Not if you're really bad at them.

"In the non-violent condition, however, participants with higher scores in Machiavellianism had a higher increase in cortisol" - linked study

So people trying to be manipulative bastards in 'nice' games increase thier stress? Interesting.

Unfortunately the source study appears to be paywall and not yet on sci-hub, so don't know what specific games they used. As to how they define Machiavellianism, I assume something toke this:

"In the field of personality psychology, Machiavellianism is a personality trait characterized by interpersonal manipulation, indifference to morality, lack of empathy, and a strategic focus on self-interest." - Wikipedia

Awesome, let me Install Postal 2 quickly.

Not surprising at all. Animal's stress hormones don't go up after a battle you walk away from unharmed.

I recommend Left 4 Dead 2 for a minimum of two hours after work

Catharsis.

Even since the beginning of that BS with GTA4 and this old cat lawyer, it raised my eyebrows. There are mods and games created by all kinds of terrorists, but the thing is – you won't play them unless you are an especially masochistic youtuber. They are shit. And what makes them even more shit? Our upbringing, that would make even an engaging arcade of killing people stir us the wrong way. Compare Hatred and Hotline: Miami, the first one only good to laugh at it's intro sequence, and the second is the whole nugget of style, art. The same people who can create such a piece are usually those who can tell right from wrong and communicate it to their audience. Even the cringiest artists from SDBM scene know what's wrong and bathe in it, while NSBM idiots don't.

The whole notion of a game as a training camp for another masshooter is a useful horror story for parents to not leave their kids to tablets and phones (like if they have time for parenting these days, yup), but it's somehow inverted to attack the medium of games, and there's ESRB and other rating and regulating bodies sitting on their ass and casually playing vidya, not like paid testers, to see how many boxes it hits. What a sad joke.

I feel like game as a medium can be a useful environment to heal people. In my previous post, I asked people if there was a piece of media that overwhelmed them emotionally, and I've heard dozens of stories from you, Lemmings, about how some turns of a story can make you relieve a trauma you had, or cause an anxiety about something – like a newfound role of you as a parent and being worried for your kid. It has a potential in that field, as it's interactive and there are tools, although complicated for now, to create a custom scenario for a patient to untangle their thoughts. I guess, the first we have a good instrument for an easy creation, some educated psychotherapists would use it to treat PTSD and other problems related to the past experiences. That'd be the end argument in this stupid debate.

I kinda feel like it only works if you're getting the stress out, and not being stressed out.

Blasting demons in a mindless Doom-like game? Stress free.

Getting your ass handed to you in a Souls game? Stress inducing.