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purplechair
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Joined: 28 Mar 2005
Posts: 378
Location: in my pants
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 Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 10:08 am Post subject: Video Game Voters Network |
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(Obligatory link)
I still don't understand.
| The site wrote: | | Government does not regulate access to or sale of movies, books, and cable TV. There is no government mandate to show ID when seeing or buying an R-rated movie, and there is no reason to hold video games to higher scrutiny. |
Firstly, "no government mandate to show ID when seeing or buying an R-rated movie"? Surely that's bullshit? Could a 12-year-old legally buy a copy of Fight Club?
I read this, this morning.
| Hilary Clinton wrote: | | It's almost routine in popular games for players to spray other people with Uzis, to drive over pedestrians, to kill police officers, to attack women, and in some cases even to engage in cannibalism. |
I was planning on quoting that and then providing a list of the top 10 best-selling games in the US for 2005, but I can't find such a list. The Japanese list is topped with stuff like Animal Crossing, Nintendogs and Brain Training, and the UK list (which I have now lost) was similarly quite kid-friendly. My vague point is that the vast majority of spray-em-ups and drive-em-overs aren't actually popular at all, shameful clones and third-rate knock-offs that they are, although demonstrating that politicians don't really understand the subjects they're campaigning about is a bit like demonstrating the Pope to have catholic leanings.
Why isn't San Andreas (and others) an NC-17 game? Wouldn't that make everybody happy? |
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dhex
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Joined: 13 Dec 2004
Posts: 6319
Location: brooklyn, Nev Yiork
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| Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 10:34 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | Could a 12-year-old legally buy a copy of Fight Club? |
that varies from state to state. but federally speaking, it is immaterial at this time. though i have no doubt this will not change in the future, as it will apparently take a catastrophe that kills half the united states before people realize that government is not an answer to every single fucking thing we do, as giant hurricaines have clearly not been enough.
the AO rating is retail death, however, since no major retailers want to carry those titles.
anyway the whole point of this is that the ESA is worried that EA is going to cut a deal with sillary and the other freespeech-o-phobes that's separate from the industry (hence EA's 1000 bucks per plate fundraiser for ms. clinton last year) and i suppose this is a way to get people involved, thus showing "hey you guys, we've got enough people to turn this into a swing issue" type thing. or at least the threat of a swing issue bloc.
i don't think either scenario is very likely or even worthy of concern; people seem to be just happy buying their kids games that convey lawlessness in their very titles; others seem to be very happy pointing out that much like pimping, parenting isn't easy, and if everyone on earth doesn't bow to the breeders asap, they might have to have uncomfortable conversations with their children. etc. it's more or less every single democratic talking point from the last 20 years; this time the topic just happens to be something people see as a genuine issue of 'free speech' rather than something that only wicked republicans and/or [insert foil of the month here] would oppose. (see: campaign finance reform, gun control, explicit lyric warnings, smoking in movies, the effective death penalty act, etc)
basically, they're hoping that much like the mpaa, the ERSB can be used as voluntary policing tool to stave off this sort of costly legislation. (costly because it is ridiculous, court-worthy and possibly even a "ripe" scotus issue.) i do believe the ESA is smoking some incredible dope, but i can understand their desperation, since having to get everyone to pony up lots of cash to fight this (while ea starts to veer off to the sidelines, at least behind the scenes) is a difficult and annoying thing to do when it is hard enough just keeping jack thompson under wraps.
as gratifying as it is to see other people say "hey, she's a fucking asshole" or "lieberman is a frigging cuntface" in public, it makes me very sad to see that it's over fucking video games instead of something important.
perhaps it is a marketing lesson for the future - if you want to make people angry, tie it into video games. i'll have to think about this one further.
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sawtooth
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Joined: 02 Nov 2005
Posts: 419
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| Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:19 am Post subject: |
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cannibalism? Where?
I used to commit fratricide in Chip 'n' Dale's Rescue Rangers all the time, back in the day.
| a guy on the site, some article-writer wrote: | | The national carjacking rate has dropped substantially since "Grand Theft Auto" came out. Isn't it conceivable that the would-be carjackers are now getting their thrills on the screen instead of the street? |
Wouldn't his argument be better if he argued instead that video games don't affect these types of statistics at all? |
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dessgeega
loves your favorite videogame
Joined: 16 Jun 2005
Posts: 6563
Location: bohan
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| Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:34 am Post subject: |
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i gun down cops in animal crossing all the time.
i am the angel of death. i mete out justice with a gun i bought from tom nook.
judgement day is at hand, friends. come forth and be judged!
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Shapermc
Hot Sake!
Joined: 14 Oct 2004
Posts: 6279
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| Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 11:35 am Post subject: |
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| dhex wrote: | | Quote: | | Could a 12-year-old legally buy a copy of Fight Club? |
that varies from state to state. but federally speaking, it is immaterial at this time. though i have no doubt this will not change in the future, as it will apparently take a catastrophe that kills half the united states before people realize that government is not an answer to every single fucking thing we do, as giant hurricaines have clearly not been enough. |
Don't for get store to store as well.
But yes, I don't really see what would make GTA:SA and AO game. That hack is... well a hack. One way or the other you need to buy something else to get hot coffee to work. Though I think it would have been better and more honest to have released an AO version and an M version.
W/O the Hot Coffee stuff there is nothing in SA that would make the game AO.
And, in regards to that H. Clinton quote:
| The ESA wrote: | | 6. Eighty-five percent of all games sold in 2005 were rated "E" for Everyone, "T" for Teen, or "E10+" for Everyone 10+. For more information on ratings, please see www.esrb.org. |
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“The average man has a secret desire to be a swaggering, drunken, fighting, raping swashbuckler.”
-Robert E. Howard in a letter to a friend circa Decmber 1932
"There is no place in this enterprise for a rogue physicist!" |
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purplechair
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Joined: 28 Mar 2005
Posts: 378
Location: in my pants
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| Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2006 5:38 pm Post subject: |
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| dhex wrote: | | the AO rating is retail death, however, since no major retailers want to carry those titles. |
I don't really understand this, either. It's like the retailers don't want to cater for adults, even when they make up most of the market. Is it really so awful, that someone might want to see a film or play a game that was unsuitable for children?
I guess it's a bit catch-22, or something. Over here, we have 15+ and 18+ certificates that are legally enforced (although all it takes is for a parent to walk in and do the actual purchase, even if it's blatently intended for the 12-year-old son tagging alongside them), and that. It's pretty rare for a game to be an 18, but San Andreas was one.
No retailer would be dumb enough to not sell 15's or 18's. |
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sawtooth
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Joined: 02 Nov 2005
Posts: 419
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 12:31 am Post subject: |
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| i know most major chains don't carry AO titles (as well as NC17 movies) for "protect the kids" morality reasons. Of course, it's a lie; it's lip service to placate angry parents and issue groups that are still kind of angry you can buy a copy of Monster's Ball at your local family-friendly big box store. The real reason, as I see it: Were there a number of AO titles actually on the market (San Andreas doesn't count), Wal-Mart and the like wouldn't carry them because they'd never sell, and they'd never sell because nobody carries them. No risk, no exposure. |
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Scratchmonkey
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Joined: 02 Mar 2005
Posts: 1439
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 1:01 am Post subject: |
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| sawtooth wrote: | | i know most major chains don't carry AO titles (as well as NC17 movies) for "protect the kids" morality reasons. Of course, it's a lie; it's lip service to placate angry parents and issue groups that are still kind of angry you can buy a copy of Monster's Ball at your local family-friendly big box store. The real reason, as I see it: Were there a number of AO titles actually on the market (San Andreas doesn't count), Wal-Mart and the like wouldn't carry them because they'd never sell, and they'd never sell because nobody carries them. No risk, no exposure. |
This pretty much nails it. Nobody uses the 'AO' rating because if you got an 'AO' rating, your game would be dropped from Wal-Mart, which is the single largest distributor of videogames in These United States and as a result, sales would be caca.
So companies wheel and deal with the ESRB over impossibly trivial shit (truly, you cannot comprehend what this entails unless you've seen it from the inside) until the developer receives the rating that they originally targeted. Which, given the 'morality' of consumer-culture 'Muricans, means that you get some very weird violence and as little sex as possible (boobies (see: God of War) are a major deal in a videogame). |
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purplechair
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Joined: 28 Mar 2005
Posts: 378
Location: in my pants
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 4:10 am Post subject: |
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america lol
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B coma
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Joined: 06 Dec 2005
Posts: 279
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 6:53 am Post subject: |
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| Scratchmonkey wrote: | | (boobies (see: God of War) are a major deal in a videogame). |
I was wondering how they "got away" with that anyhow. Did they pull a Matt Stone/Trey Parker and include something else that they knew would be cut in order to get it in? Perhaps the ESRB is just growing more lenient? I don't recall seeing anything like that in any rated console title up to this point. |
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dhex
Breeder
Joined: 13 Dec 2004
Posts: 6319
Location: brooklyn, Nev Yiork
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 8:09 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | It's like the retailers don't want to cater for adults |
well, in one sense they don't, partially due to the wal-mart thing above. but even smaller stores don't carry that stuff because it's not entirely "for adults" anyway.
i dunno, there's a better way to explain it, but i'm not quite grasping it now.
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sawtooth
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Joined: 02 Nov 2005
Posts: 419
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 8:34 am Post subject: |
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are you referencing the whole violence + sex != maturity thing that's talked about every time doom or grand theft auto is brought up in conversation, or something else entirely?
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dhex
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Joined: 13 Dec 2004
Posts: 6319
Location: brooklyn, Nev Yiork
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| Posted: Tue Mar 21, 2006 8:43 am Post subject: |
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the market as a whole, in the eyes of the public.
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