draft of what will be spoken in my documentary film

1. Act 1: Intro
with the ever-increasing popularity of the video games industry, it has now
become larger than the music and film industry combined, generating over 90
billion dollars in 2016 and is still growing.
There have been arguments for and against video games, especially with the
release of 1995’s, ‘MortalKombat’. And whilethey are now morewidely
accepted; they remain incredibly controversial. So today, we’regoing to look at
the mostpopular arguments for and against video games and discover how
they really affect our minds.
Act 2: Creating crime?
Sadistic, gory, Horrific. All words thathave been used to describe overly violent
video games since their inception, it’s also been the heart of controversies for
years. Itseems whenever videogames appear in the media it’s related to this
subject, and it’s likely that people will never be fully united on this.
Typically, there are two points of view, the first, is that the young people can
gain access to violent and graphic videogames, and will mimic this behavior in
real life, and therefore violent videogames should be banned permanently. The
other side to this coin is that the people who are in danger of mimicking this
behavior, shouldn’thaveaccess to this content in the firstplace with the
restrictions that are set in place by PEGI, thePan European Gaming
Information. And is therefore not the fault of the videogame, but the fault of
the parentor carer.
Those are the most common arguments, but whathave researchers found? In
2015 the ‘American psychologicalassociation’, or APA, released their research
stating, quote “The research shows consistentrelations between violent
videogame useand aggressivebehavior, aggressivecognitions and aggressive
affect, and decreases in pro-socialbehavior, empathy and sensitivity to
aggression”.
However, when this research was released, it was heavily criticized by over 200
academics, openly signing a letter questioning the validity of this research,
since a large portion of the material used in the research had not been
subjected to peer review of any kind. Dr. Mark Coulson, an associate professor
of psychology atMiddlesex university is noted for saying “I fully acknowledge

2. that exposure to repeated violence may have short-term effects- you would be
a foolto deny that - but the long-term consequencesof crime and actual
violent behavior, there is just no evidence linking violent video games with
that."
He went onto say that there are adult videogames, but there are also adult,
books, movies and TV shows, allof which should be monitored to make sure
children never see them. He concluded by saying “I wouldn’trubbish the
report, butI think it’s importantto look past the headline”.
The APA stated that more research would be required to establish a solid
connection between video games and violent behavior. In rebuttal to this in
the sameopen letter, they mention that crime amongstyouth in the US and
across the world for that matter, was standing at a 40-year low point. They
wrote“This decline in societal violence conflicts with claims that violent video
games and interactive media, are important public health concerns”.
According to Dr. Andrew Pryzbylski(priz-bill-skee) from the Oxford internet
Institute. “We focused on the motives of the people who play electronic games
and found thatplayers have a psychologicalneed to come out on top when
playing. If playersfelt thwarted by the controlsor the design of the game, they
can wind up feeling aggressive.” Seemingly none of these arguments are
conclusive, and it’s almost a guarantee not everyone will agree, but whatever
the casemay be, it looks as though violent video games are here to stay. While
aggression is something, we remain divided about, do they change our
mindsets in any other ways?
Act 3: Mindsets and our biology
Diving into the archives fromthe American journalof play, there’s a study
referring to video games granting the player, as the article calls it “basic
psychologicalneeds, these include autonomy, relatednessand competence”.
They arguethat with the release of more story driven and complex games, the
players gain a feeling of controlover their decisions, socialconnection to
people in the game world, and can learn self-efficacy (eff-I-ka-see), allof which
are skillsets they argue can translate to real life.

3. A common structurewith videogames is using a system called ‘positive
reinforcement’ the action of completing a desired task and getting a reward for
it, very similar to how you would train a dog.
This is due to the release of a neurochemical in the brain called ‘Dopamine’,
this substancethat gives you a rush of satisfaction from completing a desired
task, eat when you’rehungry? Drink when you’rethirsty? That’s dopamine.
However, in 1998 in the study ‘Koepp et al’, British scientists found that
completing difficult objectives in video games led to a massivereleaseof
dopamine, whatreportedly shocked them was that this release was the same
as when they dosed patients with a small amountof amphetamines (am-fet-a-
meens) a common treatment drug for ADHD, meaning videogames have the
exact sameneurological release on the brain as a highly addictive substance.
At face value this wasn’ta problem, withdrawalsymptoms werenever found in
subjects that played videogames. But this dopamine isn’talways enough,
people need to feel like they’reearning something to keep going, however
even hundreds of years ago we learned that we can train animals by throwing
them an occasional treat for their efforts. Video game companies take
advantageof this, leading onto an issuewhich has only appeared in
videogames more recently, gambling.
Act 4: Taking our cash?
Overtgambling in videogames has been around for a very long time, however
this is something new. The infamous ‘Loot boxes’ are a game mechanic that
allow the players to purchase in game items but in a randomized manner. But
in truth it’s not that random, much like slotmachines in casinos, they are
designed to give you the more common rewards aboveanything else, with
only a very small chance to obtain anything worth spending money on.
However, it differs fromslot machines in that you are always guaranteed to get
something for your money, whether it was the item you wanted or not, and
the prices never change, so therefore it cannot be legally classed as gambling
in many territories. That doesn’t mean to say it’s not as addicting though, and
often video games, especially mobile videogames, will give you a very finite
amount of in game currency to spend on this wheel of chance, once again,
something you see a lot of in online casinos.

4. After that freebie has run out though, many are already hooked on this system,
and to get morein game currency there are usually two options. Firstly, you
can earn it yourself by spending hours playing the game, but you can justbuy it
immediately, and as mentioned before a dopamine rush from videogames is
equal to that of drugs, so people will typically take the shortcutto getting what
they want, in this case, that rush of dopamine, in addition to this, it’s simply
human natureto take the path of least resistance.
So why aren’tplayers stopping when they keep getting items that are no
good? It’s the same reason someonecan be at a slot machine for 5 hours.
Because players don’tget a rush of dopaminewhen they get a bad reward,
they get it simply by pushing the shiny button onscreen that starts the action,
simply the chance of getting something good for their efforts, is incredibly
addicting, especially when that reward starves theplayer of the large
dopamine rush that they’re now hooked on.
Therefore, when players finally do get the item they want, it’s usually the final
nail in the coffin, sincethe dopamine release after so much wasted effort is
incredibly high, and only further encourages them to spend even moreon the
loot box systemin the future. Naturally not everyoneis affected by this
system, and some justdon’tuse it at all, however there are others that can
end up wasting hundreds, or in somecases even thousands of their own
money justto spend on this system.
Governments in parts of the world have taken steps to deal with this issue,
countries like Holland and Belgium have banned videogames with this loot
crate systemin them, as they breach the gambling laws the governments have
in place, and it’s likely that other countries will follow suit.
Act 5: medicine and mindsets
Video games are even being utilised in medicine, but in an unconventional
way. In the book ‘Super better’ by Jane McGonigal, sheexplains that child
patients going through re-mission will often miss doses of medication for any
number of reasons, butin 80% of cases when cancer returned, it was due to
children not taking their medication. Therefore, Hopelab created a game called
‘Re-mission’, in which you play as a robotwho travels through the human body
destroying cancer cells with weapons such as ‘chemo-blasters’ and ‘anti-biotic

5. grenades’, the game was designed as a coping mechanism for people going
through cancer treatment.
In a clinical trial, patients who played this game for as little as 2 hours, had
better medication adherence for three months. Electronic pill cap monitors
showed that players took 16% moreanti-biotics doses over a 3-month period.
This means that the game eliminated half of the originally missed doses, Re-
mission players who had their blood tested had 41% higher levels of
medication in their system, this means they’re morelikely to stay in remission,
this breakthrough meantthe game being shipped to 250,000 patients world-
wide.
Itdoesn’tstop there however; in a separate clinical trial they weretesting the
psychologicalchanges in players and non-players through a series of questions,
the responses werevery similar except for one huge difference. Players said
they felt much more empowered and optimistic; this is self-efficacy, the belief
you can have a positive impact on your life.
Videogames are structured to teach us this, starting with nothing and
overcoming challenges and getting a reward for your efforts. If the game has
been designed correctly, these challenges become increasingly difficult, with
the clear messageof telling players that through practice and learning they can
succeed, According to Jane Mcgonigal. "This is the classic path to self-efficacy:
accept a goal, make an effort, get feedback on that effort, improvea concrete
skill, keep trying and eventually succeed." This is a lasting mindset that
permanently changes how you think, whatyou believe and what goals can be
achieved.
That’s why Re-mission worked so well, it was self-efficacy for young patients,
this game allowed them to see that their treatments weren't justexhausting
procedures that they were forced to do. Instead they could see them as
powerfulweapons they had full controlof, that perspective gavethem the
willpower they needed to keep using the treatments to save themselves.
Researchers continued to study this topic, testing the determination between
gamers and non-gamers. Simply by having people from both groups complete
a puzzlegame with increasing difficulty each time, they found that people who
didn’t play video games gave up far quicker than those who did. Other studies
unrelated to videogames, showed that people who succeeded in one task, had

6. that mentality carry over into the next, and were far less likely to give up when
the difficulty increased.
Scientists have argued that despite the high release of dopamine being taken
advantageof by video games, it is also the key to a better work ethic. Jane
Mcgonigal states that “a strong work ethic isn't a 'moral virtue' that can be
cultivated simply by wanting to be a better person, it's actually a bio-chemical
condition that can be fostered purposefully, through activity that increases
dopamine levels in the brain."
This explains why exceptionally difficult games like ‘Dark souls’ and ‘Cuphead’
prime us to deal with everyday challenges with more determination. A recent
reportfrom a team of scientists stated that frequent gamers, havea higher
gray matter volume in the left ventral striatum.
Gray matter is what the brain is made up of, and essentially the more gray
matter there is, the more powerfulthe brain. However, this doesn't mean in
general, the left ventral striatum is the reward processing partof the brain,
and in this case the more powerfulit is, the morecognitive resources itcan
devote to determination, optimism, motivation and learning. With this being a
bio-chemical process, this positive attitude towards challenges would translate
to real life, not justthe game world.
Act 6: conclusion
Videogames are an ever-advancing featureof our developing world, with the
introduction of more advanced forms of play like virtual reality and more
physically interactive gameplay, with it too the effects of them change. But
what can we do with this knowledge? Already the military is looking to hire
gamers because of their quicker thought processing and reaction times, could
they do even more to help that we’renot yet sureof? Itseems as though as we
research further into the subject, wefind they do a lot more good than any of
us realised.