Violent Game Theme Necessity

[RaccoonKing]

Alright well I thought I'd take a shot at this forum.

For Christmas I got a PS2 with Pump It Up! (similar to DDR) and I noticed that I enjoy that at least as much as games with warlike themes (the game is dynamic and DEEPLY skillful imo).

Anyway, I just wondered what you guys thought of that since practically every thread of ever post of every serious gamer board that I've seen seems to revolve around battle themes. It seems like it's an overdone theme to say the least...

I'm not one of those "Fantasy Violence is bad and makes you shooot your friends." people, but it was interesting to me that I was playing and didn't even realize there was no war theme to it because it just seemed like another well-built game. Which leads me to believe that war is not a requirement for a deep and enjoyable game.

Maybe you all knew that already, but it's new to me.

[Gamercat]

That's definitly true. I always way a fan of racing games. :O! I also quite enjoy the old pong. Violent games tend to be fun, sure. But it's not like that people playing them are the ones that say make more. (thought that may be so in some cases.) It's the game companies who for some reason thought they should just make tons of violent gaems, becsue lots of peopel seem to like them. but it seems that's the only kind of games on the market now. So it's not like we have much choise. :/ I bet if they made more games that were just fun, and not violent in nature, they would sell just as well, if they were well made.

[Hyp-R]

I think people enjoy violent games more, because they really don't get the chance to do it in real life. And the get adrenaline from playing them. There quite fantasy even though they keep getting more and more real. Plus it doesn't really take real intelligence to play them. So there simple and you can like almsot relax and not worry about it.

While like even, tetris takes a little bit of brainpower to do. But it's slow, and time consuming. People love fast action, fast cars, fast food, instant results. How much do you have loading screens?

I might have went off topic somewhere.

[Kelikan]

Yeah, Burnout Revenge is awsome!

...wait.

[dragonfliet]

While not all good games have to be violent, videogames really lend themselves well to violence/war situations.

Animal Crossing, Frequency, DDR (also samba de amigo, guitar heroes, donkey konga, etc.,etc.) Tony Hawk series, etc., etc., are all great games that don't neccessarily include violence and that I love dearly.

However, BF2 is probably my favorite game right now, followed by the splinter cell CT, etc. Remember being a kid? Remember playing war? Cowboys and indians? Remember making sandcastles smashing them? Remember GI Joes? It's kind of in our system, and that's why we like them. It's visceral, it's exciting, it gets your blood pumping, it allows for tense moments, twitch reflexes that border on playing sports and it allows us to show off our skills.

I don't feel that a game MUST be violent (ICO was for the most part just about puzzles with a little bit of shadow thonking and it was simply amazing), and in fact there are many games that I love dearly that aren't, but violence is simply fun in a fantasy environment, it has been since childhood. I don't think it's developers Trying to push violence, it's just that these are the games that people WANT to play. I know I do.

~Jason

[RaccoonKing]

Hyp-R your post was fine.

Yeah, I'm not really implying that they're trying to push violence, it just seems like a really really ridiculously overplayed theme in games right now.

I think I agree with the statement about little boys and playing war with G.I. Joe. That wasn't really my point though. Even if that is in our blood - the desire for strength etc. - my point was just that (assuming it's not a prerequisite for having fun) the theme of War is in... way too many games.

My point was probably closer to the "All games look alike..." problem that I'm sure has been discussed before.

EDIT: Well, that and my recent epiphany that you can compete intensely without having to shoot people.

[Jman]

Animal Crossing, Frequency, DDR (also samba de amigo, guitar heroes, donkey konga, etc.,etc.) Tony Hawk series, etc., etc., are all great games that don't neccessarily include violence and that I love dearly.

AC, Donkey Konga, Donkey Kong: Jungle Beat, Tony Hawk, and games like Super Mario I play the hell out of, they're just very off topic for a FPS style forum.

[RaccoonKing]

You are a simple man who's lost your true love, and you must battle your way though countless hazards to slay a monstrous dragon by tripping a switch that drops him in a lake of fire - then you may free the princess. Mario was a war game too.

I also disagree that anything non-war is off topic for Interlopers. I for one took for granted for a while that Source is always used for shooters. It doesn't have to be.

[-[Getty]-]

Yea, this is a good topic. I recently found the game myst 3: Exile in my basement and started playing that. For those of you who don't know what it is, it's a very complex puzzle game where you have to solve puzzles and stuff to get to the next step, which is another puzzle. It's one of those games that if you don't have a notebook full of detailed drawings and notes that your not going to be able to beat the game. It takes a lot of thinking and clever idea's, completely non-violent, and is still a load of fun to play.

[Athlete{UK}]

The violence sells more. That's generally the reason. Or at least it's what people think.

Although i agree 100% none violent games can be just as fun and aren't just for kids (note nintendo plskthx)

I have to say though. Buzz fucking owns.

[dragonfliet]

The repition we see in games has nothing to do with violence though. How many tetris clones are there? TONS, and most of them stink. Every single genre is going to be done again and again and again until it hurts to even look at the games. I like it when developers try and come up with fresh material period, I couldn't give a crap if it's violent or not. If I were finding a game for a child, I would avoid violence as much as possible, but for me, violence or not, I merely look for fun gameplay.

I don't think there's a problem with games being derivative as far as violence goes, they're merely derivitive. How many movies for example don't include violence? A good number, and you know what? They're all pretty standard love stories or political thrillers or whatnot: that just doesn't translate well into games. Seriously, how many of you played Politika? (politiko? can't remember exactly) Anyone? No, because while interesting in concept, it wasn't exactly fun to play. Nice try though, I must admit.

~Jason

[DRX]

Just a quick note, people like Jack Thompson make me sick. He feels that violent video games shouldn't exist. While I believe there are other games people should play too, violent video games aren't the cause of anything he's lead people to believe.

In fact, with the release of Half Life, Duke Nukem, and Doom, teen violence went down. Its a surprised, really (not). Guess what? It doesn't provoke violence (well, usually) but infact gets rid of anger. Killing a person in a game is much better than, say, uh, I dunno, real life?

[Jman]

Jack THompson's a retard, I've played violent games since I was like 4, and i havn't shot anyone with anything I have in my arsenal.

P.S. DRX, downsize ye siggeth.

[BaRRaKID]

My opinion on this is that games will always reflect the way the society is. In the begining games where made by graduated hippies, wich only wanted to have some fun, as did the rest of youngster in the society at that time. Basically things where happier back then, and games relfected that. The where based on fun, and cool colors, with chalenging objectives.
Nowdays the main subject all around the world is war, violence, crime, death. That's all that matters really, when you see the news, the headlines are always of how many people died in iraq, the stories of those who survived are kept to the end, since they don't really sell that well. This off course changes the way games are. What does a young american(just an example) that hears about the iraq war, and terrorism all day want to do? well he probablly wants to fight those terrorists, that's way games that focus on that sell more. Probablly in the future, when we achieve something like world peace, games can go back to being only fun, but i think for now violence is what sells more, and in the end that's all that matters.

[dragonfliet]

An interesting thought Barrakid, but I think you're underestimating the limits of technology alot. In the early games of atari, you had an extremely, extremely limited amount of things you could do with the systems they had. On top of that, a fairly decent number of games were in fact violent Spaced invaders, centipede, vortex (vertex? I can never remember) had you killing aliens and whatnot. Then when nintedo came out, Mario was about killing things, contra was an insanely popular game, donkey kong, smash tv, etc., etc. These games weren't graphic by any means, but the goal for many many of them was to kill or attack in some way your enemy.

Of course, there are always exceptions, their are racing games and puzzle games, etc. but as far back as videogames have gone, destroying your enemy has been an integral part of gaming. I think that it's a reflection of mankind in general more than it is a reflection of a type of generation; though to be honest, I would love to see what kinds of books have been put out (or interviews) by some of the first generation and see if that have any views or points of refference in regards to videogame violence in those early titles.

Perhaps if I get time, I'll peruse over the list of atari titles and nintendo titles (it would be super helpful if they have records of best sellers, but we'll see) and I can compile an extremely truncated overview of the types of games. Perhaps.

~Jason