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Originally posted by Wolfy2449

Whats the difference between games and drugs for the masses?
Both do some physical and sometimes mental damage
Both spend time Both require MONEY
Both waste some time
Both make you feel better even though you might not deserve it or have done nothing to earn it. You just pay money for it... Its just like tricking kids with candy...
Do you think its correct to fool people to give their money just to give them a think that makes them feel they suck less??even though they still suck a lot and "winning" the game doesnt make you suck less

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The whole actual life works this way.

Except work (spend time, gain money) every other activity is pretty much the opposite (spend time, spend more or less money). I can't think of anything that is entirely healthy both physically and mentally. Please name just one. Also, i can't think of an activity you would do that doesn't make you feel better (except work, and ordinary maintenance of your property and self).

If you want people to have fun, make something that provides fun. If they want to enjoy your game, they will buy your game. If they want to enjoy a cookie, they'll buy a cookie instead. That's all.

I find this discussion interesting. First, what is a distraction? If we are to be distracted by playing video games or something then that means that we have something better to do. The "better to do" could be work, family or writing that novel you never got 2?

However, what really is "better to do." This is subjective. My "distraction" could be another person's "better to do". If I am a game designer, then playing tons of video games would be very important to me...my distraction might be to go spend time with my family or read a book. However, if you are an English teacher (me) that reads a ton of books and grades papers and does all that stuff...then my "distraction" would be playing video games.

However, a distraction, by definition is just something that distracts us from a task. This definition alludes that the distraction does not inherently hold a value. However, I would contend that a "distraction" does have value. "Distractions" help define my identity. I believe that my "distractions" are not distractions. They are a part of my greater self.

I talk to students about my characters on WOW and EVE Online. This provides a window for my students to look into my personality a bit. My game playing is not distraction. It helps defines who I am as a person. 

I am not only my job or my relationship with my family. My game playing, book reading, miniature model making and time wasting self is just as important as my work or family self. These are not distractions, but part of who I am as an complete individual. 

Drugs Vs Games

First, the illegal drug trade is highly evil. From exploitation of the growers to the street dealer, and addicts. And let us not forget the situation in Mexico and how entire families have been slaughtered. The entire system sucks, and innocent people die on a daily basis. There is little comparison between gaming and Drugs besides the fact that both are addictive.

Originally posted by Wolfy2449

Both waste some time

 there is no such thing as a 'waste of time'.

you got about 80 years to bend down on this planet. it's completely irrelevant what you do in that time as its yours.

amateurish psychology/philosophy is bad and awkward.

Well Gaming is simply a tool to spent your time in a non-productive way. it brings you to a fantasie world were you can escape the boredom of the real world. most games like movies are pure escape tools, book are expencive to, they do however stimulate the brain both learning and creativity capability (science fact) drawing is a expencive hobby aswell so is model building or fixing up old cars in your past time. the only danger gaming has above most other forms of luxury/hobby's is its adicting ability. our brains love visual simulance and like everyting that stimulates our happy feeling brain parts it should be done in moderation.

the cost for a game is based on you spending money on it, simple economics , is it right..hell no, but then 90% of our society is not moraly right.. we eat burgers and fatfood and scream if we get less pay so we cant eat those burgers anymore.. on the other side of the world some poor kid tried to eat some paper half starved as there is no food.

if you cant buy a game becourse its $60 instead of a more "fair" prize you complain, but you dont give a crap about those who never had electricity in the first place.

going back to gaming: Gaming is a adicting expencive hobby, does it kill people? well maybe ruin your own live but defintly not as sugestive or gore rich as the average movie. does gaming make you smarter? nope. it might give you some view points you never tought about but it does not make you smarter. is it bad for your health ? yea it is, spending time behind a screen (tv or gaming) increases chances to get hearth attacks. in case of game adiction you start to neglect yourself and real live.

Games -are- are drugs but its more like coffee then some crap you inject yourself whit. if used in moderation you will enjoy yourself,if done to much it might ruin all you could be.

live lesson: Give some money to the poor villiage streetguy, buy a game, go to work  and if possible try to teach yourself someting new. you be happy , done some good and improved yourself.

I find the comparison to drugs a huge stretch. I have stopped gaming entirely for weeks, months even, and the only withdrawal feeling I get is that I "miss" gaming, but it isn't a such an addiction with symptoms that my life would be destroyed from the withdrawal. I simply don't want to stop because there's nothing else I would rather do. Gaming isn't a substance that you are taking into your body like drugs are. Gamers do all sorts of other normal hobbies, but nothing quite takes the place of gaming with the exception of vacations like going to theme parks or swimming/snorkelling at the beach, etc..

gaming isn't wrong.

people are wrong.

gaming used to be an entertaining, enlightening art showcasing the intricasies of possibility, but instead has become a social-political cash-cow stockyard yielding mad-gamer disease.

gone are the freely wholesome interactive alternate realities promoting depth and inquiry.

often are the procrustean passive agendized realities promoting stagnation and indifference.

This is wrong.

there is no better way to measure the consciousness of an era than through its art.

Originally posted by psyclum

you can replace the word "gaming" with any other form of entertainment including sex or eating candy/sugar and the question remains.....

then the question becomes is it ethical to seek/provide entertainment for humans...

then that become a religion question since you will be talking about the 7 sins such as pride, envy, gluttony etc...

or you can just face the fact that people are always going to be seeking happyness and entertainment is part of that search.

dont think too hard, your brain might explode:D

I would like to focus a little on the money part, which you pay money to a greedy company in order to get that fake entairtainment.

Some entertainment might cost money, but make you laugh and are real, games create a fake feeling to the player that makes them feel better or that they are good while they are not.- everyone in gaming for some time and everyone in the current industry knows that

They will believe they achieved something while the achievement required no skill and everyone can do it

They will feel better when they have the power to destroy a village or not, but thats a simple trick to make players believe they have the power to do thinks

I am not saying that there arent any people who dont fall for that, but they are mostly people who were in gaming a lot or people who werent dumb and could just see through it.

But this is just a small minority compared to the huge masses that believe they are actually achieving and winning something

As about the question about me, I love creating games and thinking them and creting complex balance but it seems i am thinking too idealisticly and try to create a good game while i forgot the game should also be economicaly correct game.

Adding many diffent endings in a game is good, adding many different games in a game is good but thats only good for the player not the company, the company wont profit from that (at least not a lot, expect get some good reputation). I had an idea, which also had some small psychology tricks to make people feel better and attract them to the game, but i totally forgot about the economicaly successful part and added many features which will provide 0 more money to the publisher

And if a game is not profitable its simply not gonna be made because the person who gives the money to make games is a rich bastard who only cares about money on his entire life(which is wrong but off-topic) and if he doesnt see profit he doesnt give the moeny.

Originally posted by Luv_bug

I believe all entertainment should leave its consumer better than he/she came. Nowadays though, entertainment exists to dumb down society so that they will except lower and lower quality things in life, whether its education , government, personal freedom, general discourse, we are beset on all sides by a consistent lowering of the caliber of things, while at the same time being propogandized to think we are advancing somehow, or worse that we are the best. Its the hype machine of this life, and entertainment is its primary tool. Despite life becoming more and more difficult and restricted, we in the states do little to escape our respective lots in life or  transcend what the system would try to limit us to be, instead we flee to imaginary worlds to seek achievements of no meaning and bounty that doesn't exist hour after hour, day after day, year after year. What if instead of escape, we sought action? What if instead of exploring imaginary worlds we traversed this one? Would you maybe discover that the world is not what tv has said it is? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfPkg8S4Fio

Gaming and entertainment has its place but it should be grassroots, its should reflect what  the people want for themselves not what some corporate bigwigs want for us. We need to tell our own stories, and be rulers of our own minds. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylhqasb1chI

 

God bless...

This is my favorite post of the day. 

Haha, the title alone was a prelude to comedy via misinformation and overzealotry of ethics.

Wolfy I am still trying to figure out what your argument is here. Apparently you think video games are "fake" entertainment, which are still entertaining but not in the same way as "real" entertainment? And then you think it's wrong that they cost money?

Originally posted by Vryheid

Wolfy I am still trying to figure out what your argument is here. Apparently you think video games are "fake" entertainment, which are still entertaining but not in the same way as "real" entertainment? And then you think it's wrong that they cost money?

 

Yes, Games are fake entertainment for most people.

Games generally make you feel you are better somewhow by achieving thinks or "winning" other opponents, while in truth everyone could do what they did required 0 skill to do so. So you give a person the feeling that he is good, that he is unique but in truth, he is just being fooled for his money and he i no better than anyone else. Thats a fake self confidence boost

Games give players the power of choice, the one that they dont have in real life so they can feel better again

I am "ok" with buying entairtenment but thats not the topic, the problem with games that cost money is that they are just fooling people and make them feel better while THEY ARE NOT ANY BETTER THAN THEY WERE BEFORE THEY PLAY THE GAME.

Its just a psychological trick

An example

A kid is raised in a huge rich house and he gets everything he wants and everyone tells him he is right in every of his choices. This kid has huge self confidence and believes he never does any mistakes and anyone who will say different is simply wrong. He lives in his own fake world believing that his is god while he is nothing more than another typical human(this is an overexxagerated example)

Also i am not talking about mmorpgs only, even though many people seemed to assume that. The majority of games(individualy not based on population or sold copies) that give that fake feeling is single player games. Mmos also give that feeling but its either more hidden or the other players get in your way of feeling better

Originally posted by Wolfy2449

Originally posted by Vryheid

Wolfy I am still trying to figure out what your argument is here. Apparently you think video games are "fake" entertainment, which are still entertaining but not in the same way as "real" entertainment? And then you think it's wrong that they cost money?

 

Yes, Games are fake entertainment for most people.

Games generally make you feel you are better somewhow by achieving thinks or "winning" other opponents, while in truth everyone could do what they did required 0 skill to do so. So you give a person the feeling that he is good, that he is unique but in truth, he is just being fooled for his money and he i no better than anyone else. Thats a fake self confidence boost

Games give players the power of choice, the one that they dont have in real life so they can feel better again

I am "ok" with buying entairtenment but thats not the topic, the problem with games that cost money is that they are just fooling people and make them feel better while THEY ARE NOT ANY BETTER THAN THEY WERE BEFORE THEY PLAY THE GAME.

Its just a psychological trick

 

An example

A kid is raised in a huge rich house and he gets everything he wants and everyone tells him he is right in every of his choices. This kid has huge self confidence and believes he never does any mistakes and anyone who will say different is simply wrong. He lives in his own fake world believing that his is god while he is nothing more than another typical human(this is an overexxagerated example)

I guess the concept of "fake entertainment" is what is in question here.   for some, reading a book is "real entertainment", for some watching porn on their iphone is "real entertainment" and for the more extereme, jumping out of a perfectly working airplane at 17000 feet is "real entertainment":D...  the question comes down to who or what decides is "real" entertainment for anyone/everyone?  this is a question that religious people have been arguing for ages.  what is "real" religion? or who is the "real" god/gods :D

just because a particular activity is NOT considered "real" entertaiment for YOU, doesn't mean it's not REAL entertainment for someone else.   this is the internet age, so you might be better to keep an geocentric viewpoint in discussions rather then being so myopic in your definitions.

There is nothing bad about having fun, nothing dirty about wasting time, it is all very natural. As long as it is natural.

The contemporary omnipresent kytsch is wrong. Games that keep dragging on after they stopped being fun and after they showed you everything they could, are wrong. Business build on exploiting humans.

But you do not have to conduct business or make games in such way, not everyone does.

Originally posted by psyclum

I guess the concept of "fake entertainment" is what is in question here.   for some, reading a book is "real entertainment", for some watching porn on their iphone is "real entertainment" and for the more extereme, jumping out of a perfectly working airplane at 17000 feet is "real entertainment":D...  the question comes down to who or what decides is "real" entertainment for anyone/everyone?  this is a question that religious people have been arguing for ages.  what is "real" religion? or who is the "real" god/gods :D

just because a particular activity is NOT considered "real" entertaiment for YOU, doesn't mean it's not REAL entertainment for someone else.   this is the internet age, so you might be better to keep an geocentric viewpoint in discussions rather then being so myopic in your definitions.

Its psychology. A person doesnt have any real power in real life, he feels powerless. Then he goes play a game and is feeling better because he has the choice he doesnt have in real life. But at the end its a simple trick to make you feel the so called "fun"

The other is winning or achieving thinks that require 0 skill and even a 4 year old can do. Companies portrait those thinks as something that is really difficult and require skill but that only exists to make the player believe they actually achieved something. So a person after pressing a button he gets flashe graphics and gets "A NEW LEVEL OMG!! U ARE SO AWESUM" box feels better and believes he achieved something. This feeling is simply fake because it was simply created to create that sort of illusion and its also fake because EVERYONE can do it. Its nothing to be proud about, yet i have seen people feeling proud about thinks that they didnt even do...

Books, movies, shows might give you entairtainment and made you laught or have fun, but that does NOT make you feel any better about yourself or give you a fake self-confidence boost like games do.

Would you ever call chess a fake self confidence boost??? a game that is solely based on player skill? and the winner is the one that plays better thus is better than the other player. Today games are not games with achievements they are achievements inside games

Other example of fake achievement? cardgames. No matter how skilled you are there is ALWAYS a % of luck. Most people love to play luck based games because when they lose they dont say "omg i suck hard" they say "omg i have really bad luck". But when they win they feel like they won a chess match... Obvious difference is obvious(lets not get out of topic please, i used cardgames as an example, we are discussing the current generation of games like single player games and many online games like wow)

Its similar to the real life sports psychology, most people who watch sports only and never play them they simply do it so they can feel better. They have 0 self-confidence and most times are right(since psychology is very important, to the level it can heal someone if the person believes is fune), they need to find a way to feel important and succesful. that why humans join group most of the times. That is why many times you see sports watchers argue about their teams using the word "WE" instead of the word "THEY". It simply shows that they need to feel better even though its completely fake and is based on another persons acts

Originally posted by Wolfy2449

Other example of fake achievement? cardgames. No matter how skilled you are there is ALWAYS a % of luck. Most people love to play luck based games because when they lose they dont say "omg i suck hard" they say "omg i have really bad luck". But when they win they feel like they won a chess match... Obvious difference is obvious

 

Its similar to the real life sports psychology, most people who watch sports only and never play them they simply do it so they can feel better. They have 0 self-confidence and most times are right(since psychology is very important, to the level it can heal someone if the person believes is fune), they need to find a way to feel important and succesful.

You had me until this last part.  Card games actually do take quite a bit of skill to be successful.  The skills required are definitely different than playing Chess, but you can't simply sit down at a card table with professional poker players and expect to win any hands.

As to the "people who watch sports have 0 self confidence" comment.  All I have to say to that is... What?

I don't personally watch sports because I find it boring.  It was never something I got into.  But, I know plenty of successful people who get enjoyment out of watching their home team play and are very passionate about "their" team.

I think the more ethical question to ask is not that gaming is wrong itself, everyone will try some form of entertainment at one point in time in thier life. No, the ethical question should be what we do in that form of entertainment, is it right or wrong. To me it is far more 'right' to sit through 10 hours of blackjack at the casino than spend that same 10 hours sitting at a computer simulating killing thousands of other people. Most, and everyone will agree I'm sure, most of the entertainment venues we have today involve some sort of visual debautery towards other human beings.

We have ruled out in our society the cruelty to animals which is all good and fine, I'm sur enobody wants to watch a movie about killing and skinning dogs. But it seems to be more than acceptable to see a movie where human bodies are cut apart, most of them when they are still alive even. We do it in our gaming as well.

To every PvP nutt out there, your desire to get your 'fix' by 'killing' other people, in a game or not, is still the desire to kill other human beings. So really, what is more ethical, making games for entertainment, or making dark games for entertainment. I think the content of the deversion is far more important than the form of deversion itself.

Originally posted by Dameonk

You had me until this last part.  Card games actually do take quite a bit of skill to be successful.  The skills required are definitely different than playing Chess, but you can't simply sit down at a card table with professional poker players and expect to win any hands.

As to the "people who watch sports have 0 self confidence" comment.  All I have to say to that is... What?

I don't personally watch sports because I find it boring.  It was never something I got into.  But, I know plenty of successful people who get enjoyment out of watching their home team play and are very passionate about "their" team.

Cardgames do actually require skill. And that there is skill. But there will ALWAYS be a % of luck, no matter what. Plus i didnt say everyone falls under that category, most professionals just play for the money

About the sports example i do believe it, 0 might have just been an over-exxageration. But i do believe that the only reason of watching such thinks is to feel better by having the team they support win, even though they did nothing to help them in reality(money related stuff dont count)

Most of what i say are targeting around 90% of that crowd i am talking to. there are always expections in every case

To me it is far more 'right' to sit through 10 hours of blackjack at the casino than spend that same 10 hours sitting at a computer simulating killing thousands of other people. Most, and everyone will agree I'm sure, most of the entertainment venues we have today involve some sort of visual debautery towards other human beings.

Ye i do agree with that, those killings also count as a psychology trick to give the player the power he doesnt have in real life.

about the pvp part

Personally i do love pvp, not as a way of killing people, but as a competition sport. Requiring skill in order to win and sometimes can be so satisfying if you have a really close match where both people are low on health/units and every single move is crucial and every small detail counts

But thats just me, i do believe the majority just plays to win and that is why there are so many gear based mmo that require you time untill you get the top gear in order to win people with low gear since many times people with the same gear are too difficult for you... Pvp also has some killing aspect in it though

Here's a simple analogy.

 

Let's say someone does a crossword puzzle, and they do one that's somewhat easier than what they could probably handle if they really tried hard.

After the person completes the puzzle, have they: 

- wasted their time? 

- done something unethical?

- done something 'wrong' cause they could've done a harder puzzle?

 

I would emphatically answer no to all three, and I think most people would.    Not everything we do has to be constructive or have a purpose other than self-enjoyment. 

Well that depends on the complexity of the puzzle and how difficult it was. If it was something that is considered difficult then it could be a reason to feel better since you wasted time and skill(yet i am not sure about puzzles since they seem to require time instead of skill or thinking) to achieve that and if it was good enough other people would trully like and he would be called an artist. But really it just depends on the level of skilled required

Here's a simple analogy.

Let's say someone does a crossword puzzle, and they do one that's somewhat easier than what they could probably handle if they really tried hard.

After the person completes the puzzle, have they: 

- wasted their time? 

- done something unethical?

- done something 'wrong' cause they could've done a harder puzzle?

I would emphatically answer no to all three, and I think most people would.    Not everything we do has to be constructive or have a purpose other than self-enjoyment.   

this thread is frustrating.

you are trying to assign an absolute value to subjective concepts.   I BELIEVE it is wrong to tell other people that their likes/dislikes/wishes are "wrong".   it is fundamentally disrespectful, and displays a lack of maturity.

it is not up to us to judge others and try to decide what is right or wrong for THEM.  for yourself, gaming may be wrong. but there is no "truth" to be found in examining the objective morality in the hobbies of others, no matter what destructive values you place on them.

Originally posted by ScribZ

I think the more ethical question to ask is not that gaming is wrong itself, everyone will try some form of entertainment at one point in time in thier life. No, the ethical question should be what we do in that form of entertainment, is it right or wrong. To me it is far more 'right' to sit through 10 hours of blackjack at the casino than spend that same 10 hours sitting at a computer simulating killing thousands of other people. Most, and everyone will agree I'm sure, most of the entertainment venues we have today involve some sort of visual debautery towards other human beings.

We have ruled out in our society the cruelty to animals which is all good and fine, I'm sur enobody wants to watch a movie about killing and skinning dogs. But it seems to be more than acceptable to see a movie where human bodies are cut apart, most of them when they are still alive even. We do it in our gaming as well.

To every PvP nutt out there, your desire to get your 'fix' by 'killing' other people, in a game or not, is still the desire to kill other human beings. So really, what is more ethical, making games for entertainment, or making dark games for entertainment. I think the content of the deversion is far more important than the form of deversion itself.

What's wrong about killing and skinning - ok not dogs but say rabbits? What is so cruel about it? Do I want to see it? Well i definitely should watch it and learn it, It is weekly routine I should be able to perform easily. That is pretty much the whole purpose of rabbits as far as normal human being is concerned - to be killed and skinned.

This world is all twisted.

Oh and I agree about killing humans in games. Some people want to "pwn" human beings in some clearly defined way, so "killing" them serves the purpose. Funny thing is there are two postions in a pack that do not want to start a fight - the underdog who serves as punching bag for everyone and the leader who has nothing to gain and a lot to lose. And the lower you are the more inclined you are to "pwn" some helpless sod. In this case, the fake in games is that they glorify the accomplishments of self proclaimed losers.