8. We're Completely Desensitised To Violence
We all know the age restrictions on games - after all, how can you miss the ever-increasing "18" sticker in the corner of the box? - but that hasn't stopped most of us delving into a bit of GTA or Resident Evil years before we were supposed to. While I wouldn't care to crowbar open the debate about whether video games precipitate violent behaviour for the umpteenth time - hint: I don't think it does - it is fair to say that watching the amount of violence we do no doubt de-sensitises us to it. Violence in movies is one thing, though it's rarely executed with the frequent repetition of, say, a first person shooter or a hack n' slash action game; it's that frantic flippancy with regard to life - human or other - that makes it a far more potent de-sensitising agent. I fondly recall playing the first GTA and Resident Evil games on the PlayStation when I was around 10 years old, and now, I sit playing games where players have their heads graphically chainsawed off, and I don't even blink. It doesn't mean we're all hollow shells of human beings, but isn't this sort of thing detrimental to the games themselves in the end? Were the shock factor retained, we would probably be profoundly more affected by these experiences, though some would argue that it wouldn't be beneficial. Our dismissive attitude to the violence is a coping mechanism.