Does Violence in Video Games Influence Violent Behavior? The video game industry is the fastest growing entertainment industry the world has ever seen. In 2015, it was worth over $90 billion, more than double the international film industry. But video games have also become one of the most polarizing forms of entertainment or media to date. Their fans love them and simply cannot get enough, while their detractors’ ire seems to know no end. As with any form of media that contains violence, video games have come under scrutiny for their content and presence in the lives of some who commit acts of violence in the real world. There seems to be no midway point in the argument of whether video games cause violent thoughts and behavior
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Well, many videogames need violence to tell their stories. Let us take a look at one of the greatest stories in all of video games, the story of Bioshock. Set in the 1960’s in the underwater utopia of Rapture, a city built on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean to be a haven of expression and objectivism by business mogul Andrew Ryan, Bioshock is a first person shooter entailing the arduous adventure of Jack (the player character). Jack is trapped in Rapture after his airplane explodes over the city and comes to find that the city was brought to ruin on New Year’s Eve 1958 by gene altering powers known as “plasmids” that mutate the user over time. He must fight the mutated inhabitants through this dystopia and intervene in a power struggle between the Ayn Rand-esque Andrew Ryan and his seemingly righteous foe Atlas. Bioshock is one of the most universally acclaimed video games of all time by gamers, game journalists, and those in the video game industry. With its beautiful graphics, gripping music, engaging gameplay, and stunningly deep and twist-filled plot that never lets up, Bioshock cannot be denied as a work of art. To tell this story, much violence is needed. Violence is consistent in all art: movies, music, and paintings. Violence is not in art for the sake of violence. Rather, violence is in art for the sake of the art conveying its meaning unto us. Violence creates a powerful picture and art would not be nearly as compelling without it. Would Saving Private Ryan be as gripping and harrowing without violence? Would the words of Inferno by Dante Alighieri be so well-regarded and loved by so many through history? Would the painting Judith Slaying Holofernes by Artemisia Gentileschi still depict the same tale of feminine heroism and hang in the Museo di Capodimonte in Italy? I argue they would not and that violence is an essential
Well, many videogames need violence to tell their stories. Let us take a look at one of the greatest stories in all of video games, the story of Bioshock. Set in the 1960’s in the underwater utopia of Rapture, a city built on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean to be a haven of expression and objectivism by business mogul Andrew Ryan, Bioshock is a first person shooter entailing the arduous adventure of Jack (the player character). Jack is trapped in Rapture after his airplane explodes over the city and comes to find that the city was brought to ruin on New Year’s Eve 1958 by gene altering powers known as “plasmids” that mutate the user over time. He must fight the mutated inhabitants through this dystopia and intervene in a power struggle between the Ayn Rand-esque Andrew Ryan and his seemingly righteous foe Atlas. Bioshock is one of the most universally acclaimed video games of all time by gamers, game journalists, and those in the video game industry. With its beautiful graphics, gripping music, engaging gameplay, and stunningly deep and twist-filled plot that never lets up, Bioshock cannot be denied as a work of art. To tell this story, much violence is needed. Violence is consistent in all art: movies, music, and paintings. Violence is not in art for the sake of violence. Rather, violence is in art for the sake of the art conveying its meaning unto us. Violence creates a powerful picture and art would not be nearly as compelling without it. Would Saving Private Ryan be as gripping and harrowing without violence? Would the words of Inferno by Dante Alighieri be so well-regarded and loved by so many through history? Would the painting Judith Slaying Holofernes by Artemisia Gentileschi still depict the same tale of feminine heroism and hang in the Museo di Capodimonte in Italy? I argue they would not and that violence is an essential