It was earlier this week in my Mass Communications Ethics course that we discussed the negative effect that violent video games have on the youth of America. Of course this is all debatable, and this post isn’t meant to challenge or condemn anyone for playing these games.
The point is to examine America’s obsession with these games. A prime example of this is the new video game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.
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The massively multi-player online gaming industry has seen a lot of press over the last decade, with the huge success of Everquest and then the release of Blizzard’s unstoppable force, World of Warcraft. There are also stories of crazy things people have done, or have let happen, because of their involvement in these online games.
People have paid more attention to the life of their online Avatar, and their second life, and forgetting simple things like eating, showering, going to work, or feeding the baby he or she left in the closet because its crying was distracting. There are also the stories of people being killed or beaten over stealing or selling digital property in these games, and those who’ve committed suicide over things not working out in their digital world.
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Most days, as soon as he gets home from work or finishes with his last class, Thomas Odmark, a business major and junior at the University of South Florida, hops into the seat of his leather, high-back computer chair and logs onto his favorite online game, World of Warcraft.
Odmark is but one of more than 10 million people worldwide who are subscribed to World of Warcraft, also known as the most popular of the hundreds of MMORPGs (massively multiplayer online role-playing games) out there now.
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