"These video games -- gosh, they've gotten a lot more realistic over the years," says Fox 26's newscaster Ned Hibberd in the opening of a segment called Videogame Addiction on Houston's Fox station.
In the segment, which can be found in their Videogames can be Explicit, Addictive story, they talk with neurotherapist Ron Swatzyna, who says that gamers' "brains can not tell the difference between being in real combat and being in a game," and continues to say that "the brain is going into a survival mode."
This statement is followed by stock footage of fiery explosions while the newscaster likens this "survivial mode" to the posttraumatic stress disorder a soldier would get on the front lines of war.
Swatzyna also talks about videogame addiction, stating that he has "seen people who have stopped playing the game go into withdrawal-type symptoms - shakes and everything else."
Finally, Ned Hibberd rounds the segment out by saying that "Parents who let their kids pour their youth into an online alterego might be creating a pixelated Peter Pan."
You can watch this fine segment on MyFox Houston's Web page.
Tell me, Destructoid reader and avid gamer, how are you coping with your posttraumatic stress disorder and incessant shaking?
[Thanks, TT]
Contest:
9:59 AM on 12.20.2007
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YOU CAN'T HANDLE THE CONTROLS!!!
I sometimes find myself running around with a Jersey accent hitting people with aluminum bats.
MAXIMUM ARMOR
MAXIMUM SPEED
MAXIMUM STRENGTH
CLOAK ENGAGED
AHHHHHHHHH!
I've got my heroin and booze to tide me over till 5pm.
Oh, also, I wouldn't put too much weight in this story.
Fox 26 here in Houston routinely does exposes on child predators and whorehouses. So much so that they made it into a Sunday night segment called "Predator Check"
They are typical expose style news with no real meat.
BTW, for us to be the #7 largest media market, our entire news and radio coverage in Houston is TERRIBLE like this. Awful news coverage, terrible reporting. Even the weathermen blow. 50% chance of rain means that 50% of Houston's getting rained on. That's about it.
This is so much bullshit it isn't even worth a long/serious response.
thats why i feel like crawling up into a shivering ball everytime i see a hedgehog. DAM YOU SONIC, WHY COULDNT I COMPLETE YOU!
=(
CLOAK ENGAGED!
Does somebody have some HEROIN? I NEED IT TO NUMB THE PAIN!
wtf does that even mean?
but seriously,
That's the biggest load of bullshit I've heard in a long time. I want this guy to name ONE person that's been "traumatized" by a game at all, let alone to the level war would traumatize someone. He's basically trivializing what a lot of soldiers go through and I'd be offended if I was a veteran.
They're making a ridiculous jump from "the body releases adrenaline" to THE BRAIN CAN'T TELL THE DIFFERENCE!
This is fuct.
This maybe?
If you get adrenaline while trying not to die in a real war, that is not fun.
I know I sure as fuck would like to stick with being a couch commando rather than a real commando.
awesome/
For example. I play and have played a copious amount of racing games that invlove you wrecking the shit out of your car and crumpling it to pieces. Destruction Derby was one of my favorite games when it came out and I loved Twisted Metal. So by this guy's logic, I should fear ever stepping foot in a car because I'm unable to distinguish the games from real life.
But I was entirely fine in a car until I was sideswiped by a semi in real life. Now I have trouble sitting in the passenger seat especially on rainy nights since that's the situation I was in when it happenned. So my point is that I know what it's like to be traumatized, and no game has ever done it to me because I can easily distinguish between reality and games as I'm sure most people can.
Then the other story of the asian boy who killed the 60 year old woman for rought 6 US dollars to pay for another month of "random addictive Asian MMO" and of course the hardcore WoW players we hear about.
This guy is still full of shit, no doubt about that, but there are sad individuals out there who get addicted to games.
Happens to me everytime a grenade detonates next to me in any of my FPS games. It's a real hassle. I'm lucky I can type without looking at my keyboard.
"NOOOOOOO PHIST WHY??? WHY DID I KILL YOU? NOT THE AZN!!!"
...I guess I cant tell the difference between games and reality
We have, of course, evovled beyond that to the point that while the primal responses remain, we are able to temper them with rational thought.
As we know the events on screen are not really a threat to our survival we are able to react to it differently and more rationally so we do not make a situation potentially worse.
Hence you don't see people running for their lives in fear as soon as they boot up CoD4.
To hell with that.
Whats so wrong with peter pan, I'm mean shit, at least he enjoyed himself.
"He's basically trivializing what a lot of soldiers go through and I'd be offended if I was a veteran."
Saying that a video game about war is similar to what our soliders go through shows just how uninformed he is. One of my mom's good friends' son just came back from Iraq a few months ago. He's having sleep problems, sleep walking, and some other stuff. No matter how many war games I play I don't exhibit symptoms of post traumatic stress syndrome, and I've been playing them for YEARS.
However, I was walking into the grocery store the other day and I heard a sound like the claymore makes in COD4 before it goes off and I stopped in my tracks, kinda funny if you ask me.
Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to go shoot up a russian night club before I lapse into bullet time and speaking noir again.
The overpowering sounds of my days on the battlefield when they screamed QUAD DAMAGE and HEAD SHOT as well as MOOOOOOOOONSTER KIIIIIILL!
I can't dream anymore.