Video Games are often being criticized because of violence and the effect they may have on youth. However Games also portray military, some more loosely, some more specifically. I will use the recent example of a game called Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 by Infinity Ward ("Call of Duty") The game is a part of a popular franchize Call of Duty which portray military conflicts in a form of a "first person shooter." The first three installments took place during the Second World War, but the last two, labelled "Modern Warfare" takes place in a modern enviroment within a fictional story. ("Call of Duty")
The games portray generally soldiers and other servicemen in a positive light, showing them as a likeable characters the player can takes role of or interact with. However since the Modern Warfare 2 is primarily published on the Western market, the villain in the game are mainly terrorists from Arabic countries and Russia. The game also portrays fictional conflict between Russia and USA ("Call of Duty") So while the gama portrays American and British soldiers positively and as people with faults and traits, it can be argued that it does enforce the typical stereotypes of the Cold War and the contemporary conflicts in the Middle East.
There were also some issues regarding violence in the game ("Game Review"), because of the scene in the game where group of terrorists - including the player - is shooting civilians in an airport. The justification for it is that the player at that time is supposed to be a double agent earning the trust of a terrorist leader ("Game Review"). While it is true that the player does not need to fire on the civilians and the game would progress anyway, many critics claimed that this was already too much, because it was probably the first time in gaming history that murdering of civilians on such high scale could have been carried out by the player ("The 10 most shocking moments of the decade"). This part is essential to the story, but the game also offers player to skip this level. ("Call of Duty") So is this really damaging? It probably varies from person to person. If you are reading this, what is your opinion?
Newertherless, games like this may increase the awereness of military and soldiers in a good way, but violent parts like this may create a negative publicity concerning the games in general and military-themed games in particular. But maybe even negative publicity creates awareness and makes people more interested in the issue.
Do you have any thoughts on that?
Works Cited
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2." Infinity Ward. Nov. 10, 2009.
"Game Review: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2." Military.com Games. May 15, 2010.
http://www.military.com/entertainment/games/game-reviews/game-review-call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2
"The 10 most shocking moments of the decade." GameRadar. May 15, 2010
http://www.gamesradar.com/f/the-10-most-shocking-game-moments-of-the-decade/a-20091221122845427051/p-2
Pictures Source:
"Modern-Warfare-2-No-Russian.jpg." May 15, 2010.
http://g2.stahuj.centrum.cz/hratelne/793/modern-warfare-2-no-russian.jpg
"Modern Warfare2.jpg."May 15, 2010.
http://www.go386.com/culture/images/Modern-Warfare-2.jpg
Video games reflected military scenes are currently arising issues and are often criticized because of violence and terrible effects on children. When playing the games, we can easily face with gender stereotyping situations such as white men (British or American) are positively portrayed while terrorists are always from Arabic or Russia – I absolutely agree about it. Moreover, we seriously have to think about possibility of shooting civilian without any guilty in the video games of military sconces. Then, are there any guide lines or possibilities that certain stereotyping will not be reflected in these video games?
OdpovědětVymazatWell, there will always be SOME stereotypes, because someones has to be enemy and it would have to be white heterosexual males without accent if the game would be too politically correct. I think that since the game is rated as inappropriate for children, there is nothing that can be done. I think I read somewhere that Japanese version of the game had a modification that made the player fail the mission if he shot civilian. That may be a good way to explain to kids that it is wrong (I don't know how it was solved in the airport massacre part, but as I said, the player does not have to shoot there, so it can work even with that modification)
OdpovědětVymazatI think that violent video games are harmless to children. There has never been any scientific evidence showing that these games harm the players. As far as the stereotyping goes I don't think that Americans are going to create a war game where the player is going to be Arab and shoot Americans, and because most of these games are done by american, english or australian companies, we will always have the enemy being german, russian or arab. When considering the shooting of the civilian part of the game, there are many other games that make you kill "civilians" (Condemned) and children and players are aware that it is just a game, so I do not see any problem with it. Video games are just something unreal and the negative awareness that it has comes almost every time from people which actually do NOT play the video games, so it is irrelevant!
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