Confessions

[Darkstar]

I love violent games. Some of my favourites are Manhunt (the sequel was sadly shit), Grand Theft Auto, Hitman...

Of course it still has to be a reasonably good game, many violent games are so glitchy and badly designed they are no fun.

In person I am the most calm and mild mannered guy, and I'd never hurt anyone. Never even think of actually hurting anyone. But in my head is a weird cinema of violence. All utterly meaningless, and not directed at real people even, it's just fun.

I'm kind of like that too, actually. Not so much the fantasies, per se, but I do tend to commit random acts of violence in video games. And not even all of the time; I played very paragon in the Mass Effect series. I'm generally a rather calm and unaggressive person in real life.

My brother was playing Grand Theft Auto five and handed me the controller for a while. I immediately went on a homicidal rampage. In fact, this happened every time he let me play to the point where he started complaining that I was too violent. It then occurred to me that he was trying to progress in the game whereas I was just killing everyone in sight for no reason. I still have to resist the urge to run over random pedestrians when I'm trying to actually get something done in that game.

But I'm not a violent person at all! Which is further evidence that violent game player =/= violent person.