Discussion

a) According to the film, what are some pros and cons of playing videogames for indivuduals and societies?

   The main pros of playing videogames for indivuals and societies is these games can spread some messages educationally, for example the concept of having safe sex and the way that can prevent cancer diseases. It is because when people play this games, they can learn and gain right values and knowledge. These kinds of games can do good to individuals especially to the teens as they are the group that will easily be affected by the games and absorb concepts though games. For the societies, I think when people receive right values from games can definitely benefit the communities. For example, when teens receive the right sex education, they will cause less sex-related problems to societies.

   For the cons part, I think the videogames can really harm both the individuals and societies. since nowadays, there are many videogames related to some people-shooting activities and when kids are playing these games, they may somehow get used to the killing scenes and the whole violence atmosphere. They may practise shooitng in terms of the accracy, the target-located skills and the usage of different weapons. For societies, these games are surely harmful to it. There are increasing cases of school-shooting in the whole world. And these terrible crime event increase after the big hit of some violence shooting digital games. Actually kids are somehow have the shooting concepts planted in their mind. Maybe when they encounter problems in daily lives, the wrath just push the violence consepts out in their mind and they may tend to resort to violence.

b) According to the film, is there any evidence that digital games can encourage aggressive values and anti-social actions in the real world? Do you agree?

According to the film, there are some evidence that digital games can encourage aggressive values and anti-social actions in the real world. For example, a 14 year-old boy brought guns to school and shoot his classmates to death. Some of the victims got head shots and the boy just explained that he shot them on head because head shot can get extra points in playing video games and he got used to this skill. According to Laidman, when youngsters are obsessed with violence video games, these games can really trained them as effective killers.(Video games figure, Laidman, April 27, 1999) And actually I agree with that point, I think playing video games hours and hours can really imbue teenagers with the concept of killing is every problems' solution. And they will eventually get used to killing in their lives.

c) Should governments have the right to ban certain games? Why or why not?

I think governments should have the right to ban certain games because improper video games can really harm the communities and the next generation. Some may say that this kind of prohibitation ruin the right of freedom and the development of creativity. However, in my opinions, right of freedom and creativity should only be enjoyed in doing the right things. Let say if someone murders others, can he be judged as innocent when he claims that he has the right of freedom to do anything he desires? The answer is surely NO. He will definitely be sentenced to jail. When we can observe that things are losing control from the increasing school-shooting cases, governmetns should really ban some harmful video games which spread the wrong or evil messages. This can protect our children from absorbing the wrong values.

Reference link: Video games figure in school shootings, Jenni Laidman http://www.post-gazette.com/headlines/19990427games4.asp

4.) My favourite video game
My favourite video game is The Sims. This game is a strategic artificial life game. Player can live or control one or more lifeforms and they can create almost everything in the virtual world, for example, they can create different characters and different kinds of buildings and shops. What I like it most is that I can control everything in the game and I can do whatever I desire. I can even do something which I cannot do in reality, for example, fight with others.