VIDEO GAME DESIGNER

Are video game designer socially responsible

Are video game designer socially responsible

Introduction

Whether the video designer have social responsibility towards the society or not? In order to answer this question, I feel that it is important that we look back upon the predecessor of today's violent video games. Yes, there was once a time when movies were considered to be in the position that the videogames are in now. That is that movies are an uncontrollable purveyor of violence and the movie makers, according to certain cause oriented groups, have a responsibility to make less violent and more socially responsible movies. Movies after all should reflect real life and be an educational too. In this paper, I will focus how the video game designer are social responsible. I will also discuss the benefits and drawbacks of violent games on the human brains specially children.

Discussion

Nobody really knows when the video games took over in popularity from the movies. In fact, video games are so popular that Atari CEO Bruno Bonnell has proclaimed that the golden age of movies have come and gone. People prefer video game now because unlike in the movies where one is simply a spectator who cannot participate in the unfolding story, a video game allows the player to participate and create his own storyline each time he plays the game. The outcome of a video game is not predictable unlike the movies where plots are standard and endings are predictable (Takahashi, 2010). The problem with the video games is that designers tend to go overboard with their storylines simply because the computer graphics available to them these days are tremendously impressive, allowing the designer to get as crazy as he wishes to be . A video game can use computer drawn effects that cannot even be used in movies yet (Anderson, 2004).

The issue this all boils down to is when and how the designers should draw the line with regards to the games they are designing. After all, video games are receiving a lot of flack about how it encourages violence amongst the populace. One thing we have to understand is that creating a video game is the same as developing a movie. It requires research, analysis, story development, and finally, the artistic consideration for the look and feel of the game. Video games have a twofold function in the world of entertainment (Gentile & Anderson, 2003). The first is, to give people a few hours of fun and relaxation by allowing the players to immerse themselves in a becoming part of that world by engaging in the storyline. The other is to educate the players regarding the real world. Ralph Koster, in his article “Video Games and Online Worlds as Art 'explains how entertainment carries a communicative element in its presentation”. He goes on to say that: Mere entertainment becomes art when the communicative element in the work is either novel or exceptionally well done. It really is that ...