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TalkBack / Re: Warren Spector on E3, Violence, and Epic Mickey
« on: June 19, 2012, 04:57:46 PM »
Let's not get side tracked into whether Spector is saying that violence doesn't have a place in games. This is one of the chief minds behind Deus Ex, which he brings up in the very interview we're discussing. If you've played it you know that this was a violent game, rife with guns, bombs, soldiers, etc.
The issue Spector is raising is more subtle than "Violence is bad." The issue he raises is one of how violence is portrayed in video games and what it means within the world of most games.
Several posters have mentioned movies and other art forms and how violence has a long standing role in those other art-forms. They go on to ask why, therefore, video games should be treated any different. The difference is that those other art-forms, taken as a whole, provide a much more well rounded view of violence.
A quick dirty example: Saving Private Ryan is an incredibly violent movie, but it asks very real questions about the nature of violence and war. While there have been war games whose story plays lip service to similar ideas (all be it almost always in a superficial way), the gameplay nearly without exception tends to glorify the action and violence.
To be sure, there are plenty of stories, plays, movies, and poems that glorify violence. But there are also many more that use violence to ask hard questions of the characters and the world that they (and we) inhabit.
Another, more complicated, example. Beowulf. The earliest surviving English epic poem is in many ways the ancient equivalent to a video game story. It stars a larger than life male role-model. Beowulf is hardcore to the max. He spends his time wandering around beating down monsters, swimming in a full suit of armor and just generally all around kicking ass and taking names.
But where video games stop there, Beowulf digs deeper...much deeper. It asks hard questions about violence and what it means to live a violent life.
Video games, and many video game developers, seem terrified to do this. They don't want to dig deep. They want to provide gamers with an easy, mindless, escape and violence (which is rooted deep down in the human psyche) tends to be the way they go about this. And to be sure, there is a place for mindless violent games, but the industry seems unwilling to make anything else.
That, as I see it, is the problem that Spector is addressing in his remarks.
The issue Spector is raising is more subtle than "Violence is bad." The issue he raises is one of how violence is portrayed in video games and what it means within the world of most games.
Several posters have mentioned movies and other art forms and how violence has a long standing role in those other art-forms. They go on to ask why, therefore, video games should be treated any different. The difference is that those other art-forms, taken as a whole, provide a much more well rounded view of violence.
A quick dirty example: Saving Private Ryan is an incredibly violent movie, but it asks very real questions about the nature of violence and war. While there have been war games whose story plays lip service to similar ideas (all be it almost always in a superficial way), the gameplay nearly without exception tends to glorify the action and violence.
To be sure, there are plenty of stories, plays, movies, and poems that glorify violence. But there are also many more that use violence to ask hard questions of the characters and the world that they (and we) inhabit.
Another, more complicated, example. Beowulf. The earliest surviving English epic poem is in many ways the ancient equivalent to a video game story. It stars a larger than life male role-model. Beowulf is hardcore to the max. He spends his time wandering around beating down monsters, swimming in a full suit of armor and just generally all around kicking ass and taking names.
But where video games stop there, Beowulf digs deeper...much deeper. It asks hard questions about violence and what it means to live a violent life.
Video games, and many video game developers, seem terrified to do this. They don't want to dig deep. They want to provide gamers with an easy, mindless, escape and violence (which is rooted deep down in the human psyche) tends to be the way they go about this. And to be sure, there is a place for mindless violent games, but the industry seems unwilling to make anything else.
That, as I see it, is the problem that Spector is addressing in his remarks.