Reading Response

The theme of these articles seems to be the pretty standard two sides of the argument about violence in video games. This is after discounting the third view of “It’s just a game” with all the magic-circle baggage that brings. The two sides are roughly as such

Side 1 – Video games create a realistic environment in which players enact violent acts. This is similar to training VR simulators used by all sorts of group for all sorts of purposes, including the Army for combat training. Ergo video games with violence are training players to commit violent acts.

Side 2 – Like sacrifice of old or other “scapegoat” traditions, the virtual enactment of violence leads to a sort of violent catharsis in which violent impulses are purged.

With all of our research it seems that the most important aspect of virtual reality is intent. What you bring in determines what you are going to take out. So for those who go into virtual gaming with a sense of “It’s just a game, let me enter my magic circle and blast some alien scum”, then they create that magic circle and get a -blasting. For those who enter with an extreme propensity for violence, then the gaming might train them to kill or weaken their already faltering resistance to the idea of real and enacted violence. Or some enter into the gaming world with some great rage and frustration and say “Well, I can’t stab my boss but by golly I can stab some orcs.” and they stab some orcs and social order is preserved. The difference between that second and third scenario seems to be the mental will of the player and if he or she is able to keep that psychic barrier between enacted virtual violence and real violence separate.

Of course with a view like “intent is key” it’s really hard to do meaningful analysis because every experience is then different and subjective. But if that’s where the evidence is pointing, guess you gotta follow it.

Reading Response

The one that interested me most was the one that was a critique of Turner’s liminality as a universal concept. It’s nice to see such dissenting views since we have been discussing liminality as some sort of given when discussing ritual. One minor point of confusion I had with her work had nothing to do with ritual studies but she said that medieval Christianity was marked by asceticism and anti-dualism(joy in creation and physicality). I have no idea how one can be both ascetic and have this great joy in physicality. Beyond that it was very interesting to see how she felt that many women’s experience in religious ritual were more static than liminal. Now this could relate to virtual reality where my completely factually unfounded and probably media-stereotype influenced view informs me that women are more interested in things like SecondLife which are more continuations of real social life while men are more interested in things like CounterStrike where you log on, have some liminal havoc, and then log off. That’s just a first unfounded impression.

On the work about “Video Games of the Oppressed” I feel the author has completely unrealistic expectations for the gaming industry. He’s taking a theater model used by free, not-for-profit theaters in Brazil and hoping that huge for-profit corporations such as the one that has created The Sims will suddenly adopt it. The Aristotelian model is preferably for profit-driven media because the linearity and necessity of the author makes it easier to turn into a profitable enterprise because it isn’t recrafted and redistributed by the people. So the author’s rebuttal to Zimmerman’s very telling critique that such “open-source” games already exist is a faulty one.

“Bio-cultural imperialism in Civilization”

The thrust of this article’s argument is that Civilization is ultimately a game that claims the Western model of development that lead up to the United States is the ultimate method of development. The reason for this claim is that there is only way to advance in the game, through the pre-determined “tech tree” that leads a civilization from knowledge of the alphabet to knowledge of missiles. While the player can determine in what order a few various technologies are researched, in general there is only one way to advance and that way is the one that Western civilization went.

Near the end the author gets into some embodiment questions about what it’s like to be virtually embodied as “The State”. First of all the author claims that the game implicitly argues that almost all economic, cultural, and military power is concentrated in the hands of a like minded cabal of capitalists or aristocrats since the player can command their civilization with little to no problems. So this means that actually the player is not being embodied as “The State” but as the cabal of rich and powerful who run the state and civilization.

It was an interesting look at how something that is not explicitly argumentative like Civilization, because Sid Meier constantly speaks about how he doesn’t let his views influence his programming in interviews, can still be arguing something with procedural rhetoric. The author wrote before Civilization 4 came out, and Civilization 4 does include religion which would have been good for him to discuss for our course but alas he did not. As it stands now when I look at religion and look at his work I would think the author would argue that Civ 4 argues for religious pluralism. Each religion is equally mechanically advantageous for a Civilization and “collecting” religions by founding as many as you can is good for your score, culture, and diplomatic relations. Thus the game implicitly argues that one should try and get as many religions as possible, but you still have to choose one to be your “state religion” even under a “democracy”.