1. How long have you been playing video games?
I have been playing video games for roughly 15 years I suppose.
2. How many hours do you play video games a week?
It varies heavily. If I am gaming normally, I suppose it would average around 5 hours a day, so about 35 hours a week. If I am deep into LaTale(An MMORPG), it pretty much sucks up most of my free time, and I might spent around 6-8 hours on weekdays, and then 8-12 on weekends, so about 48-64 hours if I am really into LaTale. Or in another case, like right now, I am hardly gaming at all, as I lost my old PS3 controller, and am currently waiting on one which shipped from the U.K, and I live in the US, and the expected shipping time is 18-26 says, so I probably won't have my controller until the end of February/First week of March. I am also waiting on a big update for LaTale, that is super late, to the point that I don't feel like playing until the update hits, so my two biggest gaming slots are on hold. I am pretty much limited to DS games/GBA games on my computer, which I have been neglecting Lately. So, my current gaming time per week would have to be about 0-5 hours a week.
3. Do the majority of your games feature some form of violence(extreme violence, gore, or strong language)?
That depends on how you define violence. If you define it as what is in the parenthesis, then no, almost none of my games match that description, but if violence like in Sonic the Hedgehog, Pokemon, or pretty much any JRPG for that matter count, then pretty much all of my games are violent games.
4. From a scale of 1-10, 10 being the highest, how aggressive do you get playing violent video games? This can be yelling, damaging items, or as simple as getting frustrated.
I would say that violence in a game isn't what influences my aggression. I would only even enter this scale if I was becoming frustrated, which is caused when a game is being very tough/cheap to beat. I would say that I could reach up to a 6, at least internally, when I am getting frustrated by playing games. When I reach that, I just lose the will to play if it goes on for too long, and I find it difficult to calmly talk to people for long until I cool down a bit.
5. Do you feel that you have been affect by violent video games in a negative way? I.e, desensitization, higher aggression, or any other ways.
I would be lying if I said that video games haven't altered my perception of violence at all, but I definitely don't feel desensitized to real violence, and I still find it to be highly disturbing compared to video-game violence. Heck, even in video games or movies/comics, I still find it unnerving when the violence seems to get a bit too real, like seeing someone get decapitated.
I definitely think that I am desensitized to violence to a moderate degree, to the point that things that got the country all riled up, like the Sandy Hook shooting, didn't phase me at all. I honestly didn't even see at first why everyone was even paying so much attention to it. This, I can squarely blame on the news media, as they broadcast every kind of horrible tragedy, so regularly, to the point that it loses its shock value, and just becomes another daily occurrence.
6. How old were you when you first started playing video games?
I think I was about 3 when I started gaming, as my parents had a NES before I was born, so I remember playing with it at a young age, but my first system that I ever owned for myself was a Sega Dreamcast I think when I was like 4 or 5. I'm 18 now by the way.