NOTE: If you haven't read the 'Foregrounding' blog post or the one entitled 'Rough Draft', please do that first. They're both short, but they matter a lot for what you're about to read. Okay. Done.
Enjoy.
Zach de la Rocha: "On truth devoured/Silent play in the shadow of power/A spectacle monopolized/The cameras eyes on choice disguised." Rage Against the Machine's single "Guerilla Radio" from their Battle of Los Angeles album is a reaction against the political circus and faux-choice presentations during the 2000 elections. The quote is not in full context (it is much more political than theoretical) here, but it provides a powerful starting block. A little bit of re-punctuation will help to clarify the thrust: "On truth devoured, silent play in the shadow of power [is] a spectacle [that] monopolized the cameras' eyes-on choice disguised." Line by line, we see parallels between how video games are perceived outside of aficionados, the reason for their strength, and the pitfalls of the game.
On truth devoured
At its most general, truth is subjective, reliant upon the interpreter to understand and decide what is or is not real-and, arguably, what is or is not truth. Tautological, this line of thinking is, in some senses, crystallized by the game. The truth of what the avatar Petitor sees in any game and the truth of what the gamer sees are separate. "There is no spoon," a popular Buddhist axiom, is the reality of reality for Petitor. There is no spoon, just as there is no 'ground' on which he walks, no 'sword' for him to swing, no 'enemy' to kill; the 'truth' of the avatar is simply a copy without a true original-a simulacrum.
But is not the game a reflection of reality? Is not the world of, say, Motocross based upon real life locations? Or any number of sports games that are representatives of the actual franchises? In a word: Yes. And that proves the point. A simulacrum, in one of its many senses of the word, is the idea of a replicated piece without the original being present. This is only achievable if the original is by its own construct outside of its copy; that is, that the analog is, ultimately, incompatible with the digital. There is no real Madden if Madden is real.
Hence is truth devoured, consumed upon its own tautological impulses and paraded in front of the gamer's eyes at 60 frames per second.
Silent play in the shadow of power
Both poetic clauses underscore the basic impulses that propel and compel gamers. The first is silent in metaphor only-anyone who has played Rock Band 2 or been to a party with Dance Dance Revolution on the screen knows that gaming does not necessarily preclude noise. What has become silent in the play is this removal of the gamer away from society and into a new sphere of relationship, one that is simultaneously broader and more confined than the one that it is usurping. This silence is one of significance, not volume. What words mean, always already corrupted by a self-referential cycle, is being oppressed by the spectacle.
It's important to note that the play has a locus: in a shadow of power. This concept will be more tightly detailed in the consideration of Metal Gear Solid 2, but here it has pertinence, too. If we assume that Petitor is conscious, he might realize that he is being controlled by a being perpetually beyond knowing, beyond understanding. In the blurred shadow of the Other side of the screen, the manipulator would be all powerful and always unreachable. The most chilling thing for our self-aware avatar would be that the play that it was being forced to endure was done in silence-and crippling, decisive power.
A spectacle monopolized the cameras eyes
Marxist theorist Guy Debord is best known for his work Spectacle and Society, and defines his meaning of spectacle in many ways. The one most useful here is this one: "The spectacle in general, as the concrete inversion of life, is the autonomous movement of the non-living." It seems as though this quote is written specifically to describe the over saturation of our society with movement that goes nowhere, an unending cycle of consumption until even the truth is devoured. Further, Petitor's autonomous movements-called 'animations' within the industry-are indeed perpetrated by a non-living entity: himself. The camera's eye follows him; the gamer's eyes follow him. Every movement of Petitor's is watched, controlled, responded to. His fate is not his, but instead he is put on as a spectacle, one that monopolizes the cameras in all areas and all movements.
How frustrated can a gamer become when the 'camera is broken'? How difficult is it to complete a game (and the accusatory finger is pointed at you, early-versions-of-Tomb-Raider) in which 'blind fighting' occurs more often than not? 'I can't see what's going on!' shrieks the gamer, knuckles whitening about the controller in frustration. What rage builds when a monopoly is broken?
On choice disguised
My wife and I build a (in my opinion) fun level in LittleBigPlanet using the custom level creator. In it, the little SackPerson must topple a mighty green dragon in order to proceed through the level. As we tested it, I realized that tackling the dragon was superfluous, despite the fact that we had spent a great deal of time (and level space) on its creation. The reason? The bridge on which the dragon lived had no gate at the end. In effect, the dragon guarded an unlocked entrance to a tower, meaning that the gamer could safely and quickly bypass the 'boss fight' and move on sans difficulty.
To force the gamer into battling the green behemoth, we created a gate that could only be unlocked with a key. The key's path to the key was blocked by the foot of the dragon-a gate that is impossible to open unless the gamer defeated the dragon. Choice, here, is disguised; the illusion of being able to bypass the dragon is pushed onto the gamer. In order to succeed, choice-or rather, non-choice-must be disguised as volition.
Spectacles and Fear
Combine all of these analyses together and you'll get the major response to what there is in gaming that terrifies legislators and galvanizes parents to disregard the First Amendment: there is a monopolized spectacle, a fully controlled scene of non-living, autonomous motion, masquerading as meaning, that is drowning the 'real' world. This combo amplifies with each preceding scandal and shocking (though frequently banal) expression within the video game industry, a type of points multiplier that works against the gamer and the industry-another type of simulacrum.
Perhaps the most pointed argument, however, is the assumption that the following quote is inherently wrong, bad, wicked, or frivolous:
"We live in a spectacular society, that is, our whole life is surrounded by an immense accumulation of spectacles. Things that were once directly lived are now lived by proxy. Once an experience is taken out of the real world it becomes a commodity. As a commodity the spectacular is developed to the detriment of the real. It becomes a substitute for experience." -Larry Law
We'll come back to this later, but it is important to note two fundamental things: (1) Our society as a whole is participatory in a spectacular (that is, dependent on spectacles) way of life, a never ending barrage of visual stimuli, raped of meaning by repetition and dilution. To place video games in a special stratum because of its relative newness to our society is flawed and fallacious. (2) The concept of an ideal world represented in the game turns this concept back into itself-a commodity becomes an experience of a would-be ideal world. This inversion is important to keep in mind, for it flies in the face of logic of those who fear games and their power. It is also a crucial way of understanding games and their power.
Enjoy.
Zach de la Rocha: "On truth devoured/Silent play in the shadow of power/A spectacle monopolized/The cameras eyes on choice disguised." Rage Against the Machine's single "Guerilla Radio" from their Battle of Los Angeles album is a reaction against the political circus and faux-choice presentations during the 2000 elections. The quote is not in full context (it is much more political than theoretical) here, but it provides a powerful starting block. A little bit of re-punctuation will help to clarify the thrust: "On truth devoured, silent play in the shadow of power [is] a spectacle [that] monopolized the cameras' eyes-on choice disguised." Line by line, we see parallels between how video games are perceived outside of aficionados, the reason for their strength, and the pitfalls of the game.
On truth devoured
At its most general, truth is subjective, reliant upon the interpreter to understand and decide what is or is not real-and, arguably, what is or is not truth. Tautological, this line of thinking is, in some senses, crystallized by the game. The truth of what the avatar Petitor sees in any game and the truth of what the gamer sees are separate. "There is no spoon," a popular Buddhist axiom, is the reality of reality for Petitor. There is no spoon, just as there is no 'ground' on which he walks, no 'sword' for him to swing, no 'enemy' to kill; the 'truth' of the avatar is simply a copy without a true original-a simulacrum.
But is not the game a reflection of reality? Is not the world of, say, Motocross based upon real life locations? Or any number of sports games that are representatives of the actual franchises? In a word: Yes. And that proves the point. A simulacrum, in one of its many senses of the word, is the idea of a replicated piece without the original being present. This is only achievable if the original is by its own construct outside of its copy; that is, that the analog is, ultimately, incompatible with the digital. There is no real Madden if Madden is real.
Hence is truth devoured, consumed upon its own tautological impulses and paraded in front of the gamer's eyes at 60 frames per second.
Silent play in the shadow of power
Both poetic clauses underscore the basic impulses that propel and compel gamers. The first is silent in metaphor only-anyone who has played Rock Band 2 or been to a party with Dance Dance Revolution on the screen knows that gaming does not necessarily preclude noise. What has become silent in the play is this removal of the gamer away from society and into a new sphere of relationship, one that is simultaneously broader and more confined than the one that it is usurping. This silence is one of significance, not volume. What words mean, always already corrupted by a self-referential cycle, is being oppressed by the spectacle.
It's important to note that the play has a locus: in a shadow of power. This concept will be more tightly detailed in the consideration of Metal Gear Solid 2, but here it has pertinence, too. If we assume that Petitor is conscious, he might realize that he is being controlled by a being perpetually beyond knowing, beyond understanding. In the blurred shadow of the Other side of the screen, the manipulator would be all powerful and always unreachable. The most chilling thing for our self-aware avatar would be that the play that it was being forced to endure was done in silence-and crippling, decisive power.
A spectacle monopolized the cameras eyes
Marxist theorist Guy Debord is best known for his work Spectacle and Society, and defines his meaning of spectacle in many ways. The one most useful here is this one: "The spectacle in general, as the concrete inversion of life, is the autonomous movement of the non-living." It seems as though this quote is written specifically to describe the over saturation of our society with movement that goes nowhere, an unending cycle of consumption until even the truth is devoured. Further, Petitor's autonomous movements-called 'animations' within the industry-are indeed perpetrated by a non-living entity: himself. The camera's eye follows him; the gamer's eyes follow him. Every movement of Petitor's is watched, controlled, responded to. His fate is not his, but instead he is put on as a spectacle, one that monopolizes the cameras in all areas and all movements.
How frustrated can a gamer become when the 'camera is broken'? How difficult is it to complete a game (and the accusatory finger is pointed at you, early-versions-of-Tomb-Raider) in which 'blind fighting' occurs more often than not? 'I can't see what's going on!' shrieks the gamer, knuckles whitening about the controller in frustration. What rage builds when a monopoly is broken?
On choice disguised
My wife and I build a (in my opinion) fun level in LittleBigPlanet using the custom level creator. In it, the little SackPerson must topple a mighty green dragon in order to proceed through the level. As we tested it, I realized that tackling the dragon was superfluous, despite the fact that we had spent a great deal of time (and level space) on its creation. The reason? The bridge on which the dragon lived had no gate at the end. In effect, the dragon guarded an unlocked entrance to a tower, meaning that the gamer could safely and quickly bypass the 'boss fight' and move on sans difficulty.
To force the gamer into battling the green behemoth, we created a gate that could only be unlocked with a key. The key's path to the key was blocked by the foot of the dragon-a gate that is impossible to open unless the gamer defeated the dragon. Choice, here, is disguised; the illusion of being able to bypass the dragon is pushed onto the gamer. In order to succeed, choice-or rather, non-choice-must be disguised as volition.
Spectacles and Fear
Combine all of these analyses together and you'll get the major response to what there is in gaming that terrifies legislators and galvanizes parents to disregard the First Amendment: there is a monopolized spectacle, a fully controlled scene of non-living, autonomous motion, masquerading as meaning, that is drowning the 'real' world. This combo amplifies with each preceding scandal and shocking (though frequently banal) expression within the video game industry, a type of points multiplier that works against the gamer and the industry-another type of simulacrum.
Perhaps the most pointed argument, however, is the assumption that the following quote is inherently wrong, bad, wicked, or frivolous:
"We live in a spectacular society, that is, our whole life is surrounded by an immense accumulation of spectacles. Things that were once directly lived are now lived by proxy. Once an experience is taken out of the real world it becomes a commodity. As a commodity the spectacular is developed to the detriment of the real. It becomes a substitute for experience." -Larry Law
We'll come back to this later, but it is important to note two fundamental things: (1) Our society as a whole is participatory in a spectacular (that is, dependent on spectacles) way of life, a never ending barrage of visual stimuli, raped of meaning by repetition and dilution. To place video games in a special stratum because of its relative newness to our society is flawed and fallacious. (2) The concept of an ideal world represented in the game turns this concept back into itself-a commodity becomes an experience of a would-be ideal world. This inversion is important to keep in mind, for it flies in the face of logic of those who fear games and their power. It is also a crucial way of understanding games and their power.
Comments
You do raise a question that struck me: Why does society hate gaming, when really, it's filling in the parts that society is missing?
The Mormon religion teaches us to let go of distractions and to think in silence. I would go as far to say gaming has helped me become comfortable in isolation. I sit in my thoughts while the world keeps moving, and people give me these weird looks and ask if something's wrong, when really, I'm just stepping back and looking at a larger picture of what my social environment. I think of the other day when Alex, Marie and her friend Kaitlyn were over at my house. Marie had another episode and attacked me, and I ran out of the room. I came back to find Kaitlyn traumatized and Marie fainted on the floor. She always faints around us. When she came to, Kaitlyn was curled up on the couch in true terror, scared of Marie's behavior, and Alex and Marie started casually talking while we waited for Kaitlyn to come back to us. I didn't participate in the conversation. I sat there, staring at Kaitlyn, thinking of what she must be going through. I isolated myself from my ring of friends to focus on how we were all doing in life. I guess gaming has taught me that skill.
Thanks for the compliment (at least, I'm taking it as such) about how deeply the words are studied. I appreciate it.
Recently, I've been playing Dungeons & Dragons with some friends from school (Adam, Bronson, Tamela (imagine that), and Brian is our DM). Throughout the campaign there have been several scenarios in which our party has entirely avoided combat because of my character's amazing skills in diplomacy (as well as my own creative dialog prowess). The only problem is, although I, as an improvisational role-player AND a lawful-good Half-elf cleric with an impressive +11 bonus on all diplomacy rolls, am able to basically circumvent any life-threatening obstacle without risk of messing up and getting us all killed, I suspect that the other characters (and sometimes players themselves) feel as if I'm taking away immensely from the campaign as well as the game itself by denying the combat system an opportunity to flourish. In any digital game, this kind of ridiculous (albeit realistic) nonsense wouldn't even compute. I realized that even though my style of play is admirably utilitarian, I'm basically taking advantage of the fact that the game and its system can do nothing to stop me, no matter how creative the Dungeon Master is. I also compared it to those very few situations in which a game won't allow you to engage in violent action, even though you want to. Like, let's say, Metal Gear Solid. In that situation, the only thing acting against you is a system that changes the trigger of the fire button from "fire rocket" to "Snake doesn't want to, fool". I wonder how the situation changes when it's not a system that's stopping you, but another human being.
I totally agree with your MGS reference. To put it into an interesting counterpoint, in MGS3, Snake has to execute his mentor at the end of the game (no, that's not a spoiler; that's part of your mission). Rather than letting it be a cutscene, you HAVE to press the square button. If you don't, you'll never get past that scene—you can't beat it unless you take her life.
By the way, I think you may want to re-analyze your approach to how you play with your friends, Stephen...just, y'know, a suggestion.
Heck, at the beginning of the year, they said they were going to authorize clubs headed by the faculty. What happened to those? We need to start a basis for that.
Oh, thanks for pointing out my religion thing. I was just thinking about my beliefs, I forgot about the religions that take meditation to the extreme like Buddhism or Taoism.
It has always been fascinating to me how rich and untapped the deeper side of video gaming is. I understand a majority of it is accidental, but it is there nonetheless. The true games, the ones created in their own wombs and not merely clones of popular sports or movies are the most fertile grounds for deeper inquiry. The epistemic implications are limitless.
Yet, there is both fear of, and naivety toward, the power of video games. Fear from those who don’t see, who don’t understand the depth and breadth of passion produced in pixels and bytes. Parents who criticize the amount of time spent playing a game and yet, if the game was written as a story, and the teen spent the same amount of time reading the novel the same parent would generally be at ease with their child’s “productivity.” In this they are also naïve, but the true naivety is in the avid gamer who uses illusion after illusion as a masking agent, not understanding the true power either. In the Tao Te Ching it states, “The Tao that can be expressed is not the eternal Tao.”
I agree, too. Part of the thesis of the book will be exploring what makes the games powerful—what it is that compels so many to play for so long. The understanding of that disarms some of the fear while simultaneously (and paradoxically) reconfirming it. The book will be both an apology and attack on gaming.
I like the Tao Te Ching, but does that mean that it isn't the eternal Tao Te Ching that I like, since it's expressed?
Besides, the purpose of the blog isn't to create a flame war about which RPG is 'best' (because, as I'll eventually discuss in the blog, the overall experience of the game has to have a significance, which means that the gameplay is a significant factor—making FFVII a much stronger contender than based upon the story alone). The point of inviting y'all is to get additional insights into what the post is about.
Don't make me retroactively fail any of you (and even if you weren't my students, I have powers...)
You’re exactly right about the Tao, and you have figured out a very important clue about understanding eastern philosophy. The eternal Tao is ineffable; therefore, the only way to truly not understand it is to actually think you do understand it.
One of the most venerated Buddhist logicians, Nagarjuna (200ish CE) developed a system of inquiry based on a negative dialectic approach. He would attempt to understand something that is severely esoteric by knowing everything it wasn’t. When he negated what it wasn’t, he was closer to understanding what it was. This is not unlike the way the Prophet Joseph Smith approached truth, “By proving contraries, truth is made manifest.” Some Buddhist Sutras will have lists of thousands of things that something is not, in an attempt to understand what it is.
The teachings of Nagarjuna survive to this day in many Buddhist schools. This is why language is not used as much in Buddhism as in other religions, words only have a handful of meanings. Therefore you are more than likely to do violence to a pure principle by explaining it in our finite and mercurial language, than by just seeking it through mindfulness.
Be a figgy piggy oink oink oink!
Have you played Bioshock yet?
The way someone usually plays a video game is by focusing on an aspect that appeals most to them. For example, a game might have a great system of play, but if someone is looking for a good storyline and doesn't find one, they might find it pointless. On the other hand, someone who likes non-stop challenging action might be playing Xenogears, and get so frustrated with it that they would scream at it and eat the disc.
Just as there is an ideal reader, there is an ideal gamer. My opinion of the ideal gamer is something of an appreciative chameleon. If a game focuses heavily on action, we should appreciate it for the action, and commend the developers thus. If a game has an amazing storyline, then it should be appreciated for that aspect. The ideal gamer doesn't ask "How can this game disappoint me?", they ask "How can this game amaze me?" What do you think? What does it mean to be an ideal gamer?
Interesting stuff, my Buddha-like buddy. I need to get a copy of the Tao Te Ching and try to expose my classes to it a little more...even though it's technically out of the purview of the class. As for BioShock, I beat it this week. The reveal is amazing, and I will be adding an essay about BioShock to the book now.
Yes. It's essay worthy (which means a lot to the type of literary/video game geek that I am).
@ Stephen
I think that's fairly apt, except that an ideal reader would be given an ideal text; we've yet to encounter the ideal video game. Example: One of the reasons that I think, despite the narrative powers of Xenogears, that FFVII is a superior game is because of the music. I can only argue from a biased standpoint, but the musical themes of FFVII are so intense and emotive that it is actually another character in the game—an NPC to be sure, but still a character. Xenogears does not have that same sort of power, in my mind, and ChronoTrigger's software limitations prevent it from gaining much beyond a nostalgic power.
But back to your question: Yes, the ideal gamer is capable of turning the game around upon itself and appreciate it all in a way that exposes the art that has gone into it, the thoughts it expresses, and (perhaps paradoxically) observes the failings and shortcomings that the game entertains.
Becoming an ideal gamer is problematic because it can be permissive to the point of effacement; also, one has to overcome prejudices and learn to accept much that may not be instantly palatable (e.g. the ideal gamer has to find SOMETHING worthwhile in Madden and Hannah Montana IPs...and, I'm sorry, but that just sucks).
Then again, there's always something more to the game. So perhaps there's something worthwhile within those IPs, too.
But I probably don't want to find it.
Leap: I think the best part of Aerith's death for me was when they kept playing her theme when you fight the JENOVA copy.
I'm going through your post again and I was wondering if you could elaborate on this comment, "what there is in gaming that terrifies legislators and galvanizes parents to disregard the First Amendment" the latter part especially.
The First Amendment is disregarded by types such as Jack Thompson or the Utah house bill H.B. 353 that is dubiously constitutional at best (though it would be the 14th Amendment violated by the H.B. 353).
I think there's a lot of it comes from a type of sublimation away from the spectacle (what is always already an inextricable part of our society, but in games burgeoning in a different form) and toward broad-standing reforms based upon perceived threats to childhood.
Let me try that again: It seems to me that a lot of the legislative (often inspired by parents) outcry over what kind of content, aside from being hypocritical, stems from a misunderstanding of what is actually going on behind the scenes of the spectacle of gaming. It's more than games, of course—as Wark says in GAM3R 7H30RY, it's actually a part of the "military entertainment complex," a confluence of self-perpetuating spectacle of various violence. The point of the essay (and the book) is to explore why 'This is a bad example for the children' can't cut it as a justification for why some games shouldn't be made. It is to explore why 'This harmless violence will breed harmful violence' cannot be accepted as a reason for truncating the 1st Amendment and its protection over creation of debased content (I'm looking at you, Rockstar).
Hmmm. I still don't think I'm expressing myself right. One more try? Entertainment generally and games specifically have something within them that, when misunderstood, frightens people to the point that they are willing to trample the very rules that allow them to express their distrust. It's the hypocrisy of burning a religion in the name of free press (ironic, since the guarantees of free press and free worship are in the 1st Amendment).
Did that work for anyone?
I still think that an appeal to the First Amendment is sidestepping the main issue, especially when applied to minors. Remember that the Bill of Rights does not, in any amendment, protect or preserve the right of anything that insights violence. You can shout “fire” all you want in an open field but you can’t yell it in a crowded movie theatre; or you can swing your arms wildly all you want, but your right to gesticulate ends where someone else’s nose begins, and so forth. I think legislators and anti-gaming parents would argue that games lead to violence, the same way some lawmakers thought that pornography caused Ted Bundy to kill (bad example). Therefore, I think the main issue is deciding if there is a clear causal connection between video games and their ilk, and violence or debauchery. And you’re absolutely right; this area is murky with hypocrisy with movies and television promoting the same mental and emotional attachments as video games.
In my opinion, of you are going to claim violation of a child’s First Amendment rights there has to be no connection. Even then, that’s what statutes are for, the legislating of minors to protect them from lazy, ignorant guardians (among other things). If the State had complete faith that guardians would always do what was best for the minor, there would be no “statutory” regulation of children.
As far as H.B. 353 is concerned, I am assuming the “dubious” portion of it is the penalizing of Hollywood for selling/renting MA rated games to 10 year olds. Is it the rating of games that irks or the attempted legislation of “what I do in my own home” sort of thing? This statute, again, in my opinion, is made simply to appear to be doing something, much like the political outcry against illegal immigrants. Capitalism requires them in order to prosper, but politicians will fight them so long as they need votes. I digress.
On the other hand, I know many friends who would gawk and cuss at the idea of having any sort of responsibility as a gamer. Since to them, it means having none.
I think that there's also a fallacy at work that I'm trying to point to. It isn't that the First Amendment is actually trampled, but there is a brewing sentiment that someone should 'do something about games.' It's less that the rights are actually being ignored as much as the idea that they, for some reason, SHOULD be. The eradication of video games as a pastime is certainly on some people's agenda, and I believe that it's that fear that stems from a monopolized spectacle.
As for the problem with H.B. 353, it's less that there's legislation about who can purchase what from a store, it's more the utter inequality of forcing a voluntary system (the video game rating system) to be the barometer for what is permissible. Rating drift (what was once rated R can easily get a PG-13 rating) is occurring in video games, too (DOA 4 was rated M for violence and nudity, yet Soulcaliber IV was rated T for arguably worse 'nudity' in the fact that you can, as it were, strip the characters of their outer clothes). Look, if children should be banned from purchasing Halo 3, they should be similarly banned from buying 'The Sopranos' on DVD, Cosmopolitan from the magazine rack, and the Bible from the book shelf (since that last entry is filled with polemic posits, violence, and sex. How many wives did King David have again?) That's the dubious part; that because the game is new, it can be regulated, while more traditional forms are given a pass.
I can easily confess that I've purchased MANY 'rated-R' books--many of which I purchased as a teenager. So why the double standard?
Just because there are huge flaws and hypocrisy in marketing today doesn’t mean we should throw our arms up in the air and demand the removing of all obstacles so that children can do who and what they may. Shouldn’t we require more accountability from marketing firms and not less? In the years after my mission I was into the fitness industry; I spent hours in the gym every day and subscribed to all the fitness magazines to keep up on the latest supplements and workouts. I ended up canceling all my magazines because the images were pornographic at best, even though there was no “nudity.” It is the same way in the comic book and gaming industry. The X-Men movies are tamer than the comic books. Yet traditional parents who wouldn’t let their child see the PG-13 movie probably allows the same child to read the comic book. This is a failing in parenting, not in legislating. It doesn’t matter if an image is artistically rendered or photographed; the neural stimulation is the same.
I enjoy games, I really do. In fact I prefer them to fantasy or sci-fi books. But to compare a video game with the Bible, Plato, Shakespeare, Marx, or Dickens is a little absurd. There’s a fallacy for you!
It's less the QUALITY of the work (since there IS no Shakespeare, Plato, Marx, or equivalent in the video game realm) and more the concept of exposure to what might be called objectionable content. It's an observation of the way that some forms of unacceptable behavior can be viewed and derided as drivel and worthless, yet in a slightly different context, there's a disconnect and suddenly the behavior is more acceptable. A small example is Shakespeare. If you were to have a game that emulated the ending of Titus Andronicus (in which the eponymous hero of the play kills his daughters rapists, bakes them into a pie, and then feeds them to their mother), that game would be more controversial than Rosie O'Donnell trying to get a tan in public. It's acceptable as a dark type of art on a high school stage, but not on a high schooler's Xbox.
As for neural stimulus: I agree with your point about it penetrating deeper with a visual medium over what we might call a more imaginative medium, but doesn't that make books an even greater threat? Look, the power of the imagination is so potent that you can kill yourself with it—sometimes literally. Macbeth is one of the most brilliant dramatizations of what the imagination can do. Beyond that, think of how many times you've been unable to sleep at night simply because you were 'worried' about something. I put that word in quotes because worrying is really just your imagination making thing seem extreme, in one way or another. People can have such overactive imaginations that they gain ulcers—we'd probably just say they're a little too stressed out, but, frankly, it's a lot of obsession over what might have been and what will be—the former is out of our control, and the latter is yet to be in our control.
If that's the case, the last thing on earth we want to do is let our kids read and play with toys and 'exercise their imaginations'....right? Right? Okay, maybe not, but I think it's worth keeping in mind that the whole point of a book is to directly embed the ideas into the brain.
Last response (particularly because I thought I was arguing the same point, but obviously something fell off along the way): I absolutely agree that we should be finding ways to prevent objectionable content from being easily obtained by minors. Keeping stores from selling them to said minors is fine and probably right. I think the call I'm trying to issue here is less about making marketers more accountable for what they do (besides, in capitalism, who cares what you do? So long as you get money, that's all that matters, right? I mean, that's what the new governor of Utah is saying when he says, "regardless of the debate on the science, I'm a capitalist" on the topic of climate change?) and more about preventing a misinformed barring of games. Moreover, I would hope that more games would try to emulate all that is good in literature, rather than all that's tawdry in reality. Unfortunately, there are too many games that push the envelope in all the least interesting and least useful ways (I'm looking at you again, Rockstar).
P.S. "In fact I prefer them to fantasy or sci-fi books." Like the one that I wrote and gave to you, but you never finished?