One man's observations, examples, thoughts, and personal anecdotes on how gaming, despite its flaws and bad reputation, has made him a better person.
(Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, Culture, ICO, Journey, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes, PC, PS Vita, PS2, PS3, PSP, Wii U, Xbox 360)
It was a commenter blaming violent games for games for real world violence. The misinformed comment went something like 'Oh, it's because these kids spend all day playing violent videogames'.
The reply was 'If they spend all day playing games then when do they get a chance to commit random acts of violence'.
If anything i'd become more violent if I couldn't play violent games. They're one of the best stress relievers on the planet.
and fighting games like Street Fighter series,MVSC2,Capcom Vs. SNK 2,Guilty Gear,Blazblue,Mortal Kombat,King of Fighters,Samurai Showdown,Melty Blood,Tekken, and Gundam Extreme Vs. I'd be breaking shit. But instead I play a lot of fighting games as a great way to vent stress.
NON-GAMERS need to STFU.
And I learned that (through the use of monks or priests to cause a rebellion), like in real life, preachy religious men are NOT to be trusted.
Future Nobel Prize winner here!
Breath of Fire 3 and SaGa Frontier 2 taught me that I was not alone in the fact that even my own family members would be the first to hurt/betray me. Those games touched on some disturbing topics of betrayal and the innocence of children in a harsh world. And finally, Catherine taught me a thing or two about relationships and pressure of growing older and the pressure to get married. These games WILL change a persons perspective on things, and I hope to have my children play some of these games (when I have kids someday).
So my point is that games can make u a better person, without the game needing to be preachy, overly-optimistic, mega-positive, dramatic tear-jerker, etc. It just needs to tell you the cold hard truths about life, and how you take in that information is up to you.
(Plus those are some sweet games you named!)
To say game will always make you a better person is far from the truth, games are no different than situations you would normally grow from in life.
So a game should not be treated differently, just like a bad situation in life can have a positive or negative outcome, a game is not any different.
It all heavily depends on the persons mentality whether they choose to make it a positive one or a negative one.
Some people might play GTA, screw a hooker and say that is gross, I would never do that in real life. Others might actually consider picking up a prostitute something they might have never thought of before and only thought of just from playing GTA.
Again without repeating myself it all depends on the person and what mind state they might be in when they assess the situation.