The pretty amazing-looking Japanese arcade game Arm Spirit is being recalled after three gamers have broken their arms playing it. Here it is:
This comes at an unfortunate time, just a month before I leave for DiGRA and Tokyo Game Show. That’s life for you: Sometimes you just miss the boat, or the arm.
Now, the interesting bit is actually the fact that it is being recalled due to three broken arms, and that I also instinctively believe that this is the right thing to do. It is assumed that games should be mostly harmless, and it is hard to argue otherwise.
Games that actually hurt you just remain associated with dystopian sci-fi (Rollerball), but we wouldn’t want it here? Never?
I guess you have already heard about the “painstation”, a pong variant that actually harm you if you miss the ball : http://www.painstation.de/
But is this still a form of “play” ? Or does the limit between “play” and others activities, such as “working” lies in the idea that “games” are disconnected from “reality” ?
I think the “games must be harmless” statement is deeply connected with this particular idea of what “play” is.
But in my opinion, games likes this “masochist” pong or an hypothetic “masochist edition” of Arm Spirit that broke arm of losers on purpose (pain beeing part of the outcome) should question this “narrowed” conception of “play”.
Is “play” only limited to frivolous activities ?
I don’t think so. I think that games involving money or these games featuring a punishing game over are not “frivolous”, but are still a form of play activity.
Agreed, games often involve some kind of penalty for losing, even if it is just feelings of frustration or dissapointment; Raising the stakes can make games more exciting, hence gambling or contact-sports like boxing. I suppose it depends how much sport and games are forms of play.
I just thought of this:
Perhaps we are inclined to attach a significant outcome to play as adults because we are increasingly immersed in performance oriented tasks as we enter the adult world? In other words we need to introduce a significant outcome to our play to reconcile it with our adult understanding of the world.
Interesting thought :).
It may open a link to “serious games”, where the outcome is intented to be deeply connecty with “real life” (either learning someting “useful”, or training oneself to be more efficient on a task through so-called simulators).
Maybe you’re right, this vision is related to the adult vision of the world. I think children point of view on such “harmful” games could be interesting. Besides the fact that gambling is forbidden to children, I bet they don’t need “play to be safe” to recognize it as play. Many kids seems to enjoys enjoy fighting as a form of play.
Does anyone ever heard of a study on this topic ?
“Many kids seems to enjoys enjoy fighting as a form of play.”
A very good point.
Not to mention that russian roulette is a game as well. The stakes are rather high, but still.
But, then again, whenever you’ll play russian roulette, the painstation or enjoy a good fight, you’ve accepted the consequences in advance. You know you can get hurt – or worse. This is not the case with the Arm Spirit, which is, or should be, harmless.