Nonviolence, Gaming, And Revolution

Jamais Cascio's post, A Force More Powerful: Now Available caught my attention - as did Game Designer, Heal Thyself by Alex Steffen, Globalization in the Virtual World by Jamais, New Worlds by Jamais, and most recently, Dungeons & Deals -- Virtual Worlds as Social-Business Networks (again by Jamais).

Games are a big deal. Games are how people interact when they aren't working; it's the evolution of the board game without a common physical table. They can be educational within the intellectual confines of the authors of the software, and increasingly they can be educationally outside of those confines because of increased focus on simulating reality instead of 'gaming'.

Non Violent Gaming

Such things are seductive to me. I always wanted to write my own game, especially after time as a Hospital Corpsman in the United States Navy. Games like Emergency Room: Life or Death, ER (from the TV Series), and Emergency Room Collector's Edition (which also includes Emergency Room: Disaster Strikes). These games, while interesting, don't become bestsellers. Why?

The answer to that question tells us more about people who buy games than it tells us about the games themselves.

Still, the Sims Series has been popular - but it's a different market. It's a different mindset. It's playing with legos instead of shooting the neighbour's kid with a BB gun.

Violent Games

In games related to saving lives, people lose if the patient dies (nevermind that the virtual patient loses as well). In more popular games, the player wins by destroying other players. Some people will say that it's an outlet, that it's healthy, and I can't argue that. I've been known to wax a few people at Tekken 5 or StarCraft when I need to get rid of some aggression.

Then I'm reminded of the Scottish Proverb:

They question my drinking, but they never question my thirst

When we feel the need to blow things up (even virtually) to 'let off some steam', one has to wonder where all that steam is coming from.

Weak Cases Against Violent Games

A lot has been made of violent games and the effects on society... there are now even ratings for video games, which I find amusing because a lot of the new games are simply smarter, 3 dimensional renditions of Space Invaders - no matter how good the sound and graphics are. The plot is simple - kill the bad guys. The plot isn't graded for these ratings, though- it's about how graphic it is. If you don't see intestines flung against the inside of your monitor, all is well and a 5 year old is allowed to play it.

That's like saying that as long as the media doesn't show graphic details of war, war is ok and even fun.

That seems backwards to me, really. Nobody has a gun put to their head when they buy games. People are buying what they want to play. They want entrails flung across the inside of their monitor with surround sound. Nobody seems concerned about why people want to do that; instead they blame the gaming industry for allowing people to spatter virtual lives all over the place.

Nobody's really questioning the thirst, and they're kind of upset with the people who sell the drinks.

Back To A Force More Powerful

That brings me back to A Force More Powerful. Non-violent resolution of conflict, non-violent revolution - this is what we probably should be focusing on. For a change, simulating the possibility of winning without conflict... but for the same reason, we have to ask whether it will sell, whether it will hold the attention of people - not because of the quality of the game, but because of the people who would play the game (or not).

It seems to me that this form of subversion is what has most troubled countries worried - insurrection in any form is alarming to people in power. Revolution, a change in the way things are done, does not instill a lot of goodwill from those that profit from the status quo remaining the status quo.

Perhaps the sales of the game itself will be an indicator of our odds of survival on an increasingly small globe.

Me? I just bought a copy to review.