The mainstream media interest in videogames has generally only been sparked by the regular doses of outrage at whichever game is currently corrupting our children. Which is why I’ve been so absorbed by the coverage of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, in which you go undercover and become part of a terrorist act – and also the media coverage which seems to be a more balanced and mature look at video game morality than we’ve previously had (Probably because most people in their 30s have grown up with videogames and are reasonably likely to have a current generation console in their house).

Two thoughts initially sprang to mind:

1. The morality questions comes round every 6 months, and has done since the days of the Spectrum and Commodore 64. Aside from the comical notion of the media outcry over Night Trap, for example, in which the most offensive thing was the acting, there have also been dilemmas put in front of gamers for a while now – if not quite as explicit as this choice.

In one edition of the World War 2 series Medal of Honour, for example, you encountered a group of unarmed German soldiers sat around the campfire, and could either sneak past, or shoot them in the back – and either option resulted in the game continuing as before – the only result was to have the player consider the moral implications. (Possibly more for me than most, as I’d been reading Michael Walzer’s ‘Just and Unjust Wars’ for a history class at university around the same time!)

2. Even in games where there is no explicit moral dilemma or mechanic players have used their own imagination for years to fill in such gaps. And with online gaming, our encounters with other humans is leading to questions of etiquette and morals in a way which is entirely compatible with the physical world, even if it’s played out differently. For instance, have a read of ‘Bow, Nigger’, an article often referenced as spearheading games journalism away from simply rating graphics on a score of 1-10, and instead starting to look at the feelings and emotions players encounter, for example.

And that’s before we even start mentioning Second Life and World of Warcraft.