Evolution of video games and - Why are almost all video games about battling and killing?

I was around 11 or 12 years old when some of the first video games came out like Space Invaders and Asteroids. One of my favorite games was Tempest which came out some years later. I used to spend a lot of my time at pizza shops, bodegas, and little neighborhood arcades when I was a kid. They were so amazing to me back then. I was so into them, even making drawings of them in my school book, and thinking all day about them.. about how to get to the next level..

Games were so creative back then, and even into the Commodore 64 years. (I know you kids are like, "whats this guy talking about"..) There were so many different genres and types of games. They were intriguing (for the mind set of those days), and on some, you had to really think or have some real skills to get to the higher levels. It is hard to relay this experience to the newer generations because they may see these games and think its a joke, but you had to be in the mind set of that time to really appreciate it. Everything is viewed in a different perspective now.

Something happened to gaming with the introduction of 3D rendering game engines - In came the first person shooter..

I think one of the first games was Wolfenstein 3D (a sequel of Castle Wolfenstein, a Commodore 64 game), followed by Doom. I remember my first impressions of playing Doom - after a while, I got dizzy and it was really annoying to try and aim your gun by tweaking the joystick left and right. Apart from that, I thought that it was a really mindless game that involved a really limited skill set. I never go into the first person shooter.

Fast forward 20 years later, playing the now top first person shooter games on the top systems, I still feel the same way - they make me dizzy and this whole aiming with the joystick thing... never got into it. After a short while, I am completely bored. There is nothing intriguing about it. This accounts for the majority of the most popular games today. I don't understand why people like them so much. Do they really?

I have to say, something was lost in the transition from 2D and pseudo-3D games, to real rendered 3D games. It had something to do with A) the creativity and different perspectives/genres which were offered in games, and B) the loss of 'gameplay' and a certain precision and fluidity that came with 2D and pseudo-3D style games. This was due in part to them being less complicated and less processor intensive as 3D rendered games. This is not to say there weren't any good 3D rendered games..

When one of the first popular MMORPG's made itself known - World of Warcraft, I built myself a top notch PC of that time; the best ATI video card, Processor, etc. and jumped into it. I was blown away by the size of the world and some of the details of the world. I was really in awe with the art in the game, like sitting by a lake and fishing while the sky over me transformed with clouds and sun rays, with the sounds of water, birds or whatever. It created a real experience that you felt. I was really impressed by that. Also, I liked the idea of meeting other people in the game and interacting with them, that was also great. However, I thought (like most of these games) that there was much lacking in the gameplay. It was just a mindless - going around killing things. Kill X-number of things get that, and then with that kill more things. Kill more things for more powerful swords, then, kill your friends and bigger bosses. After a while it got tired. (Not to take away from the fun of raids, but raids were hard to organize or reserve time for.)

I thought to a certain extent - 'what a waste of a great game world, and game platform'. What happened to the storytelling and adventure, intriguing puzzles, challenges, etc.? While in many ways corny.. I thought the Longest Journey and Dreamfall was great in that respect. It was an amusing story with different interactive scenes.

Anyway, after playing many of the tops games of today, I am asking myself - Why is every game today about shooting and killing each other? Is everyone so into that? or is it being pushed on us? Is it a type of conditioning? There is such a lack of variety in games today. I don't even like the idea of shooting and killing other people, even if it is not real. I don't get any enjoyment out of it.

And then it dawned on me.. Even in Pac-Man and Space Invaders, you go round killing other things. It's just not as explicit or realistic as the 3D rendered games today. Almost every game has some theme of beings battling, or trying to kill each other in one way or another, Donkey Kong trying to kill Mario or whatever..

I guess that is just the nature of what most people are amused by.

Anyway, I just wish they would create some interesting games that are not just about going around shooting and killing each other or chopping each other up, because it's getting really boring and mind numbing. I stopped playing video games because of that.

C'mon creators.. you can get more creative than that.

There are non violent role playing puzzle games , racing games , sports games

ETA Have you tried rehm series rppg game stupidly hard to figure out

Personally, I'm looking forward to getting a copy of this new SimCity. It looks like what I always would have liked to see the old SimCity become but computers were nowhere near powerful enough.

I'm also getting a bit tired of the combat based games and even in shooters, I'm almost exclusively into sandbox games now like Far Cry III and Just Cause II. The exploring and vehicle use for it's own sake is as fun as any fighting.

prepping the kids to fight the "evil terrorists" for Big Brother ... start desensitizing and training the next generation of drone pilots ....

reply to post by nOraKat


been playing games since wolfenstein3D came out..

And I still love fps games, killing and blowing stuff up, watching rag dolls flying all over the place
for me, playing games always been a fun role play, where you can do things you cant do in real life.

A game about washing the floor, vacuuming and doing other things you do in RL would not be as fun.

Perhaps if you could wash the floor in multiplayer with some friends.. because playing with others is a big fun factor for me also

Originally posted by freedomSlave
ETA Have you tried rehm series rppg game stupidly hard to figure out

edit on 4/3/13 by freedomSlave because: (no reason given)

Who's Rehm? You mean Delilah Rehm? (found in Google search..)

Firstly, WoW is not really a great example when it comes to pure gameplay perspectives.

Secondly, i think the aspect affecting you is Nostalgia.

Games were so creative back then, and even into the Commodore 64 years. (I know you kids are like, "whats this guy talking about"..) There were so many different genres and types of games. They were intriguing (for the mind set of those days), and on some, you had to really think or have some real skills to get to the higher levels. It is hard to relay this experience to the newer generations because they may see these games and think its a joke, but you had to be in the mind set of that time to really appreciate it. Everything is viewed in a different perspective now.

The creativity has changed since those days, yes. But for the better. Sorry to be so upfront, but you are viewing this through rose tinted glasses. Over the years, with the introduction of new technology and further mediums, the games industry has had the ability to experiment more freely.

The modern games of which you are talking about are AAA products; products designed purely to make money off the consumer base. THAT is why those games seem boring or stale to some. If you look past the bland and often repetitive AAA titles of Call of Duty and Battlefield, you will find other FPS titles pushing the boundaries. Far Cry 3 is full of creativity for example.

Also, there are more genres today than what there was back then, even to the point that they are now blurred wit one another. FPS, 3PS, RTS, RPS RPG, MMO-RPG, Puzzle, Platforming, Sport, Stealth, Action, Action-Adventure, Strategy and so, so much more exist today.

If you really do want to see "creative games," then i suggest you look past the AAA developers and toward the independent ones. That is usually where you will find the breeding grounds of talent and creativity in today's world. That isn't to say you should completely give the AAA titles a miss, but you are more likely to find what you are looking for in indie games.

With all this being said, there are still AAA games pushing the boundaries from creativity to story-telling. I suggest you look up the following:

Shadow of the Colossus.

Ico.

Metal Gear (Solid) - from the very first one to the latest one. They are all great.

Far Cry 3.

The Elder Scrolls - all of them push the boundaries in regards to RPG and world mechanics.

Grand Theft Auto.

Assassin's Creed.

Dishonored.

Deus Ex.

Suck in everything, from their mechanics, to their stories, creativity and themes. You will be surprised once you look past the surface.

Originally posted by Expat888
prepping the kids to fight the "evil terrorists" for Big Brother ... start desensitizing and training the next generation of drone pilots ....

Really think there is some truth to that, but like one poster here already says.. he really likes those first person shooters and enjoys killing people (in the virtual).

Did the games create that desire, or did the desire create the game?

Originally posted by nOraKat

Originally posted by Expat888
prepping the kids to fight the "evil terrorists" for Big Brother ... start desensitizing and training the next generation of drone pilots ....

Really think there is some truth to that, but like one poster here already says.. he really likes those first person shooters and enjoys killing people (in the virtual).

Did the games create that desire, or did the desire create the game?

Two words:

Player Psychology.

AAA games are created for the sole purpose of attaining money. How do they achieve this? Through psychological methods. Violence is ingrained in every male. This is abused by the AAA companies in the hopes that people will buy their games and play them.

There are a lot of games that don't involve killing out there. I hardly ever play first person shooters, but I have noticed that they are very popular. One reason "killing" is popular in video games is because a video game's purpose is to be challenging and build skill sets and, sometimes, be competitive.

I play a lot of Starcraft 2 and it isn't the "killing" I am interested in - it is the complicated strategical aspects and mental challenge.

Chess could be about killing too, if you think about it, as well as Go and Checkers.

But I think your question has to do with FPS games. They seem to be the most popular, even though there are a *lot* of alternatives out there - if you want to spend the rest of your gaming life not playing killing games, go for it.

I've been playing Dungeon Defenders a lot lately - it is a Tower Defense game.

Although my favorite game genre, the Adventure Game (Myst, King's Quest, Space Quest, Escape from Monkey Island etc.) became virtually non-existent!

Originally posted by daaskapitalThe creativity has changed since those days, yes. But for the better. ...
The modern games of which you are talking about are AAA products; products designed purely to make money off the consumer base. THAT is why those games seem boring or stale to some... Far Cry 3 is full of creativity for example. (Also suggested The Elder Scrolls)

I think what has improved are the 3D engines, physics, 'realistic-ness' of the graphics but not the creativity of the game. By creativity, I mean it's theme (and by theme I don't mean just the story behind the game).

You mentioned Far Cry 3 and Elder Scrolls, but this is precisely what I was talking about..

Apart from the annoyance of the first person perspective, what is occurring in the game is disturbing to me especially when it's realistic. Shooting and killing other people, or chopping other beings up and incessantly. It is disturbing. (It is also boring from a game perspective and not creative.)

I think the culture and perspective that is developing is one that is casual to the idea of killing, and takes their attention away from the tragedies that are experienced in reality (if it were a reality), such as the suffering that is experienced (but this is beside the point). The point is that I find these games disturbing and not fun. I wish they created games that were different and fun to play. Ones that made use of all the new graphic engines but was just not based on incessant graphic killing and mutilation. (..but also not cute kiddie games, that are so cute that they make you want to throw up.)

I loved and still have my Atari 2600 game console with about 50 games.There was no 3D back then. 3D brought gaming to life in new and creative ways. I am an avid first person shooter fan of single player games.. games with a story or campaign. My favorite genra is "first person role playing game" - a game that gives you both the immerse experience of seeing the world through the characters eyes and also has deep story lines and deep gameplay such as building your character through skill trees.

Why killing? Well, it's only a game. Lots of games dont have killing like Portal 1 and 2. Many games that rock dont even have graphics like the text adventures of the Zork series. In fact as far as killing goes, the very first video game called Adventure or Colossal Cave en.wikipedia.org... was a Zork like dungeon dwelling adventure had you killing dwarfs and what not. It was text based so no one saw any harm. I still play these text adventure games. I have everything Infocom the makers of Zork ever put put out.There are many good places on the net to download free text adventure games ( called Interactive Fiction now en.wikipedia.org...) such as The Interactive Fiction Archive www.ifarchive.org...

A new game coming out looks promising called Deadfall Adventure. It emphasis more adventure than killing.

The year is 1938. James Lee Quatermain is a man of many talents, yet holding on to money isn't one of them. Quatermain isn't all too keen on escorting Jennifer Goodwin, a US agent and former colleague of his, to an Egyptian temple complex in order to retrieve an ancient artifact - The Heart of Atlantis. Neither does he believe in the reputed invigorating qualities of this artifact, nor does he care that a division of the Ahnenerbe, the Nazi department specialized in the occult, is after The Heart as well.

But life has its ways of changing one's perspective. Quatermain soon finds himself part of a hunt across the globe - from the stormy deserts of Egypt to the icy depths of the Arctic and all the way to the steaming jungles of Guatemala, where deep in temples, age-old guardians awake from their eternal slumber. For all things live forever, though at times they sleep and are forgotten.

Thats from the Nordic games newsletter I just got.

I believe the character is based on H. Rider Haggard's Alan Quartermain from the 19 book series and movies fame.The similarities are just too striking. It will be like playing as Indiana Jones in first person. en.wikipedia.org...

A comment from a developer team member, Sadocommando on the forum says,

there is some monsters to kill, but fighting them is completely different - you need to use environment, mechanisms, your special equipment, instead of spraying bullets. And combat is just a part of experience, cause there is a lot of exploration and puzzles on levels.

www.nordicgames.at... - Release date June 30th 2013.

reply to post by nOraKat


rhem sorry

Originally posted by nOraKat
I think what has improved are the 3D engines, physics, 'realistic-ness' of the graphics but not the creativity of the game. By creativity, I mean it's theme (and by theme I don't mean just the story behind the game).

You mentioned Far Cry 3 and Elder Scrolls, but this is precisely what I was talking about..

Apart from the annoyance of the first person perspective, what is occurring in the game is disturbing to me especially when it's realistic. Shooting and killing other people, or chopping other beings up and incessantly. It is disturbing. (It is also boring from a game perspective and not creative.)

I think the culture and perspective that is developing is one that is casual to the idea of killing, and takes their attention away from the tragedies that are experienced in reality (if it were a reality), such as the suffering that is experienced (but this is beside the point). The point is that I find these games disturbing and not fun. I wish they created games that were different and fun to play. Ones that made use of all the new graphic engines but was just not based on incessant graphic killing and mutilation. (..but also not cute kiddie games, that are so cute that they make you want to throw up.)

You are correct that the 3D engines, physics and the 'realistic-ness' of the graphics have improved. But with it, the creativity has improved also.

You have to look past what is presented initially. Not all First Person games are about killing. If you are going to buy a war game, then yes, you can expect it to revolve around the killing of other AI. The Elder Scrolls for example can be played in both First and Third person perspectives. While you can, and do occasionally kill NPC's, it is an RPG . An RPG (Role Playing Game) allows one to pursue any role they choose. One does not have to mindlessly kill others. This is in contrast to a lot of FPS games.

Far Cry 3. Yes you kill...a lot. But you have to look past that. The creativity found within the game, not only in the story, but elsewhere is astounding.

I agree that modern games do desensitise people somewhat. But you can't let that scare you. If you don't like violent video games, fine. There are a lot of other genres out there (of both AA and Indie) which you can tackle.

reply to post by nOraKat


It seems like you forgot what we are; Animals. we are no less than nature intended us to make, no more either. we'll always have an alpha/beta complex.

personally i play FPSes to beat other players.(alpha complex) i look past the ''killing of people'' because thats an irrelevant part of the game. its the mechanics that interest me. Games have allowed people to process their thoughts into a machine.

i.e. you can sometimes tell where someone is going to walk to and you cut him off and beat him. you read their thoughts and acted to it. if i can outsmart a group of 5 people on my own, its the best feeling ever and i doubt anyone would disagree on that.

World of warcraft has great lore and the recent expansion has been very exciting in lore as well, every game has a ''kill this, kill that, get this'' mentality, if you dont actually read the quests, you wont understand the lore either.

reply to post by nOraKat

I get so disappointed every time I open up a "great video games thread" and find nothing mentioned of past consoles. I'm glad you're sticking up for the golden age of video games.

I agree with you on just about every point. I started with the home consoles like NES and Genesis. Moved on to PS1 and N64. I still play these games on the original consoles.

I think the older generation of video gamers got to experience a golden age before the dark times came...the times of the first person shooter clones. I never got into them. I never saw what was so exciting about Halo or Call of Duty. It just made me long for something as memorable as N64's Goldeneye (the only 1st person that I ever really respected.)

I still have Genesis and NES games in my collection that I can't complete (providing a real challenge,) while most modern games can be finished and become trite over a 3 day weekend.

Remember the days when you could read the game manual for back story and character bios etc? (In other words, you could skip it ) Well, now you don't have to because you can watch 20 minutes of animation to introduce the story. When I put in a video game, I expect to be immersed in action! not exposition. Those were the days.

I have played plenty of modern games and get bored with them really easily. I mean, you've played one 1st person shooter, you've played em all, right? I see video games declining every new generation. I won't even get into the cultural mentality that reveres video games about shooting and killing people...and little else.

All I can say is...I miss decent video games. I stopped being a gamer because video games were getting less and less fun with each year.

Those were the days:

Is it really evolution of the games or evolution of the audience using these games?

When we think of what media provides today is violence and even kids gets used to it in early age, take a look at animated tv series for kids specially for boys that involve shooting, blowing things up like biker mice from Mars, Lego hero factory etc etc, what these are teaching to our kids is shooting without any second thoughts. So Kids are brainwashed to be consumers this genre of mindless shooting. Game houses provides the audience what audience likes and are used to consume, cos it is all about profits.

There is also good games which requires some brainwork too, they might not be the top of the whats hot list tho. Bulding games and role playing games with a good theme. If anyone remembers when role playing games came they were "doomed" by the media because people thought they are bad for kids and teens mental healths and nowadays there is not that much fuzz about these mindless shooting games at all.. what happened? We have been brainwashed.. happened

What really bugs me about games today is not only the mindless shooting but games teaches our kids to be irresponsible with money for example. Lets take a new genre of games Iphone/android games, you can download game for free, game has nice graphics but gaming has been made quite difficult without spending real money in it and with very few purchases of game"money" you have spent a lot more than buying a whole real game that you can own. This new evolution is a endless moneyspinner for game companies today.

Dishonored is a neat game, in that you may choose to play through the game, killing any or all adversaries that stand in your way, or you may stealthily go around them. The storyline, set in sort of a graphic novel steampunk city, adapts according to the level of violence the player exhibits. One way to play through is trying to kill nobody, harder than it sounds.

I played through violently, and the ending of my character's story was not pleasing to one's soul, but seemingly apt.

Playing an alcoholic bum that meanders through life gaining experience points by brewing his own beer and evading internet demons that remove his posts, sounds like a pretty boring game to me.

I like fps games, if they're good with multiplayer.. other than this they tend to bore me quickly.

I prefer god games. Black & White, From Dust, etc. but there is little killing in them so..

yeah I guess I should be an elite soldier for the highest paid secret military groups, since I like first person shooters, I mean they're only made to desensitise the kids to be mindless killers. Right, guy up the thread?? Yeah..

What they should do is combine the alcoholic bum game with need for speed, and have that multiplayer online, so that way you can drive around killing people.

No weapons.. just a fat torana. Ommagod fully sick bro!!!

reply to post by daaskapital


Ico and Shadow of the Colosus are two games that I can't get enough of. I was so happy when they came out with the PS3 remastered version. You really have to think and figure out what to do to get passed the obstacle that's keeping you from progressing. I just bought the the Prince of Persia trilogy pack. Those are also pretty good. Can't wait until someone comes out with a real puzzler Shadow Gate type game.