It\'s interesting, because I\'ve actually been thinking a fair bit about it myself recently. I have no problem with violence in games in principle, but lately a lot of the excessive violence in some games has been bothering me. Like any medium, I\'m okay with graphic violence in games insofar as it serves a PURPOSE. Games like Metal Gear Solid, for example (as a matter of fact I believe Miyamoto had something to do with the development of The Twin Snakes) tell a meaningful story about appropriately mature subject matter - if you\'re telling a story about war set in the real world, it is completely acceptable to include graphic violence because violence is a very real and very relevent aspect of the topic at hand. Similarly, in games like Brothers in Arms or Assassin\'s Creed I find the violence to be appropriate, because they are telling mature stories about realistic subject matter - in fact, it would be wrong to needlessly sugarcoat the reality of war and killing. Also, those games give an appropriate emotional and moral weight to acts of violence - it\'s not just \"fun\", the game makes every acknowledgement that violence is disturbing and harmful. Even No More Heroes didn\'t bother me, because it\'s very stylized, very satirical, and I felt like it was making a strong statement about violence in popular culture. I\'m very much looking forward to Sadness and expecting it to be quite grisly, and I find that acceptable because the stated goal of the game is to explore the darkest, most twisted depths of the human subconscious.
But then... there are games like God of War and Resident Evil 4. Games that are really well designed, are really GOOD games, but just have all this excessive, tasteless violence that doesn\'t really serve any purpose at all. It\'s not like they\'re telling mature stories, like Hideo Kojima. It\'s not like they\'re making complex statements, like Suda 51. The gory, grisly, excessively detailed violence is pure spectacle, it adds nothing to the gameplay. I actually consider the excessive violence in RE4 to be one of the game\'s only major drawbacks. Lately I\'ve even been alarmed at the level of gore in games like Half-Life 2, which aren\'t dumb or mindless, but at the same time they\'re not acting at a level of sophistication and maturity that merits that level of extreme violence. It\'s just kind of sickening. Half-Life 2 could\'ve been rated T, or at least rated M without the \"intense violence\" label, and been none the worse off for it.
So, there\'s my 2 cents.
PS: That said, I would LOVE to see Miyamoto make a mature, complex game that puts violence in an appropriate context. Just because mindless violence may be distasteful doesn\'t mean that Nintendo shouldn\'t demonstrate that they can appeal to older gamers interested in more mature and morally complex subject matter.
( Edited 23.10.2008 19:56 by gatotsu911 )