on Thursday, January 29th 2004, 13:25 PM.I also believe in the healing power of video games. Well, not specifically video games, but the healing power of play. However, I always question to myself why so much of game play is based around perceived violence and why acting out symbolic violence is specifically relieving for many people? I am not refering to Second Life, or even our class experience specifically.
It is definately possible to have games and play of another type. For example scrabble, or Dance Dance Revolution, a great game I had about raising a hamster, animal crossing, tetris, etc. All of those games provide their players with a sense of satisfaction and masterly when played. So I do not know if the violence itself is the key to the healing power of play or if it is a sense of purpose and mastery. I realize that most Americans are not into those type of games. Do you think it has something to do with our personal up-bringings or with our societies focus on militarism?
In the Interactive Environments course I took last semester at the University of Buffalo
, we studied the video game culture in Japan and found that they have large tradition of games that involve skill outside of shooting. For example cooking games, organizing games, logic games, dancing games, etc and that their fighting games are often based more on fantasy than reality (magic powers vs. machine guns). I noticed at the while at the local videogame store the other day that many America games are really based on reality. Lets use "Socom" or "Counter Strike" as an example. If video games are an escape for many people why do Americans often want games that base their play on reality?
