Solution to the Violent Video Game

Do you play violent video games, such as mmorpgs (online massive multiplayer roleplaying games) and it's starting to wear on your conscience? Do think they are trying to induce entire sectors of the population to commit violent crime against real people? Do you disagree with killing animals and other sentient beings? There's a solution, at least for World of Warcraft (WoW) mmo.

Note how in WoW, the quests frequently require you to kill the helpless or weakened living things? Is it diseased? Kill it. Here's a quest. Kill "x" amount of rabid such and such. Is it ugly? Fat? Weird? Too skinny? Too old? Decrepit? Is it already dead or dying? KILL IT.
I was thinking about all this and realized there's a way to avoid this while still enjoying the challenge of the game. I call it "WoW pacificst" , which I will outline in a moment.

For those who find any participation in a violent game, still objectionable, realize that you live on a violent planet. You personally, don't have to take part in the direct violence, but any of your labor that supports a society, also by default, supports the violence that society may inflict, this includes your taxes paid and so on. Nurses and doctors still heal patients who are injured from violence, even if it is self-inflicted or as a result of gang banging, war, police work, and etc.

So without further ado, a possible solution to avoiding inflicting violence on others in WoW:

Make a character that can heal, either a paladin, priest, shaman or druid.
I suggest a paladin, as they can wear plate armor and bubble, but it's really a matter of preference.

1. any quests that ask you to locate a friend of the quest giver that is not inside an instance (see #11 for extenuating circumstances).

2. any escort quests in which you can heal the person your escorting who will do all the fighting, but which doesn't require you do any violence yourself.

3. collection quests that don't require violence. if violence is necessary, see if the needed items are purchaseable from the auction house instead. if so, buy them and turn them in to the quest giver (see #11 for extenuating circumstances).

4. cooking quests for which the items can be purchased off the auction house or foraged from the landscape.

5. non-violent delivery quests.

6. the cloth quartermasters cloth donations: wool, silk, mageweave, runecloth, etc.

7. world event quests that don't require violence (see #11 for extenuating circumstances).

8. world exploration achievements.

9. quests that require you modify npcs in some way but do no violence to them.

10. quests involving your trade skills (see #11 for extenuating circumstances).

11. groups/raids/battlegrounds with other PCs in which you are the healer but do not dot, nuke, slash, stab, hack, or do physical damage to the npcs or players from enemy factions. fears or stuns, provided they do no direct physical damage, are allowable but are a matter of choice.

12. chain quests that will eventually require violence, are still okay to do provided you only do the non-violent preliminary parts (see #11 for extenuating circumstances).

and there ya have it, how to play pacifist wow.

Never knew you could do the player you project in the game, having never played it.

I would say 99% of people would never choose that path.

And this is related to general conspiracies how...?

If people have issues with killing in games, maybe they should just play games that don't involve killing?

reply to post by Chadwickus


it's a challenge. and it's related because alot of people think it's a conspiracy that so many video games are violent. so i was thinking you could still function without the violence, enjoy the game, without killing the things around you. it's a way to bypass the violence without bypassing the game.

reply to post by Chadwickus


it's interesting that you have so many stars yet your avatar is of a guy with razor blades for fingers

reply to post by undo


I'm not quite sure how to respond to your post but when playing video games, especially WoW, killing is the last thing on my mind because i am in no way killing anything other than a bunch of pixels that come back to life in about 5-10 min anyway.

Maybe people have a difficult time distinguishing between a game and real life but if I do ever happen to see a 50 ft dragon walking down the street then I will absolutely attempt to shoot a fireball out of hands to get rid of him

reply to post by Anjin




hey, dragons are not ALL bad.

ANYway, i know what you mean but for the person who is a pacifist in real life and finds the act of pretend violence is still marginally to very offensive, it can be a problem. there is the solution of not playing, but i don't think that's necessary. just do what most of us do in reality (trademark, copyright): play the game without the violence.

if you like to play it with violence because it's just a game, i see nothing wrong with that either. this is just a matter of choice. ya know?

In Grand theft auto four, you will be driving a maybach through brooklyn, a very regular gaming experience for that particular franchise. If your an avid gammer your going at about 160 miles an hour, but once you lose your control you are quite likely to go onto a sidewalk and take out any NPC's unfortunate to be walking down the street. in the older GTA's, this wasnt a major concern to me because of the stock animations of the ran over pedestrians were recycled and in no way realistic.

NOW, they have the euphoria game engine which gives each object a unique trajectory and "rag doll physics" which means no two people will react in the same manner, and each time a person is struck their body flies in a totally unique way.

In the older GTA's, you never think twice about hitting people, but in GTA4, I just feel really bad when I hit an old lady with her grocery bag.
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One of the best game franchises of all time is the Star Wars - "Knights of the old republic" (dont talk to me about KOTOR3, as I am not a MMO person. )

in KOTOR you are a jedi with a choice on each game action. you can be really nice, or really evil. the light path still has you killing people, about half of the kills off the dark path, but you only fight people who are out to kill you.

reply to post by drsmooth23

So... By not killing creatures, monsters etc but assisting a person by healing them and watching their back isn't that just as bad as killing them your self... (Real life) friend of murderer: "your crazy I won't kill them!" Murderer:"ok then shut up and get me a snack whilst I kill this person." But to back track if you don't like violent video games don't play them, and the little pretties that you smote and loot... they will re-spawn in a couple of seconds no need for anyone to worry...oh yeah how are you going to get cloth, and money for auction house auctions if your not killing anything because there aren't enough "passive quests" to get 1/3 of the currency / cloth required to complete quests you mentioned...and I don't think this is a topic for ATS anyway.


[edit on 24-11-2009 by Solar.Absolution]

reply to post by Solar.Absolution


to quote myself from previous post:

if you like to play it with violence because it's just a game, i see nothing wrong with that either. this is just a matter of choice. ya know? not to mention, it's quite a challenge.

Everyone here seems to be missing a point. Any person above the intelligence level of a 6 year old seems to have the competence to discern reality from a virtual environment. Being the case, most people that play such violent games will not have an urge to reenact what they see in say, God of War.

Given there are some exceptions: Mental Illness, Drunkenness, and hard drugs. Example: During my time in the USAF, there was a group of fellow airman that got extremely drunk, played a bit of GTA: San Andreas and decided to live the game. Apparently they grabbed whatever firearms they had permits for and proceeded to shoot up a few city blocks. They did not shoot any people, only property. There were 5 witnesses to the carnage, 3 of which were in the line of fire. Those three stated that the shooters saw the person and stopped firing. Their total lack of common sense still stopped them from running over or gunning down a pedestrian.

The moral of the story is that no one in a very slim definition of "right mind" would willingly reenact the violence they perceive in video games to harm another human being.

Jack Thompson spent his life trying to prove that people would and try to get the games off the shelves. He has been disbarred as of late for bringing too many cases before the courts with no premise.

(p.s. earning money is easy. there's alot trade skills that don't require killing things unless picking flowers and mining ore is violent? then ya take the money and buy cloth, make clothes, or take the ore and make jewelry or armor.

anyway, the idea is that if you think there's a conspiracy to create an entire generation of violent people but personally enjoy video games in which there is violence, start with making a pacifist character if possible. i realize not all games are capable of such things but the ones that are, there's a possible solution.


[edit on 24-11-2009 by undo]

I can't read all of it. Its too terrible. Because its against violent video games.

First of all. Violent Video Games aren't even a real problem, maybe in the weak minded, or young kids.

But look. There is video games without violence, and there is video games with violence. Its the person's choice on what they play.

ive seen more people get hurt from watching wrestling than playing any video game.

remember the kid who broke another kids neck trying to do power slams? wrestling move.

why doesnt anyone try to ban that? IMO its only soft-core gay porn with terrible acting. sure the flips are hard.... but seriously... they wear spandex thongs with tassels.....

i remember one instance where a kid hit another kid with a hammer and they tried to blame it on that game kingpin. of course half the game you did have a hammer, but i still think something else went on.

most kids know the difference between the game world, and real world. there are some who don't, but these are the ones who give you a clue they shouldnt be watching certain things.

Win Lose Draw...

Tic Tac Toe...

"Do you want to play a game?" (Wargames movie)

You can't escape it!

this isn't an anti violent video game thread. this is about a way to look at and play violent video games even if you're an extreme pacifist and find it disturbing at some level.

i remember making a character and as i was questing along, i encountered this dog named "stanley." later, a quest giver asked me to go poison stanley. no way. perception has alot to do with it. get a quest to kill wolves? eh, they attack ya anyway. get a quest to kill a cute dog? could be a problem. in some places in the world, they would bludgeon stanley to death and eat him for dinner. so it really is a matter of perception and cultural bias i think.

i betcha a sizeable minority of healers are actually female players who don't like chopping people up with swords and stuff. not that females don't make or have violent characters, just theorizing on that portion of the population that is female and not into violence in violent video games, so they make healers. it's a jungian thing, perhaps. women tend to be nurturers (healers) ...yada yada.

this thread makes me miss my warlock

reply to post by STFUPPERCUTTER


aww. i haven't made a lock yet.
don't think i will either. although they make battlegrounds look easy.