Video Game System Comparison
Effects of Video Games
Searching for motives, we might consider more deeply the effects that games have. What is the experience unique to synthetic worlds that is so attractive for so many? Unfortunately, there is much more research into the effects of video games in general than on the specific effects of massively multiplayer virtual world games. And it would take us astray to delve too deeply into the video game effects literature. (For a comprehensive review, see Kwan-Min and Peng 2004.) The games in this literature are, in many ways, so completely unlike the typical synthetic world experience as to make any findings about their effects of only doubtful relevance. For example, a typical study places a subject in a first-person, single-player shooter type game, and then observes how physiological or cognitive metrics respond to various in-game events, or how attitudes change before and after the experience. Unfortunately, the core features of this kind of game (raw violence, rapid-fire action, and the lone-wolf, kill-or-be-killed mentality) are almost never observed in synthetic worlds. First, a large number of those worlds are really only about chatting; there’s no fighting at all. Second, very little happens individually; the whole point of a social world is to be social, to work in teams. Third, in those worlds where fighting happens, network latency prevents any kind of rapid-fire combat action.9 By far the most frequent combat move is to wait until the time is right, and then hit one button: Attack, Heal, Cast Spell, etc., depending on the role you occupy in your group. Therefore, studies of single players, playing games with rapid eye-hand coordination and a flow of gory moments, are really not relevant.
Since there do not seem to be any studies that focus specifically on the physiological or attitudinal effects of synthetic world experiences, however, the ordinary video game research is the only evidence we have. Video games have been shown to have some positive impacts; kids who play them have better eye-hand coordination, for example (McSwegin, Pemberton, and O’Banion 1988; Green and Bavelier 2003). Nonetheless, most research focuses on the negative. Indeed the dominant issue in the literature has been the question of whether violence in games makes kids violent in real life.10 On the basis of this literature, and with the support of anecdotal evidence from parents and teachers, legislatures in the United States have on occasion sought to ban violent video game sales to minors. These laws have regularly been overturned by courts as violations of free speech rights. Still, from the tenor of the outrage expressed, it is hard not to conclude that video games are just the latest in a series of bugbears of parents who have become frustrated and frightened about how violent American society has become. In sympathy with those parents, I truly wish that video games, TV, rock n’ roll, the nickelodeon, and wireless radio receivers were at fault, because then we could just have banned these things in sequence and our problems would have been solved long ago. Unfortunately, one suspects that violence in youth media is rather more of a tonic against violence in daily life than an incitement to it. The preeminent scholar of fairy tales, Bruno Bettelheim (1976/1985), reminds us that make-believe violence is very helpful for childhood psychological development. There are violent fairy tales that are good, and peaceful ones that are awful; the same is probably true of video games. The ethical analysis of playing and designing is still in its infancy (Reynolds 2002). Still, the implicit message here is that we ought to be thinking very seriously about the quality of the games that occupy the time of our children.11
And when it comes to issues of time, here we have a clear point of overlap between video game research and synthetic world user effects: the prospect of addiction. According to Yee’s surveys (2002), many Ever Quest users consider themselves addicted to the game. In 2003 there were reports, perhaps apocryphal, that a Korean player had died of exhaustion after spending 80 continuous hours in Lineage without a break. An Ever Quest user who committed suicide was said to have done so out of desperation at events within the game world. Indeed, Yee is able to identify a smoking gun: he finds that the reward structures in Ever Quest are designed as a classic randomized reinforcement mechanism that is known to induce process-based addictions.12 And in this potential for addiction, synthetic worlds are quite similar to ordinary video games, and even computers in general.
There are doctors who focus exclusively on Internet and computer addiction as a behavioral pathology (Young 1998; Greenfield 1999). According to Dr. Maressa Hecht Orzack, of the Harvard Medical School, the dangers are apparent: She [Dr. Orzack] has studied recreational drug use and thinks that inappropriate computer use is similar. Her sense is that we are just seeing the tip of the iceberg. Our society is becoming more and more computer dependent not only for information, but for fun and entertainment. This trend is a potential problem affecting all ages, starting with computer games for kids to chats for the unwary or vulnerable adult. (“Computer Addiction Services” website).
When people spend dozens of hours weekly at their computers, or on the Internet, or playing video games, it is almost certain that some other activities will suffer. The question is, when does this behavior warrant the label “addiction”? Addiction is a strong word, calling for both renunciation on the part of the subject and forceful intervention by others. For some behaviors, it is the right word. My mother was addicted to alcohol; it added no joy to her life but rather interfered severely with all of her relationships; she should indeed have turned her back on it, and others ought to have taken some responsibility. Now suppose she instead had been addicted to Ever Quest. To me, that sentence, in comparison to alcohol addiction, sounds like someone suggesting, “What if your mother was addicted to France instead of alcohol?” I would reply, “Fine! She likes France. Let’s move to France. End of problem.” The point is, a behavior becomes problematic when, and only when, it degrades other important things in life. A 60-hour-a-week compulsive Ever Quest user who fails to speak to his own children when they come home from school is engaging in a problematic behavior. But consider the same user, living alone, with all his friends being online and in the game – is his devotion of time to cyberspace problematic? In the end, we can only judge whether presence in a virtual world is good or bad by reference to the ordinary daily life of the person making the choice to go there. For some people, Earth is where they really ought to spend their time. For others, perhaps the fantasy world is the only decent place available. Unfortunately, we have no studies that go into any detail about the daily lives of synthetic world users, so we cannot really tell whether they are addicted, or just making an understandable choice.
About the Author
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System Shock 2 Mod Comparison
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