Violence in Video Games

          For my partner and I the questions in the exercise were very easy to answer. We both felt that the image in question was really not graphic enough to cause any alarm. I may be biased as I have played video games for my entire life and am now studying to one day create them. Regardless of my predispositions, the idea that video games actually contribute to real life violence is downright ludicrous. The real problem here is that parents and politicians refuse to accept the fact that they are responsible for raising their own children properly. If your child decides to go to school and shoot half of the student body that is because of either pre-existing mental illness, or somewhere along the line you have FAILED as a parent,  not because they spent their nights playing Call of Duty. 
          Video games in their current state are UNDOUBTEDLY a form of true art. To really understand this fact one needs to look a bit further into games than just taking a cursory glance at the latest ultra violent blockbuster shooter. From indie standouts like the fantastic recent title Journey, to major commercial hits like the Mass Effect series or Shadow of the Colossus, it is plain to see that video games are an art form just as, if not more capable of producing a truly awe inspiring experiences as their counterparts in film and literature.  So why then are video games held to a different standard than print or film media?

Show me someone who says this is not art and I'll show you someone who doesn't know what "art" means.

        
           The website posits that video games' "representation of violence reduce mayhem and murder to an experience designed to entertain", But would they ask this same question of Saving Private Ryan or Apocalypse Now? In short, of course video games present this content as an experience designed to entertain, they are a form of entertainment. But just as with any form of entertainment there is both tasteful and tasteless examples, for every Apocalypse Now or Full Metal Jacket there are twenty movies like The Expendables or Commando, why should games be any different?
       

The Uncharted series possesses a narrative stronger than any summer blockbuster movie, why treat it as less?