Davnes007 said:
Violent video games are an easy sale. If you shoot people, or beat them up, or anything like that, almost every 13 year old boy will want it.
However, if the game involves any thinking, or non-violent stuff, those same kids won't even try it. Sex and violence means big money.
Examples-
"Call Of Duty: Excuse To Shoot Stuff" = Instant hit.
"Sim City: Make People Happy" = Slow Sales.
"Street Fighter 10: Blood & Boobs Edition" = Line Ups around the block.
"Test Drive HD: Quiet Sunday Drive" = 10 people bought it.
For the record - I think First Person Shooters are a dime a dozen, and I only like playing Grand Theft Auto because of the driving.
I think that is a little simplistic. Your premise seems to be that games are aimed at 13 year old boys. I believe the largest demographic of video game players are ages 18-34, with an ever increasing number of females to be found in those numbers. It makes sense for game makers to aim for this age group.
I do feel a little disturbed when I see 10 year old kids running around making Left 4 Dead references, or talking about how great Bioshock or Grand Theft Auto is. I feel like parents really need to monitor what they let their kids play, and think twice before just writing them off as silly games. It seems many of the same parents who let their 13 year old kids play GTA are the types that wouldn't let them watch rated R movies. I think this is because of the same misconception Davnes seems to be making, that games are for 13 year old boys.
Half-Life, Bioshock, Left 4 Dead 2, and Fallout 3 are probably four of the most violent games I have every played. When I first played Half-Life as a teenager, I remember the level of violence being rather shocking to me. Perhaps it makes me sound like a pansy, but after dying for the first time in that game I had to turn it off. I remember having a really weird unsettled feeling after watching my character's bloody skull roll across the screen into a pile of intestines left behind by a downed security guard. It was a borrowed copy, I decided it wasn't for me, and uninstalled it. I didn't play it again for a few years, when I found myself engulfed in a really intriguing, enjoyable, and imaginative (and yes, sometimes downright freaky) horror story.
I felt similarly disgusted almost ten years later in one particular level of Bioshock, where a character commissions you to go kill his enemies and take pictures of their bloody corpses for him. It was pretty messed up. Bioshock may well be my favorite game of all time, and an outstanding example of video games as a medium for the delivery of art and thought provoking story telling. The messed up deprived violence of the game, and the way you as the player just go along with it doing as you are told throughout, ties into the major twist at the end of the game, causing more thoughtful players to look back on all their actions throughout the game, which ultimately delivers a pretty positive nonviolent message. The game definitely isn't aimed at thirteen year olds, and if there is a thirteen year old with the maturity and mental capacity out there who can truly wrap his brain around the story and message of the game, then they just impressed the shit out of me.
Left 4 Dead 2 is honestly a fairly mindless game centered around a generic zombie story, but its focus is in working together as a team, and if you refuse to work with your team mates, you're screwed. I think it is a great deal of fun, and I miss the days when I used to play it with Mr. and Mrs. 005 and Xhonzi. It's not aimed at little kids, and more often than not they made the game unplayable. It was only really worth playing when playing with real human team mates, and when you ended up getting paired with some squeaky voiced kid, you could pretty much expect he wasn't going to work with you and was just going to leave you for dead or run off on his own and get himself killed.
Fallout 3 is very violent, and also covers a lot of very adult themes throughout. Nothing like this existed when I was thirteen, and I am not sure if I would have been able to get into it then or not. The game requires a lot of interaction with non-playable characters (who often use very R rated language). The game can really suck you in, it's when watching someone else play the game, you realize how slow moving it is, and how much time is spent talking to people or walking from point A to point B with very little action taking place between. I'm pretty sure my thirteen year old self was way too ADD to sit through it. Of course, I am sure there are plenty of thirteen year olds who do play it, and love it.
Bottom line, all four of these games were designed for and marketed to adult gamers. The fact that thirteen year olds get their hands on them is simply bad parenting. They do contain very heavy adult content, fortunately, adults are capable of picking and choosing entertainment appropriate for themselves. If it is too upsetting or over the top, just stay away. We've managed this for a long time, if sex upsets you, put down that erotic novel. If violence upsets you, don't watch that movie. If you don't want to see naked people having sex, turn off that porn. Unfortunately, video games have been stereotyped as toys for kids that some adults occasionally enjoy playing with. Just like other forms of entertainment, video games appeal to a large number of age groups, and their are games appropriate for each one.
I feel like this is a big issue, and that if half the parents that willingly let their kids play these games had any clue of what content they were actually allowing their children exposure too, then they too would be a bit disturbed by it. The games are clearly marked and labeled for their content, the gaming industry has done its part, now it is in the hands of the parents.
