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Thus posting another problem. Children, this is something you cannot deny, will always try to find out why the game cannot be played. If the parents dont bother to tell them why its considered taboo, the children will want to find out why.

Okay, so there are those that do still want to find out even if their parents stated why they shouldnt very properly. And sometimes its the media to blame when they advertise all these things. But at times, it really depends on how well kids control themselves.

It say Mature, ages 17 and up on there for a reason! If the parents are stupid enough to let their kids play it early that's their screw up! mind, The maturity level of the kids plays a factor too. I started playing M rated games when I was 15, cause I was mature enough to understand its a GAME. And that shotting the person in the game was kewl but its BAAAAAADDDD to do so in real life! >_< plus my mom refused to let me till then...
Canada & Japan are the 2 countries with the most sex and violence on tv, however they're countries have a significantly SMALLER crime rate and stuff than ze U.S. Why? BECAUSE PARENTS THERE TEACH THEIR KIDS ABOUT MORALS AND ETHICS! If a parent sits down with their kid and explains about game v. real life, and actually is around or has a competant adult babysit their child, then the kid is less likely to pick up a gun and start shooting people in the middle of the streets.
Mind, some people are mentally/emotioncally disturbed. If that's the case, don't give them the damn game!
*takes a deep breath as she finishes rant. looks at clock and crawls into bed to sleep.*

A speech? I wanna see! Please post it soon!

I think it's truely the parents fault. They seem to be so stupid when buying video games. My mother knows what we buy, they are mostly E+10 or T we only have one M rated game, & that's 99 Knights. I don't even let my little cousin who's 3 years old play my games. I make sure I'm playing a game he can watch when he's over. I know I'm being protective, what can I say? He's only 3!

I really want to comment on this. I'm twenty eight years old and when I was in high school GTA was yet to be invented and there were fights all the time as well. It had nothing to do with videogames because back then, games were considered something exclusively nerdy, hardly anyone did it.
I really don't see the connection between games and aggressive behaviour anyway, most people who have committed violent crimes will have eaten bread, that doesn't mean eating bread makes you violent.
The problem with videogames and violence are the media and people like Jack Thompson. As soon as there's someone admitting he played violent games and committed a violent crime the media are all over it. However, you'll never read in the papers about the millions of people who play violent games and have never harmed a fly in their lives. The reason for that is that violence sells, and not just in videogames.
As for Jack Thompson, anyone remember the Virginia Tech shootings? The first thing Jack Thompson said about that was that we would probably find out that the perpetrator had a history of playing violent games, quite possibly Counter-Strike. It turns out that the guy only had a laptop and his room mates had never see him play any games at all, he was just a nut who believed he was serving some deluded religious purpose.
That being said, I don't believe everyone should be allowed to play every game, small children are easily influenced as has been said before but that's what the age ratings are for in which case it becomes a matter of parent responsibility, not the government. Parents are always eager to blame anything but their own shortcomings when their kids go bad. In the fifties it was rock 'n roll, in the seventies punk, then metal, movies, and now they've found videogames to be a nice new scapegoat.

Considering that I'm only 14, & I like blood & gore. Come one,it's fact that you know it's not real & there's no way you can chop a guy's head with a Katana when he has a machine gun in his hand & come out unscathed. Now fantasy is my scapegoat when I've had a bad day or there's a fight going in between my sister & my mom. Now if someone could answer me this: Why can't the politians leave us gamers alone? If a kid is violent, don't look at video games. Look at the parents.

Like I said in my essay, if kids are MORE LIKELY to play videogames than adults. If a kid is violent, they have a BIGGER CHANCE of playing games than a violent adult does.

People make connections all the time when they don't want to get involved. It's much easier to blame a gaming company than someone's parents. Because a corporation has no human face to point a finger at.

People don't want to take responsibility for their actions. It's been that way since the beginning of time. They want something to blame that can't bite back.

So they overlook things in order to make themselves feel right. Even if they're wrong.

If a person can't distinguish fantasy (videogames) from reality, there's something wrong there. Something that a game can't screw up. There is absolutely no game that can turn a person insane.

Unless they are having trouble beating a level, of course. wink

Back in elementary and middle school, I used to sometimes play Mortal Kombat, Doom 64, Starcraft, Goldeneye 007, and all sorts of violent games. Oh, and I also used to watch something as "mature" as Ranma 1/2 at that age.

Yet, every time my mom freaked out about the massive violence and how it could affect us, I finished the discussion with a simple rebuttal: "It's just a TV series/videogame! It ain't real! I can't kill anyone!".

So far, the only thing a videogame or movie could do to me or a relative was making my brother speak like a character from that film. And that's because he has this habit of speaking like one of the characters of the last film or videogame he liked. When he was playing GTA San Andreas, he used to scream "Oh, a*****e, my s**t!", just like CJ. But then he watched Scarface and began talking like Tony Montana: "You ******** with me? Fine, say hello to my little friend". Before that, he watched LOTR:ROTK and began speaking like Gandalf. Now that he watched 300, he keeps speaking like Leonidas.

Conclusion: playing violent videogames doesn't makes you a violent dude.