Over the weekend, I started seeing this new commercial for "Call of Duty: Black Ops":
http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pblj3JHF-Jo
It's called "There's a soldier in all of us" and shows "ordinary" people, including some kids, basically shooting up a place. (No one actually is shown dying in the video.) The soundtrack is the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" (lyrics: "War, children, is just a shot away"). To make it even more appealing (I guess) some of the people in the video are celebrities.
Although I'm typically not disturbed by viewing violent video games, for some reason I found this commercial disturbing, and I'm not totally sure why. Anyone have any thoughts? Maybe because I can tell the game is a game, while the commercial is live action? Maybe it is the commercial's similarity to many actual real (and tragic) events, where an "ordinary" person gets a weapon, goes somewhere, and starts shooting lots of people? This scenario somehow seems different than when soldiers are shooting.
Wow, I agree with you. I am NOT a fan of violence in video games and although many studies have proven that there aren't really huge effects, I still think that no matter how small the effect or how short lived the effect is....an effect is still an effect! when I watched the commercial it felt so real, and I do think that shatters our image of a fake game-play world versus a real-life world. I've personally played call of duty, and although I die in the first min every time, I think it is an awful game! It is very life like and just seems like I'm getting attacked from every angle and I end up shooting my partner or just shooting everywhere! I just don't like it!
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i did see this commercial on tv and i was a little put off by it because i didnt know what it was at first. i think seeing normal people with guns shooting up the place is a little unnerving. i guess it added a sense of realism that was too much, even for me
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