Games of Empire RR

Violence in video games has been an issue for a while, but what I find fascinating as the reason why it is an issue. It was brought up in Games of Empire that there was uproar when after the Columbine school shooting’s perpetrators was categorized as avid Doom players. Doom was a violent game at the time; of course more games came out more violent than that game later on in the video game evolution. Journalists attached to the game Doom as the only cause for the teenagers’ rampage. I think the connection happens any time there is a huge thing taking over that appears almost overnight. People don’t know what to do with new technology so it must be bad. Wouldn’t have surprised me if cinema were similar when it broke through.

It wasn’t until after 2000 that people seemed a little less “Video games are nothing but evil and force our kids to be violent,” and more of an acceptance and embracing. Game culture began to appear and make huge leaps after the fall of Atari. Many gaming systems were able to break through. Eventually, what I found interesting is other companies that you wouldn’t think of using the technology actually using it successfully to advertise themselves. America’s Army uses missions as a free first person shooter and shows the play through of normal everyday soldiers. It was a brilliant tactic to use and because they put a link to the army’s website, they saw a dramatic increase in recruits. That is an example of using technology to reach an audience perfectly.

I knew about the beginnings of video games from the military humble beginnings because I’m connected to that history. My paternal grandfather was someone who aided those machines, and the machines they turned into (not video games wise) was what my dad worked on when he was in the Air Force. I like hearing their stories of those times, but they get very quiet about most of what they have done. Just recently my grandfather opened up about it a bit more and it is a very interesting history because of nuclear missiles and what not. It was nice to read that part, but it was interesting that it was turned into an argument about Empire building.

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