.

The second issue is the guy who killed 18 people in a school shooting. Notice I said guy, not kid. People are blaming counterstrike and saying that he was a kid. He wasn't he was 19. He was a member of 2 gun clubs and his parents didn't even know that he was kicked out of school. But its those damn videogames fault. WHo's fault is it that people are calling him a kid? It looks like German media is palying the moral panic card and is placing the blame for the violence squarely on the shoulders of those awful videogames, allegedly calling counterstrike, "Software for a massacre." So once again its those damn videogames to blame. They make people so violent. That's why LAN parties always break out into violence and sporting events don't, right? Oh wait... I don't remember any fights at LAN parties. But I seem to remember Lots of fights at sporting evens. Can it be that the media is scaring us about the wrong thing????

posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 6:05 PM

 
Here is my blog. Aren't I cool now? Here is my other website with actual content: http://www.oocities.org/yllohwood/
posted by Bryan-Mitchell Young at 11:33 AM