In the video there are multiple points pressed forward about videos game being negative and positive with different researchers of psychology, scientology and more professional bodies explaining their research and findings.
A good point in the video that is talked about by Dr. Valerie Voon is the immediate reward you gain from video games, she explains how people don't like to do long brooding tasks and video games offer them a quick and easy reward that makes you feel accomplished. Looking at Crash Bandicoot it offers multiple ways to gain rewards in game, you can either complete the level normally and collect the needed crystal for the level which is quite easy or participate in a harder, longer task to collect a gem which can make you feel more accomplished. Depending on your attitude and mood you can choose either one to do and feel accomplished for collecting either one if not both.
A negative point in the video is Dr. Andy Przyblyski's research where he got two groups to dip their hands in freezing water after play two different games, tetris (a simple game) and bastet (a game that is programmed to make you lose,) what he would do is get an individual to play and after the game make them add seconds to how many seconds they place their hands in the cold water. The research that came out was that the people who played the game that made you lose would up the seconds that people placed there hands in the water by 7 seconds stating that video games made people more violent. In my opinion this is not the case and depends on the person who is playing, it could depend on their intolerant attitude or how frustrated they get. Firstly, everyone is different and some people would add seconds on to that experiment because of there personality making it a biased experiment. Secondly, If given the choice between playing bastet or Crash Bandicoot more people would choose to play Crash Bandicoot simply because they wouldn't want to play a game that forces them to lose. People have choices over the video games they play and if they have very small intolerance then I believe they wouldn't choose to play games that make them frustrated.
Both of these points in the video contradict each other when comparing crash bandicoot in the situations presented, but as stated, there is a main quest to complete and optional ones each offering a reward type that make you feel accomplished as stated by Dr Valerie Voon, this a good point as it can make people with problems such as low self esteem or a physical problem feel accomplished for doing things in an unrealistic world compensating for what they can't do in life. The point by Dr Andy Przyblyski, in my opinion, was wrong because as I said, if a person has a choice to choose between an infuriating game or a relaxing or humourous game then I'm sure they would take the latter.
Violence
The Crash Bandicoot series does not stray from using violence to portray its gameplay with things like a bazooka gun being a mechanic involved in the game. Someone like Craig Anderson from the video would explain that violence from a video game cause a "less physiological action" to seeing violence in real life, making it sound like people are becoming desensitised by video games which could lead onto them causing violent actions of their own. However, the gun speaks for itself as it fires fruit from inside so where one person says something like "this game is teaching children violence and how to commit violent acts" they won't be able to explain the fact that the violence is portrayed in a cartoon style like Tom and Jerry.
It is unrealistic and not possible, children don't look at the gun and think "I could use that on people I don't like or strangers" because they know that it is an impossible contraption that won't work the way they would want it to. They understand the unrealism that comes with it just as they understand the unrealism with Tom and Jerry, they can see two real life creatures committing acts that their real life counter parts cannot commit (such as walking on two legs) and so when they see an anvil dropped on another ones head they don't suddenly believe they could commit a heinous act. These two concepts are parts of completely different media but they have very similar ideas in how they look and work and so are both great for comparing to prove that any media (as well as video games) aren't influential upon people. Chris Ferguson from the video above summarised it very clearly and I would agree with him, he stated that "if video games are making us more aggressive there should be one very obvious consequence, a rise in violent crime."
A lot of arguments, other than violence, used against video games are things like drug abuse, sex, nudity, profanity, gore and intense scenes. If we take a look at Crash Bandicoot the game doesn't include any of the above off the list which puts a lot of the arguments down already making the people who talk negatively about games have less points to use against games. Not all games base their story or gameplay upon controversial issues and Crash Bandicoot Warped is a prime example of this explanation, the game was created so people of all ages could play a humorous adventure that relaxes and brings a happy emotion to them. People can argue that the violence is still in there and so still makes it a negative game but looking at the ways Crash attacks his enemies and the way the enemies attack him back there is a distinct visual that it isn't meant to be taken seriously.
Tim Schafer from the video made a very good point, he stated that "for the most part what people say about violent video games, they said about comic books and movies..." This is a good point because at one time when this media text was new people were outraged, they couldn't believe what they were watching or reading and thought of the negative effects they had on people. However, since the media is quite old now people don't fuss about them as much and instead see them as an integral part of entertainment. Video games are a new from of media that have only come around within the recent years and just as people did with comics and movies, they are quick to judge and label them as a bad source of entertainment, in my opinion games have slowly become less blamed for being violent and kind of falling off peoples radars as they are getting use to this new media text in their daily lives.
Below is a video that shows a level from Crash Bandicoot Warped. When watching it you can see the violence that Crash uses, to hurt his enemies, and from the methods he use they are impossible to do in real life. Even the way the enemies die show an unrealistic animation as they either disappear into thin air with a flash of smoke or they get sent flying through the air. It brings a fun childish effect to the game but isn't out of place in the slightest.
Conclusion
In my opinion there are a lot more positives to this game, especially in the form of entertainment. The player gets to experience a fantastic adventure filled with jokes, great environments, a simple yet unique story and a game created with every person of every age in mind. It allows for an interactive experience not playable by any other form of media or game due to how unique everything is about the game, especially the characters. It is hard to paint Crash Bandicoot Warped in a serious light due to how unrealistic the game looks and plays, this game is a excellent example to use for combating the opinion of video games being bad as it is a prime example of a game that doesn't display too many negative emotions or actions. It was created with one job and that was to entertain an audience that plays video games for fun.
Studies have shown that since video games have started and developed that crime has also decreased in the world, while there are many factors involved that need to be taken into account it could also mean that video games are a source of media that have helped to combat the aggressiveness of certain violent individuals. Also since video games are a popular past time for people to playthrough and have become very easy to acquire then violence should have increased since there are well over thousands of violent games available for the public to play including GTA, manhunt, doom, the punisher etc. yet crime has not risen and the majority of people who play these games do not n fact copy what they see.
Sources:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y6HxxwndXXY
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3573515/Tom-Jerry-blamed-ISIS-Head-Egypt-s-Information-Service-blames-cartoon-characters-teaching-children-blow-people-encouraging-extremism.html
http://blog.gameagent.com/weekly-flashback-games-reduce-crime-and-tf2-is-now-free/
http://pixelkin.org/2015/10/12/a-psychologist-reacts-to-a-recent-apa-report-on-video-game-violence-studies/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugY7RG54GEg
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