Does Shooting Bunnies Make Me A Bad Person?
I have a confession to make. As a city boy who came from a suburban upbringing, I haven't had a lot of experience with hunting. I don't really like the idea. But when I noticed a demo of Cabela's Big Game Hunter 2010 had popped up on Xbox LIVE, I decided to see what it was all about. I knew that Cabela had a whole series of games, but didn't know anything about them. So I thought it wouldn't hurt to give it a try.
The demo is essentially the first level of the game, which walks you through the controls. The graphics on the Xbox 360 are gorgeous, and impressively realistic, although the constant need to activate your "hunter sense" sucks because that makes everything black-and-white except for the specific targets that you sense. What I found quite appealing is that it's like a FPS where you have to move slowly and snipe your targets from a distance. Whenever I play an FPS, that's usually what I prefer to do anyway, so it's like this was made for me!
On the plus side, it's never too tedious to sneak up on your prey (which in the first level are all various kinds of deer), and they have shooting gallery sections in between to break up the monotony. First you take shots at ducks flying overhead, then later you'll aim your trusty shotgun at scampering bunny rabbits. These bits I found less entertaining because it's all fast-paced, so my accuracy suffers tremendously. Plus, it takes forever to reload! The level concludes with their version of a boss battle, which in this case is a mountain lion. You have to shoot it dead before it kills you. If it does get its claws into you, it's a simple matter of mashing buttons until you can push it off an take another shot.
I would never go hunting in reality, but I have to admit that virtual hunting was kind of engrossing. I loved sneaking around in the tree line and finding just the right spot with some cover so I could carefully line up my shot and pick out the buck with the biggest rack so it would get me the most points. It's surprisingly stingy with the points, though, making it difficult to get gold medals. I guess that'll help with replayability. There is something disturbingly satisfying, though, about lining up the shot and then watching that one bullet take down your prey.
Does that make me a horrible person? I hope not, because I have another confession to make... I now own Cabela's Big Game Hunter 2010, so I'm going to be killing all kinds of innocent wildlife! Look out!
Wootini
Posted to Video Games on 2 November 2009
· Comments (11)
Other stuff like this: big game hunter 2010, bunnies, cabela, demo, xbox 360, xbox live
Answer = only if you touch yourself inappropriately at the same time :)
I'm in two minds on this.
Mind you, I would never play this myself. My dilemma is all about how I feel about others playing these games/these games even existing.
As a kid I played duck hunt on my old Master System. And I know personally well that doing things in videogames doesn't mean that you're going out and doing it yourself. In fact, I have this theory that things like games and movies and such can provide and outlet for more violent tendencies that prevent you (as in the sane portion of gamers that don't make the news) from going out and doing it in RL.
That being said, as a huge animal lover I still have an immense problem with realistic games that have you hunting and killing animals.
It's a case of my emotions and my logic being in a deadlock I guess.
So... normal games where you kill hordes of other human beings is just dandy in comparison? Oh, I know... maybe it's okay to meet interstellar travelers with their own deep and misunderstood culture and blow their heads off into a gooey green mess.
It's not like you're really hunting, which is fine anyway. If you lived in Michigan, like I do, you'd appreciate hunting season because deer overpopulation is a real danger here. It may surprise people to learn that humans are not gods and are, in fact, part of the ecosystem, not above it somehow. As a natural predator of deer for eons we're now doubly important many of the other natural predators have been driven from the state.
I did say it was a conflict of emotion over logic, did I not?
And I generally sympathise with enemies in games, so I don't as a rule enjoy the need to kill them.
As for overpopulation, you do know this applies to humans as well, don't you? Are you suggesting we start a large-scale manhunt now as well?
And if you truelly belief humanity is living up to it's role in the ecosystem, you're kidding yourself. You think part of the ecosystem is to have huimanity kill the planet itself?
Humanity has for a long time now not lived up to whatever role it might have had and is going way overboard with its influence on the natural ecosystem.
And I would never under any circumstances appreaciate the killing of animals. No matter where I lived.
*Hides for cover*
Safe me from Wootini's sights!
Bunny.
When deer start over-grazing they starve not only themselves but other animals that depend on the same food source. So if everyone stopped hunting, at least in our state, it would lead to mass starvation of various species. There is a reason people that actually study eco-systems support a deer-hunting season, which is actually highly organized and regulated.
Or we could breed and release thousands of wolves and cougars back into the wild. Sure people would start losing pets, livestock and small children... but that's a small price to pay, right?
Yeah, I think I'm gonna end this discussion before it properly begins.
You and I have difering opinions. Let's leave it at that shall we? Please?
The last time I got into an argument with someone on this site was annoying enough.
I'd say that through all forms of media we've become desensitized to killing other sentient beings, and due to urbanization we're become intellectually detached from both our food source and the reality that the natural world is normally vicious, uncaring and bloody.
My personal view is that if I find it acceptable for an eagle to swoop down, catch a rabbit -carry it off and proceed to chew it's face off I can't complain when another species spots a rabbit, blows it's brains out -carries it home, skins it/boils it/eats it. Just because we're self aware tool users that can now call the shots (ba-doom-ching) doesn't magically stop us from being animals and every bit a part of nature's cycles as we've always been.
Here's the way I see it...
I don't have a problem with enslaving animals and forcing them to fight for my amusement, or sometimes for gambling purposes (Pokemon and some Dragon Quest games).
Nor do I have qualms with excessively killing thousands of animals much weaker than I am (level grinding in almost any RPG).
And I've never had a second thought about exterminating the sole survivor of some rare animal species even when it is merely trying to defend itself (another RPG staple with secret boss encounters, especially noticeable in Skies of Arcadia).
And don't even get me started on how many people played Oregon Trail just for the hunting mini-game and trying to shoot the tiny quick squirrels, which were the most difficult to catch while providing the smallest amount of meat.
Of course in real life I would never do any of these things, but in a videogame it's different since nothing is actually being killed or harmed. As long as you know what the consequences are in the real world and know not to actually act on it, then I don't think it really matters if you do it in a virtual realm. The only time I think I ever truly cared about animal cruelty in a game was in the Zelda series with the chickens. It's all about how your actions impact gameplay, and in a videogame if there aren't gameplay consequences for killing bunnies then it isn't a problem.
It's just the practical application of it. I care about killing animals in real life because there are consequences for that. In videogames those consequences don't usually manifest and so there is no gameplay consequence for killing defenseless bunnies. If a game was created with a realistic ecosystem where hunting one species of animal impacted other species populations and plant growth, then I would care about the bunnies in a videogame. But until those real world consequences find their way into a videogame, then I don't see it as an issue.
As much as I love animals in real life, it's just a game, and to that I say enjoy the hell out of yourself. It's not gonna make you jump up and nuke a forest for real or anything, so I'd say relax. It's all good~
I can't believe this started a debate. Oh wait I can.. I love animals but I understand that hunting has its place. There's a difference between sustainable hunting (and fishing for that matter!), and an outright wasteful slaughter or just plain animal abuse.
Anyway just reading this makes me want to try the demo if it's really that good of a game (that's all that matters to me!). Thanks for the heads up Wootini.