Video Games Teach Us…What Exactly?

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Video games being blamed for violence is back in the news. As the media tells it, video games teach us how to kill, rape and drive drunk. Did you also know that video games also help our prison guards learn how to run our jails and help companies train new employees? Video games also help doctors become better surgeons and they keep kids calm before surgery and help them with a speedy recovery. I’m confused now, what exactly do video games teach us again?
 
thanks to videogames i now know how to waste my time more efficiently ;)

and if someone tells you that they have cake, they might be lying :eek:
 
Video games don't teach, At least, I don't need them to teach for my purposes.

I use Video games as a vain attempt to cure my infinite boredom..
 
Honestly I think if the AIDS was worth enough achievement points on XBL, we would've found a cure by now.:rolleyes:
 
Wshmaster0 said:
.. or that it teaches us all that killing 200 pigeons is the right thing to do...
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actually pigeons are considered a plague in most parts of Europe, if u are found feeding them u get a fine !!! ouch !!
 
And what exactly does most TV teach us? Not a damn thing! Video games are for those of us who can not idly sit watching TV for hours on end with zero interaction.
 
i think a better question would be, what didn't they teach us?

i didn't knew how to drive a car and get away from the cops until i got Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit :p
 
Why do they need to teach anything? I'm just happy their a good place to waste time, socialize with friends and help me relieve frustrations by killing digital baddies... :D
 
The comments thus far have been a bit unfair, I've learned a lot of things from playing games in general.

When I was younger I used to play a lot of play-by-post rpg's. Researching on how I could write my character better has introduced me to The Techniques of The Selling Writer by Dwight D. Swain, the works of Spinoza, the Poetics by Aristotle, the Essays of Sir Francis Bacon and Emerson, The Dialogues of Plato, An Inquiry to the Wealth of Nations, as well as practical skills too such as learning a new keyboard set, e.g., DVORAK so it was easier to type for elongated periods of time.

Competitive action games has taught me the works of John Boyd's in the OODA loop, I learned of him from a USAF Captain who played the game with me. Also I learned about problem solving strategies from standard brainstorming techniques to lateral thinking and even gradient decent which I couldn't apply to anything, unfortunately, lol.

Playing rts games has pushed me to read some of the more popular works such as The Art of War, and the not so, such as Vegetius essays on the Roman Army and recruitment practices, and the Book of Five Rings. It has also taught me time management skills, and discipline to achieve the level of skill that is comfortable to me in game. From MMO's I learned practical VB programming skills by writing a macro tool which interfaced with the games memory and ran a step by step script using a unique index for each itteration it ran.

I'm very thankful to games, they've allowed me to look at the world with a different point of view. And gave me the opportunity me to try somethings which I wouldn't have a venue without.
 
Heck, most my world history background before high school was age of empires. (I'm a senior now)
 
we didn't know how to do that stuff already? how did we live before video games?
 
klc314 said:
we didn't know how to do that stuff already? how did we live before video games?
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i thought they have something called "books", never seen one though :p
my grandfather used to tell me stories that those "books" have like words and stuff on them :confused: :D
 
leSLIe said:
i thought they have something called "books", never seen one though :p
my grandfather used to tell me stories that those "books" have like words and stuff on them :confused: :D
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Ooh, you mean "books" were without GUI and only alphanumeric? :D

Seriously the bad things that people think are coming from video games are being viewed very cynically. These things happen in countries where kids can get their hands on guns or where kids can drive even though they don't even know what responsibility means.

You won't get an underground weapon shop next door by playing "violent" games.
And you still haven't got an idea on how to steal a car by playing GTA or such games.

The problem is that you get some information or knowledge and if you don't have someone to kick your ass when you do something stupid ("parents" who can tell you about "books") then you can get into trouble by using this knowledge in a bad way. But being stupid (or clever) is not an excuse.

It's funny that when TV is in question everybody says that it's about parenting, but when you watch a similar display and you click the mouse every now and then, you can end up as a criminal by getting your brain washed.

Thanks for reading!
 
mufcfan said:
Seriously the bad things that people think are coming from video games are being viewed very cynically. These things happen in countries where kids can get their hands on guns or where kids can drive even though they don't even know what responsibility means.

You won't get an underground weapon shop next door by playing "violent" games.
And you still haven't got an idea on how to steal a car by playing GTA or such games.

The problem is that you get some information or knowledge and if you don't have someone to kick your ass when you do something stupid ("parents" who can tell you about "books") then you can get into trouble by using this knowledge in a bad way. But being stupid (or clever) is not an excuse.

It's funny that when TV is in question everybody says that it's about parenting, but when you watch a similar display and you click the mouse every now and then, you can end up as a criminal by getting your brain washed.

Thanks for reading!
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QFT.
Parenting is a parent responsibility!!! that is not something that u want to leave to the TV or Videogames to do !!
 
What I have learned from Video Games:

1) When you pick people in the face, coins come out
2) Princesses are never worth saving
3) Im allowed to take anything laying around
4) There are more secret rooms than I am aware of
5) How to properly kill mass amounts of Zombies...and Hookers..
6) I can accurately put a knife between someones eyes from across a city, throwing a pair of scissors
7) Aliens Exist, and they are ALL hostile
8) Its ok to team kill.. Less future enemies..
 
I have actually learned a surprising amount from video games. Stupid things like someone was talking about astrology and I had never studied it but recognized a lot of the terms from the game Jet Force Gemini. There is a lot of old mythology in games like summoned creatures from Final Fantasy, or Greek gods from God of War.

I started playing games like breath of fire, and secret of mana fairly early which were fairly heavy on the text boxes and that helped my reading and comprehension. Reading about video games took me online and got me into computers which turned out to be a pretty usefully life skill.

Most importantly though they teach deductive reasoning skills. I think they are a great tool for developing thinking ahead skills, I know personally I have memorized dozens of maps from first person shooters and can do a "fly through" of sorts in my head of them which helps me to picture different machine and scientific concepts and components the same way in my head.

I thank video games for making me as smart as I am today, hell sitting in front of a tv screen doing nothing you can learn but add interactivity to the mix and I think that increases 10 fold.
 
Raise your hand if you have played a video game with one hand covering one eye.

Anyone?

Video games do not teach us how to drive drunk.
 
I learned telling corny jokes and wearing a leisure suit can get you laid.



[small]of course that hasn't worked yet[\small]
 
Play every civilization and read every bit of information that game has in it. Not a huge amount of detail, but you learn alot none the less. Sid Meier Has stolen most of my life....
 
I'm wondering what the useless media has taught me by running some of these ridiculous stories...
 
Hey I could not read when I was like 6 man started with Dr. Sues and then my parents got my FF for the Nintendo and you need to read to pass the game and ever since then I have loved to read and became quite good at it.
 
Well,consider this.How many of us learned how to upgrade,overclock,and fine tune a computer for the sole purpose of playing the latest games?(Console players,of course,miss out on this wonderful experience.:D )
 
I play so many RTS games like starcraft and warcraft, I can be a strategic planner in the military.
 
Back in the early 90's, a friend gave me a copy of Descent on a floppy to install on my spankin new Pentium 90. He told me he "downloaded" it from the "internet". I ran out and read everything I could about this internet, and how to use FTP, and Archie, Veronica, etc. I changed my major to MIS the next year.

15 years later I'm still in IT. All thanks to the lure of video games.

True story.
 
I can only speak for what ive seen, this also applying to me. When I was younger, assuming I had no computer/video games, there could have only been a few other things I would be doing with my spare time on weekends, or doing summer vacations. None of them would be legal, or advisble. Kids, teenagers.. Most people can come up with a few ideas of what they *might* do given enough time and boredom. Give teens boredom, and you are brewing up trouble.

Of course its just my opinion, but really... Anyone else here have a "if I wernt playing games when I was younger..." thought? Im not suggesting games are an alternative to parenting/supervision, but its merely fact... if I wasnt wasting my summer vacations playing Quake, I would have done something else, and I can only think of a few other "somethings". They do not involve Quilting, knitting, or community service.

eggrock said:
Video games do not teach us how to drive drunk.
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Raise your hand if you have ever played Mafia, GTA, Test drive or any other car-driving game while intoxicated to the point of being barely able to sit in a chair. Even better, if you have recorded such activites with fraps, watched it the next day, and seriously thought you were far better at playing said game...

*raises both hands*


All that videogames can teach in respect to drunk-driving, is that driving while drunk is good if your goal is to:
1. Run over as many people as possible, extra points for drug-dealers and hookers.
2. Wreck a car to the point of explosion, every other city block
3. Get "insane stunt" cash bonuses for your idiotic driving (careening recklessly off the edges of cliffs, flipping your car over as you hit light-poles)
4. Be completley unaware a dozen police cars chasing you, sirens wailing and lights flashing.
5. Spend all of your money at the Pay - N' - Spray.

In real life, anti-drug/anti-drinking ads do this same purpose, and teach us just about the same thing, but in a far more boring manner. Give me a bottle of vodka, a week off from work, GTA, and I can give you enough footage for decades worth of anti-drunk-driving ads. Gaming while drunk is also a good "wow... imagine if I was doing this in real-life" reminder.
 
Gambrinus said:
Back in the early 90's, a friend gave me a copy of Descent on a floppy to install on my spankin new Pentium 90. He told me he "downloaded" it from the "internet". I ran out and read everything I could about this internet, and how to use FTP, and Archie, Veronica, etc. I changed my major to MIS the next year.

15 years later I'm still in IT. All thanks to the lure of video games.

True story.
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Same here. I definitely would not be majoring in EE if I never played video games.

I would probably be more social though, but who cares about that.
 
seems like the simplest answer is 'whatever you want.'

Descent (and number 2) flippin ruled btw!
 
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