If you are a techie of any level or even just have a TV, you know or have seen ads for Call of Duty Modern Warfare 3. The most anticipated game of the year. It's the latest first person shooter that gets you closer to realism in a virtual home entertainment system that you can get today. Personally, being a video gamer since the Atari 2600, I did not purchase this one. I used to be the guy that would get these shooters on day one. I swore off First Person Shooters altogether and focus on more thinking and strategic games than the mindless run and gun, that and I read more. Based on the reviews of this one, Call of Duty 3 is more of the same.
This is not why I wanted to write about Call of Duty 3, a review, you won't get that from me. I wanted to write about the game itself. The word 'game' is automatically tagged in your brain as a thing for a child. I can assure you these games are not for children. One of the main reasons I got off the first person shooter bandwagon is because of the players. For whatever reason, shooter games drag out the most racist, foul mouth people. This game is rated M for mature for a reason, yet there are more 12 and 13 year olds playing this than should be. The gore, violence, and images may be digital in nature the subject matter is very mature. Kids are getting older but there is a line and Call of Duty is pushing the realism to an up front in your face approach. The violence themes are taken from the headlines, but seeing a news report or reading about it in the newspaper (people still read?) is completely different than having control of it, real or not.
Call of Duty 3's controversial moment is a family home video point of view in London. You see a mother and young girl walking down the street talking about seeing Big Ben. A van pulls up and explodes taking them all out. You can see in the video below this is about as close to a news story as you can get. For a young child this maybe a little too much. In my opinion, it's 100% on the heads of the parents to see and understand exactly what they are letting their kids play. If they don't take the time to and blindly buy whatever the little Entitlement Generation cries for then they can't turn around and complain about it later.
This is not why I wanted to write about Call of Duty 3, a review, you won't get that from me. I wanted to write about the game itself. The word 'game' is automatically tagged in your brain as a thing for a child. I can assure you these games are not for children. One of the main reasons I got off the first person shooter bandwagon is because of the players. For whatever reason, shooter games drag out the most racist, foul mouth people. This game is rated M for mature for a reason, yet there are more 12 and 13 year olds playing this than should be. The gore, violence, and images may be digital in nature the subject matter is very mature. Kids are getting older but there is a line and Call of Duty is pushing the realism to an up front in your face approach. The violence themes are taken from the headlines, but seeing a news report or reading about it in the newspaper (people still read?) is completely different than having control of it, real or not.
Call of Duty 3's controversial moment is a family home video point of view in London. You see a mother and young girl walking down the street talking about seeing Big Ben. A van pulls up and explodes taking them all out. You can see in the video below this is about as close to a news story as you can get. For a young child this maybe a little too much. In my opinion, it's 100% on the heads of the parents to see and understand exactly what they are letting their kids play. If they don't take the time to and blindly buy whatever the little Entitlement Generation cries for then they can't turn around and complain about it later.
In Call of Duty 2, you walked through an airport and gunned down hundreds of innocent people in a terrorist act.
The rest of the game is you killing bad guys. As these games get more real and more popular the farther these game makers are going to push the limits as far as they can to maximize sales. It will always exist and I am one that encourages games like this, but I am a 30 something adult, not a 13 year old kid with control issues.
I encourage any parent that reads this or one that passes this on to someone in this situation, sit down with your kid for once and put the headphones on during a few online matches. Hear what your are exposing your kids to above and beyond the content of the game. At the end of the day you are the parent or are the Xbox and racist spewing hate mongers that are online with your kid doing the parenting?
End of Line
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