The debate about whether violence in video games has a real-world effect is an old one. I can certainly remember the consternation over the original Doom game, and I’d be willing to bet that wasn’t the first time someone had wondered whether games were having a detrimental effect on society.
Two Swiss human rights organisations, Trial and Pro Juventute, have compiled a detailed report on whether twenty popular games allow (or in some cases encourage) players to violate International Human Rights Legislation during the course of play. The tests included whether the player is required to commit a prohibited action, whether non-player characters (NPCs) do, or whether the player is permitted to act illegally without sanction. Prohibited actions include shooting injured soldiers, firing on a protected building (e.g. church or mosque), torture, and firing on non-combatants.
The outcome of the report is summarised on Trial’s introductory page:
The report thus recommends that game developers avoid creating scenarios that easily lead to violations of the rules regulating armed conflicts. More generally, the report underlines that, as certain games illustrate, there are means of incorporating rules that encourage the gamer to respect human rights and international humanitarian law. Such an approach should be further developed, in order to create players with a more accurate perspective of what is lawful and what is not in real armed conflict situations or law enforcement operations.
War is supposed to be fought according to certain rules, and any simulation of war should include those rules if it hopes to be accurate. But therein lies the problem for me, games aren’t necessarily supposed to be simulations, or educational tools, but entertainment. The main thrust of games development isn’t adherence to the law, but entertaining the player… and that’s a difficult tension to resolve.
Is there a moral obligation on games designers to ensure that human rights are upheld in their games? That’s a big debate, and there’s no doubt that some of the actions in games are wrong from a moral standpoint (attacking civillians in an airport, for instance) but then games aren’t meant to be moral teachers any more than movies or novels are.
In the end, this is a debate that’s going to rumble on for a long, long time. I can see the point of the report, and agree with some of it… I’m just not sure that games will ever reach the stage Trial and Pro Juventute want them to because, at a basic level, that’s not what games are for.
I do want to end on a light note, though… One of the reasons a character might commit human rights violations is so that we know how evil they are! It gives the story purpose if your mission is to “stop the bad man”. But are there better ways to distinguish the “goodies” from the “baddies”? Enjoy this clip from Mitchell and Webb about that very subject :)
What do you think of the report? Should games allow players to take morally dubious actions? Should they portray such actions in NPCs? Do you have another point to make? Let us know in the comments!
