A news report from Russia Today television has compared a famous airport scene from the game with the aftermath of the bombing at Domodedovo International Airport in which 35 people were killed.

Even before its release 2009, the enormously popular Activision game Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, began attracting controversy after leaked footage revealed players could join a group of Russian ultra-nationalist terrorists planning to massacre civilians in an airport.

The Russian airport scene in Modern Warfare 2 differs substantially from this week's attack in that it involved machine guns rather than a bomb blast, which officials now suspect were carried out by a male and female suicide bomber. Even so, comparisons between the game and this week's bombing were inevitable.

“Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 has become a shocking reality ... with so many people seemingly downloading, playing or watching this game, you have to consider whether or not anybody actually thought this game could so closely resemble reality,” said a Russia Today news presenter in the report.

It also included comments from US terrorism expert Walid Phares, who said it was possible that computer games might influence the strategies employed by terrorists.

Phares, who is director of Future Terrorism Project at the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, said: “The issue is we need to know if terrorists or extremists are using these videos or DVDs or games to basically apply the model".

“I think those who have been radicalised already – that is supposed in this case jihadists, Al-Qaeda or other kind – they look at the games and say these games will serve them to train".

US media critic Danny Schechter told the Russian news site: “This is the way entertainment mirrors reality and reality mirrors entertainment, and there are people influenced by all this, even though the manufacturers always deny having any influence on anyone."

However, many of those posting comments on Russia Today in response to the article strongly criticised these views.

“Wake up people, the only thing to blame is the sick and twisted mind of the terrorist in question," wrote one.

“Idiots... "virtual version" in the headline at the same time they say 'a ficticious [sic] airport'... comparing a bombing to a bullet rampage... stupid media...” said another.

Another wrote: “I'm sure terrorists have ran out of ideas how to kill people so now they're playing video games in their caves to get inspiration. If you'd like to kill a lot of people, you don't need a video game to come up with such a complex plan as sending a suicide bomber to an airport."

Theories on the negative effect of violent computer games on society has found little scientific traction, however it is becoming increasingly common for army and police forces to use computer games to help prepare troops for real-life battle conditions.

The People's Daily in China reported in 2007 that 300 police officers in from the city of Tianjin had participated in a three-day competition for the computer game Counter-Strike, in an exercise officials hoped would hone the anti-terrorist skills of the force.

US Army forces are also trained on a range of computer games to help prepare them for operations in extreme battle conditions such as those experienced in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The airport bombing is the second large-scale incident this month to be linked to computer gaming. Jared Loughner, the man charged with killing six people and wounding 14 in Tucson during a US shooting spree earlier this month was found to have been an active member of multiplayer online game site, Earth Empires.

The site administrators said they were "absolutely horrified that someone who had been part of our relatively small group could be involved in such a horrible act".