Weekly Gaming Roundup: Wii Fit & Grand Theft Auto IV released; “Violence due to Video Games” Debunked

Posted on May 10, 2008
Filed Under Video Games, Lifestyle & Entertainment |

In the past fortnight two large games were released: Grand Theft Auto IV for XBox360 and PS3, as well as the fitness game WiiFit for the Nintendo Wii. In my point of view, GTAIV is aimed at those who don’t mind gaining weight by playing games hours on end, where as WiiFit are for those who do want to lose weight utilising a video game.

WiiFit is a game that utilises a balance board that measures the amount of weight on both the left hand side of the board, and the right hand side of the board. There are various games that test balance, coordination and skill in order to reach the ultimate goal of ‘making you fit’. These include push-ups, yoga, an extremely addictive faux soccer heading game, and a Dance Dance Revoluntion - esque rhythm game.

GTA IV on the other hand puts the player of the game in the world of Niko BEllic a Serbian war veteran who heads to the U.S. in search of the American dream - only to find his cousin has lied about the wealth that was promised to be awaiting him. The game follows Niko as he fights his way to the top of the underground crime scene in order to fulfill his dream.

In other news, according to news.com.au Harvard Researchers have found that boys who don’t play videogames at all… are at greater risk of getting into trouble than those who play violent games occasionally. This addresses an age old debate by parents and media watch dogs alike that highly-graphic violence within video games will induce a negative and violent attitude against others. On top of this finding, the two researchers found no evidence that violence in video games leads to future criminal activity.

In summary the results are as follows

• it was two-year study of 1250 children and 500 parents, funded by the US Department of Justice, to uncover links between games and children’s behaviour.
• it was found that there was no direct link between games and violence
• there was however a correlation between adult-rated games and aggressive behaviour
• half of the boys who played adult-rated games had been in a fight in the past 12 months, compared to 28 per cent of boys who played games with a less mature rating.
• among girls, 40% who played adult-rated games had been in a fight recently compared to only 12% of those who didn’t.

However, will the release of GTA IV induce an influx of violent news articles? Only time will tell.

If you would like to debate the topic of gaming violence, I encourage you to read and participate in the discussion held at Video Game VS.

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