Violent Video Games or Violent People

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Violent Games or Violent People?

There is a growing controversy concerning the violence in video games that is being researched and studied from every way imaginable. The problem is that there has been an increase in violent crimes committed and aggressive behavior in children over the last few decades. Much of the blame is being placed on the intensified violence and gore in video games. I am going to explore this debate by discussing video games, starting with their history and statistics, then I will examine the controversy between whether violent video games are harmful or not, and the medical research done. I also will discuss society’s potential solutions and my opinions on the debate. I can’t debate video games though without first giving a little history.

I’m not a big video game player, but I have to admit, video games have come a long way since the simplistic ping-pong and cascade games of the early 1970s, the later space-age Asteroids and Space Invaders, and the famous Pac-man. Today, severed limbs, drive-by shootings, and decapitated bodies captivate a new generation of gamers and gruesome scenes of violence and exploitation are the norm. Video games were initially designed as a hobby to contribute to the entertainment history. The first remnants of video games dated back to the 1950’s and were just overlays on cathode ray tubes. Many studies and experiments were developed over the next 20 years which finally led to the creation of the first video game console, the Atari. From the Atari came the Magnavox Odyssey. There were many models of Atari and Magnavox Odyssey designed from 1970 to about 1984 when the first Nintendo came out. Not long after the debut of the Nintendo, Sega Genesis released its console claiming better graphics and higher resolution. Despite

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these improvements, Nintendo still remained more popular, although my favorite was still the Sega. For the next 10 years Sega and Nintendo both went head to head releasing...