Video Games and violence(Please Read!)

[Gnmish Gearbinder]

I WANT TO CHOKE YOU! gnmish.gearbinder.ring.warden.sullon.zek
'Me? I'm dishonest, and a dishonest man you can always trust to be dishonest... Honestly.'

[EZ_Zancon]

Please take this seriously. I am a very strong gamer and I don't believe games make for violent people. The purpose of my paper is to try and prove people wrong when they blame things like Columbine on video games. With good excuses I feel getting anrgy at a game is justified. Once again please post.

[EZ_Jeshter Daggerfury]

Quote:1)How long you have been playing the game session(i.e. 10 hours)

I typically play for 2-4 hours at a time.


Quote:2)What happened when you got angry(i.e. someone ksed a mob you had been camping for hours)

I usually don't get angry at the game, but the stupid things that people will do to each other. People sometimes forget that there are real people behind the toons. I don't like being badmouthed, talked down to, and general treated like a sub-human by my fellow players. KSing and all that stuff is annoying, but it IS a game. It is the attitude of the KSer more than the act of KSing itself that bothers me.

Quote:3)How you also responded in real life(i.e. cussed, hit something etc)

When I am getting to the point where I am angry enough with a situation in the game that it starts to change my mood in real life, I know it is time to log off. I don't allow it to affect me in real life.

Quote:4)How important was the thing you were doing that caused the problem for you(i.e. camping epic mob for hours and you have to do something in real life)

Like I said, its the people's attitudes that have the potential to anger me. SO frankly, it can happen with any situation. People just need to remember that real humans are playing this game with them, and not computers.

Quote:Any other information you think would help me compile better data please include it in your post. Once again thanks a lot for your help.

I think you are performing bad research. Your questions make assumptions before even collecting data. Perhaps you are purposely trying to skew your data in a certain way, but I think you should reword things.

You need to ask questions like "Have you ever had a situation in the game occur that resulted in you getting angry and frustrated in real life?"

You presuppose everyone has and expect them to answer the questions thusly. Perhaps you need to redefine the scope of player you are asking these questions too. As it stands, it sounds like you want everyone that can to answer these questions, when in fact, they may not apply to everyone as worded.


Marauder Jeshter Daggerfury
65th Deceiver
Arcane Ascension
My Equipment

[EZ_Drummond SolRo]

I usually just curse when I've been camping something and it wont spawn... or I get trained. I've yet to be KSed but I imagine the same result would occur... this is anecdotal data and in no way implies that I have done research on any empirical data at all.

My husband, however is more... emotional than I and has broken 2 keyboards in 5 years of play from pounding on it. This is usually followed by my smacking him on the back of his head and telling him to grow up. He is playing on the last broken keyboard as little boys are not given new toys until they prove they can care for them in a mature manner.

Oh wait, I did get KSed on Phini once. It's best to leave that in the past, I am still angry about it and it was nearly 2 years ago. The people involved avoid me like the plague. Drummond Airsekickker
Loose Cannon or Bad Boy? You decide.

[EZ_Dekarr]

Quote:The purpose of my paper is to try and prove people wrong when they blame things like Columbine on video games

This is just stupid, people can get mad at Games, I have before, but mad enough to shoot up people; this is an invention of the media.

People shoot people caused thier screwed up in the head beforehand, not because they play counterstrike and unreal tournament. I hate this media bull**** Dekerr Wyrmbane
65 Rogue
Serenity's Tears

[Nocte]

1)How long you have been playing the game session(i.e. 10 hours) 2 to 5 hours (depends on family)

2)What happened when you got angry(i.e. someone ksed a mob you had been camping for hours) Assinine OOC banter.

3)How you also responded in real life(i.e. cussed, hit something etc) Toggle OOC channel off.

4)How important was the thing you were doing that caused the problem for you(i.e. camping epic mob for hours and you have to do something in real life) Not that important, but I rarely get mad playing EQ. It's usually just a pet peeve that irks me. People take this game far too seriously sometimes. KSers, Ninja looters, camp stealers, etc. etc.- I just ignore them and go to another zone. There is far too much content to in the game to be bickering for hours over some little knoll in the middle of nowhere. I'm an escapist and play the game to relax.
My Crib « · » ErollisiMarr « · » E-mail
Not a "True Rogue"
"Shooting out fluffy bunny hair from my hands entertains me!"

[EZ_ghiyath]

"The purpose of my paper is to try and prove people wrong when they blame things like Columbine on video games"

(sorry dont know how to do that proper quote thing)

The way you're approaching this completely invalidates it as a credible piece of research - basically, you've already decided what you want the results to be. You can't pre-judge research in this way, if you do, you end up constructing it in a manner that biases it towards producing a certain result (which is exactly what you've done with the questions you are posing.)

[EZ_mbbkw]

Not to mention, providing a possible answer (and only one) to each questions skews the data towards those answers.

If you can't explain what you're asking in the question, you need to reword the question to make it more clear, not provide an answer for everyone to use if they're lazy.

[EZ_Aurarier]

I'll give you the description of the worst time I flipped off the handle. It was on the map November in Unreal Tournament.

Quote:1)How long you have been playing the game session(i.e. 10 hours)

I had only been playing for 3 hours.

Quote:2)What happened when you got angry(i.e. someone ksed a mob you had been camping for hours)

It was a really long game, pretty epic. I had been hiding out with the flag for a good ten minutes waiting for their carrier to get popped. Finally it happened, and our flag returned. I jumped out of my hiding spot and headed toward our flag post. One of the other players used a pretty good tactic (kind of chickens***, but good nonetheless) of staying in the middle of a pipe with a sniper rifle aimed directly at head level. He didnt pick up the flag so I'd think it was safe. As soon as I turned the corner, he got a headshot before I knew what was where. He grabbed our flag, returned the one I was carrying, and ran it in for a capture. I kinda flew off... I had been having a bad night (all around = girlfriend, family, etc.) and had been sucking hardcore. That almost-capture was pretty much my only overall contribution to the progress of the game. Everything added up, I lost it.

Quote:3)How you also responded in real life(i.e. cussed, hit something etc)

I screamed "G** DAMMIT!" at the top of my lungs and threw my mouse against a wall.

Quote:4)How important was the thing you were doing that caused the problem for you(i.e. camping epic mob for hours and you have to do something in real life)

Overall, it was a pretty mundane task I was trying to accomplish. I didn't have anything to do, etc. It was just the culmination of the stressors of the day. S*** happens when you party naked.Edited by: Aurarier at: 4/1/04 9:55 am

[Koru]

I'm all for violence in video games.

Ok, the questions are poorly worded. They and the topic confuse violence and anger. I often get angry, but being angry does not automatically mean I get violent. By the same token in game I often comit violent acts, yet I'm far from angry while doing them. I have this little thing called 'Sense of Reality' that lets me distinguish between the game and the real world, also lets me distinguish between being angry and acting violently. One is a completely natural emotion, the other is a (usually) unacceptable action.

It would be difficult for me to answer these questions since I don't think you're asking the right questions. Sorry to critizise but your study will be skewered by the questions as they are currently set up. Have a little faith, reword the questions to be more neutral and a little broader (3rd question could use a "If you've become angry over a game, has that anger ever resulted in outbursts or actions in real life. If so in what manner did it manifest itself?" clause) and change the title to be more neutral and I'm sure you'll still find most gamers are very non-violent.

[Llabak Tharr]

Quote:your study will be skewered by the questions

Violence! Violence! Violence!

[DarkOmen42]

I would personally approach a project like that in this manner;

I am 21 years old. I got my first gaming system when I was about 5, a NES. I have grown up around guns, and violent video games. I own violent games, and I own several guns. I have not gone out and shot anyone or for that matter got in any trouble with any authorities. Yes, I got occasional detentions in high school. I think maybe 5 in 4 years, and I don't even remember what for.

You'll see this story or ones very similar to it repeated over and over across the country. Just because we have a few people out there that are @#%$ up doesn't mean that video games are to blame. Cause ya know what? There are people that do the exact same things that don't play video games. Hara

[Koru]

Thank you, thank you. It's not easy coming up with stuff like that I'll have you know. Took full 2 minutes.

[EZ_Jayan Thornfoot]

Plus when you are talking about people getting mad AT games.

But you then list examples of people getting mad at people. Someone KS'ing your mob is a person not a game.

So most of what pisses folks off in MMO's is the other people.

My responses.

3-5 hours
Game froze and I didnt save it for the last 2 hours
A stream of obsecenities @my PS2 and the game disc itself.
It was important at all. But it still sucked that I had to do that some junk over for another 2 hours instead of moving forward from where I should have been.

[freonsmurf]

Good post, but your questions are to general and to much skewed to eq. Change em up and Ill be happy to give good info.

[EZ_Learnrod]

Zancon did not specify his age so perhaps he is young and has not yet learned how to frame questions for such a survey.

I realize this is a board designed for people who "like" to stab you in the back :-) So some of the harsh replies must be taken into context Zancon. But, I come to this board almost as much as I do my board, EQCleric, because you guys are the BEST at giving good hard technical information.

Instead of telling him his questions are skewed, which I agree they are, why don't one of you that have experience in framing questions for such surveys give him some suggestions....

The Troll will now adjust his back armour and shut up. Learnrod Zweihandor
Cleric of Bristlebane

[EZ_Sharkeye Shadedsight]

I'm just on a post frenzy today

1)How long you have been playing the game session(i.e. 10 hours) a couple of hours (2~3)

2)What happened when you got angry(i.e. someone ksed a mob you had been camping for hours) After a very close fight against a raid target our rag-tag force downs the beast! There are dead bodies everywhere, including mine. I'm sitting in PoT naked when I see over /rs that SOMEBODY HAILED THE PP while most of the force was still dead. At that point I cursed quite loudly and profanely! But not for long, that anger urged me to get off of my naked butt, withdraw my banked jboots from the bank and run my little tush back to the Planar Projection in time for the flag. Unfortunately, the person who started the "flag frenzy" was not actually in the raid and ninja'd all the loot of our prize. Being a rogue, I was one of the very few who received anything from this raid (I was able to SoS through the zone to the PP), and this caused many of the others to curse loudly and profanely as well.

3)How you also responded in real life(i.e. cussed, hit something etc) I drank a beer after such a stressfull experience (you kiddies should do root beer).

4)How important was the thing you were doing that caused the problem for you(i.e. camping epic mob for hours and you have to do something in real life) Very important as I need flags and count on my alliance to support each other and not ninja-hail and ninja-loot.

Horrible experience, but I never really get too angry. I play for fun and tend not to get very negative when things go wrong. Blargius<Gnomes of Own>

[EZ_Zancon]

The criticisim is just great acctually, reading back on my original post I do see my questions were too slanted to that of EQ and not in games in general. I will go home tonight and compile a list of more general question \s and try to write them without a bias. Thanks anyways for the ones that did post they were quite helpful in explaining common reasons people get mad for in EQ.

[EZ_Zancon]

Don't know how to edit but if you would also like to give suggestions for my improved poll please leave them here to, thanks.

[EZ_Gilgame Heart]

i live on sullon zek, my own teamate tried to KS me, so i called someone in from another team to kill him. i then paid the PKer 500p and looted my fabled jboots and linked them to him.

the guy who was killed set up a web page of my dirty deed and now everyone on my team hates me and im loving every minute of it.

www.patmedia.net/jgwathome/main.html http://members.aol.com/johnk0/godkills.jpg

[EZ_Iscin]

Man you people are reserved.

Incident 1: (20 years ago)

I'd been playing Track and Field with a buddy when some foul mouthed snot nosed kid came up and challenged us.

We enjoyed beating him in the game...then lil snot nosed started to get frustrated, so he'd bump into us at key moments to screw us up. Finally enough was enough. I told him if he did it again...he'd be sorry.

Next time instead of just bumping into me he shoved my head away from him hard. I punched him in the nose, breaking his glasses, grabbed the back of his head, and shoved it into the game cabinet and he started to run away. I ran up to him and floored him with a haymaker before making for the nearest exit.

I'd been playing the game a couple hours, and felt a little guilt afterwards. In the end I made a mental note to keep my rage in check.

Incident 2: (2 or 3 years ago)I had befriended someone in EQ, and talked for him for 5 hours three days in a row. He seemed a genuinely decent fellow. The fourth day I was running somewhere to pay a visit on a friend 5 zones from any port (playin a Druid). He asks me for a port, then begs. After I refuse again he calls me every name in the book.

Stressed, I put him on ignore and head to Rivervale to collect some items. I have this lil thing where I run a trivia contest for newbs. First to answer gets a piece of gear. While I'm there someone else starts talkin smack to me.

I do my best to ignore him...but he thorncoats me and attacks me. The guards in my own city rush to his defense because he's worked up uber faction for this trick (I play on Rallos).

When I go to get my corpse some bug has made it disappear. I ask a GM about and proceed to wait for 3 or four hours. Eventually I decide I don't want to pay money to get stressed.

I cuss out the GM, delete all my characters who are fully and well geared then break every single EQ disk.

I'd been playing for 6 hours, and found out that life without EQ was not so bad after all. (just like TV).

[freonsmurf]

Aha! I knew there would be one!

[EZ_Mrens]

EDIT: Misread the questions.

Real answers comming in a bit Edited by: Mrens at: 4/5/04 2:17 pm

[EZ_Morek the rogue]

Does this only apply to MMORPGs? I quit playing them, but do still play video games plenty (splinter cell, baulders gate, Rainbow six, etc..)

Ill answer, but dont want to go through the time answering if its not relevent to your paper.

[Greldek]

Don't know if this has been said as I just skimmed over the thread. But your questions seem to be focused on if games make you angry, and you're trying to disprove what the media says about video gamers.

Generally the media doesn't even touch on if games make players angry, they focus on games making people heartless bastards who feel no guild or remorse at all. And can and do go on killing spree's as if they are in the game, trying to show that people who play games can't tell the differance between characters in games, and people in life; thus going on a murderous rampage in the local mall, is the same to a gamer as playing GTA. Not whether a gamer ever gets mad while playing games.

At least thats what I have been reading..

[Krimzan]

Programming has caused far more violence than video games ever have.

[EZ_Riot Sio Zon]

I am usually pretty laid back in my gaming and most of what I do. I use Video Games typically to relieve my stress, have fun, and sometimes do in a game what I can't do in real life (ie First Person Shooters). As such it isn't the game itself that makes me mad when frustrating situations come up but other factors.

1. My game play sessions can go anywhere from half an hour all the way up to 63 hours (with small sections of rest) during my Half Elf mask camp. Taking one that was longer where I got really annoyed was the Stormfeather camp that took 29 hours.

2. My anger was caused by a couple of factors. First I was getting annoyed that anyone (ie developer) would actually think that very long spawn times would discourage people from camping and that they would design a camp where people would have to dedicate so much time. My anger here was directed at people because of their choices. If they are designing a game that is fun they have failed in some aspects (though they have made it fun enough and addicting to keep people playing).

Second my anger was focused at the person who decided that my camping the mob was interfering with his ability to get Stormfeather when he wanted him. So when he came over and KSed me while I was attacking, I was infuriated that this person would take this action. While the game environment allowed this, it is ultimately the person who is responsible for their actions. I am and will always be for full accountability for your own actions. The game mechanics allowed this but it was the person who screwed me. Just like a gun allows for easy killing it isn't crap without the person pulling the trigger.

3. I was very furious in real life. I had just had someone take my time and discard it because they thought their time was worth more than mine. Cursing, mild pounding of items, and furious comments directed at the person who wronged me followed. Called friends and did whatever I could to calm down.

See the game is always secondary. But when someone says, "It is only a game let it go." what they aren't understanding is that the game has nothing to do with the misdeed done to me by a person. There is no game at this point. It doesn't matter what I was doing be it reading, working, or sleeping, the person interrupted me and turned everything I had tried to accomplish into nothing. It isn't the game's fault that a person decided to be cruel and destroy everything I worked for.

4. What I was doing in game itself wasn't that important. The items I win, quest, or make in game are small little bonuses. What is important is my time. No one that I know of likes to have their time taken away from them especially because of some cruel act intentional or not. I always rate what I do in this way. My time is very important to me and because of this I do get angry when someone takes that away from me. I am making a choice on how to spend my time. When it is ill spent I have only myself to blame; however, when it is taken from me I fault the person who took it from me.

I think that in any report for or against gaming and its affects on people, they often dismiss the fact that people are the ultimate problem when it comes to causing anger. There was a developer that designed things a certain way and in more and more games there are other people playing alongside you that have many opportunities to annoy and hinder you just like in real life.

While I would never physically strike out to harm or kill anyone, it is the person's actions that cause any anger I feel not a games. I am quite capable of being annoyed in real life just like in a game, but to suggest that a game is responsible for my inability to deal with emotions (rather than my own fault) has got to be one of the stupidest, pass the blame, answers I can imagine. Riot Sio`Zon 65 Rogue
Fusion of Tunare

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"The law of Perversity of the Inanimate, suggests that the most frequent time to get 3 procs in a row is immediately after the mob turns on you." - Syldin

[EZ_joekreeper1]

99.99999999% of people that play video games DON'T go on shooting rampages or murder spree's whereas 100% of boxing matches result in people getiing punched in the face ERGO video games PREVENT violence and everyone should be forced to play them.

my wacky psuedo statisical study for the day "I WANT TO FILL YOUR MOUTH WITH SPIDERS"

[EZ_Filan Fyretracker]

well if they saw a fanfaire they would try and connect video games to heavy drinking lol. i swear over that weekend quarks musta served more warpcores then any other time of the year.

Earth Destroyed by Solarflare. Video at Eleven
Theres something on theWing....

[EZ_Urusai]

I think my worst wasnt even during an online game.

IT was back in '92 or '93. I had just finished writing one of m y collage projects after spending 4 days on it. Figured I owed myself some gaming time so I fired up "Alone in the dark"
About 10 minutes into the game it corrupted my entire harddrive. Oh by was I pissed. Not only did I loose the 4 day project. But I also lost all the other work I had done. (Programming degree so lots and lots of code)
I never did fully recover form it and got some Incomplete grades because of it.

What did I end up doing. Scream and yell while reinstalling dos and all my apps from floppy disks.