Death occurs in almost every video game that isn't a sports or puzzle game. Pac-man is unmade by the touch of a ghost. Mario is eaten by an angry plant. These aren't gruesome deaths, but they are death nonetheless. Death in video games is rarely the heart-crushing affair it is in real life. It's usually just a game mechanic for indicating success or failure. You successfully put enough bullets into this enemy; he is now dead. You failed to make that long jump; you are now dead. We waste a thousand terrorists in Call of Duty, and we don't - nor are we expected to - give a second thought to the widows and orphans we leave in our wake. And that's okay. These games aren't meant to make us ponder death and its consequences. But some games do venture into this territory, and I think it's a very worthwhile endeavor.

There are a few ways death is encountered in video games. These might not be the only ways, but common ones are:

Death caused by the player (a.k.a. killing something)

Death of a friendly or neutral NPC

Death of the player him/herself

Because it seems I have a lot to say on this topic, I've decided to make this a three-part series. The first topic:

Death caused by the player

Author's note: Due to the nature of this discussion, I could not avoid talking about spoilers. This post contains spoilers for Modern Warfare 2, and Spec Ops: The Line.

Normally, killing things is what's expected of the player. In Doom, you kill demons. In CoD, you kill terrorists. It's like a Geico commercial. "If you play video games, you kill stuff. It's what you do". It's literally what you are meant to do in most cases. In this part of the discussion, though, we'll be looking at games that make you think twice about pulling the trigger, or otherwise ending lives.