OAO Game Ratings/Content Controversy Thread

[AndrewTS 0]

Since we probably have 36 hours to go before Thompson claims there's a sprite hack for Disney's Magical Quest 3 to make it appear that Mickey and Donald are doing the nasty, may as well keep it in one thread.

 

However, since even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while, Thompson's latest scapegoat, Killer 7, really seems to have genuinely been pushing its M.

 

However, ESRB's ratings are looking more and more like they're arbitrary and even less reliable than the MPAA's. Would a movie with Killer 7's content get away with an R or no? Does the 'interactive' element that Mr. Thompson likes to bring into the discussion make any difference whatsover?

 

And how stupid is it that Capcom/SNK fighters and Viewtiful Joe get "T" (13+ ratings) but newer such games aren't considered to be appropriate enough for the newly implemented E-10? Yet, my copy of Super SFII Turbo Revival has an E rating. Does a little spurt of somethat that may represent blood in an ancient sprite-based game that almost no kid is going to touch anyway make all the difference?

[Guest MikeSC]

The really ironic part is that many of the same idiot parent who bitch about video games were the same ones who fought their parents nearly identical complaints about rock 'n' roll back in the 1950's.

 

Baby boomers = repeating the same problems of the past, but with WAY more condescension.

[teke184 0]

The really ironic part is that many of the same idiot parent who bitch about video games were the same ones who fought their parents nearly identical complaints about rock 'n' roll back in the 1950's.

 

Baby boomers = repeating the same problems of the past, but with WAY more condescension.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

True, but that's what happens when the kids grow up to become lawyers.

 

 

Maybe THAT was the hidden danger in those 50s Rock and Roll songs...

[AndrewTS 0]

Didn't you have to download the "Hot Coffee" modification over the internet?  If so, I really don't understand why parents would be worried about their children "accidently" accessing it. 

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AR Max can be used to download everything.

 

But you can partially access the content without a net connection, minus the nude skin(s). So yeah, pantomined ploy pr0n among fully clothed characters.

[Special K 0]

And while Rockstar is to be blamed for leaving the hot coffee code n the game, the ESRB cannot be blamed for it at all. That's like blaming the movie ratings board for not catching the split-second glimpse of a centerfold in 'The Rescuers.' Or not rating Tomb Raider and AO because they didn't forsee the 'Nude Raider' patch.

And while I haven't seen the K7 scene in question, it sounds awfully tame in that article.

Next he'll be going back in time to Golgo 13 and Xenogears and saying they should have been AO for their implied sex-scenes.

 

8==>

 

OMG AO

[AndrewTS 0]

If you go back even as recent as the PS1 era, you'll find some ridiculously conflicting ratings/descriptors on games.

 

I mentioned the Turbo Revival E, yet GBA Alpha 3 gets the T rating with the descriptor "Realistic Violence." Tekken Advance has "Mild Animated Violence" (still a T).

 

I thought the blood made the difference, but Comix Zone caused the Sonic Mega Collection + to get the descriptor "animated blood" (the mutants).

 

Yet, fighting games with robots--Tech Romancer, Virtual On, Robo Pit--have T ratings. Strider 2 has an E for "Animated Violence." Shinobi games are all E except for the PS2/Saturn ones for "Animated Violence," even if the animation is fairly realistic and features actual humans getting killed. The Clayfighters get T ratings for "Comic Mischief,Mild Animated Violence"

 

Street Fighter The Movie features "Realistic Violence" while the also-digitized Shinobi Legions has "Animated Violence" (both T).

 

Blackthorne has a Teen rating, while the old 2D Prince of Persias are E. Yet the GBA Sands of Time is T (for "Mild Violence"). Flashback for the Jaguar gets an E while the Mac version gets a T (Both say "Animated Violence").

 

Robotron X originally got a T rating, but the PC version has an E rating. Supposedly the T was over one level called "Bullet Hell" that was either renamed or the ESRB changed its mind.

 

The ESRB sucks hard.

 

Of course, almost nobody cares about ratings less than M anyway.

 

And lets face it, SA got the AO because they caved in without a fight.

 

Anybody spot any others they'd like to share?

[Special K 0]

Imagine if they find out about the dreaded 'horse weiner' in Disgaea.

 

ESRB gives preferential treatment to different series. Every Zelda game has gotten an E. Crystal Chronicles (same type of game, no blood, no more violent than a Zelda game) gets a T

 

Final fantasy ORIGINS got a T for violence. That's Final Fantasy I&II. You know, the ones where your guy walks forwards a single step, swings his weapon and never even contacts the enemy?!

 

What 'mild lyrics' gave Amplitude a 'T'? I've probably played every song in that game 20 times, I remember nothing that would give it a 'T'

 

It's funny that Xenogears, which Square was reportedly REALLY reluctant to put out here, got a T.

[AndrewTS 0]

Imagine if they find out about the dreaded 'horse weiner' in Disgaea.

 

ESRB gives preferential treatment to different series. Every Zelda game has gotten an E. Crystal Chronicles (same type of game, no blood, no more violent than a Zelda game) gets a T

 

Final fantasy ORIGINS got a T for violence. That's Final Fantasy I&II. You know, the ones where your guy walks forwards a single step, swings his weapon and never even contacts the enemy?!

 

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Well, "horse weiner" probably slipped by them, like the booze in Harvest Moon. ESRB thinks a guy and a girl kissing is a "suggestive theme," BTW.

 

Final Fantasy 1 & 2 Dawn of Souls got an E. Isn't that the same thing as Origins? Anya, you know of any differences between them that would cause the change?

 

Suikoden 1 got a K-A (same thing as an E is now). Death, mature themes, occult out the wazoo? All the other Suikoden games got a T.

[Special K 0]

Well, if kissing is a suggestive theme, then we've evolved since the time that Nintendo cut out Cecil and Rosa hugging.

[Anya 0]

I don't know any differences between Dawn of Souls and Origins that would require a different rank.

 

The reason stuff goes unnoticed by ESRB is because they're not actually playing the games. Developers send them a video that they feel represents the game. It's also not the same people reviewing each game, it's a panel made up of many. That would explain the conflicting ratings. Because they're so vague it's up to interpretation.

[Toshiaki Koala 0]

Was the toning-down of the violence in the Punisher game actually done to get an M rating? Because I've never heard of a game actually getting an AO rating for violence alone.

 

In fact, if you check the ESRB's site, the only AO title that's entirely sex-free is an online casino CD-ROM, which of course allows the player to gamble with real money.

[AndrewTS 0]

I kind of figured they probably would just send in videos. However, seems like once in a while they'll pick up on some obscure thing the creators likely would easily forget (the Robotron thing). And what's up with that Amplitude thing?

 

However, the fact that they don't have clear and concise guidelines and precedents goes to show how much of a joke they are.

 

I guess Rock 'em Sock 'em robots wouldn't be appropriate for anyone under 13 if they made it into a game.

 

Well, if kissing is a suggestive theme, then we've evolved since the time that Nintendo cut out Cecil and Rosa hugging.

 

Perhaps, but at least Sega were voluntarily taking steps to regulate themselves with their ratings, and they did it quite well.

[Special K 0]

I said that tongue in cheek. removing a frame of two adult characters hugging in glorious super-deformed 16 bit is as stupid as it get, IMO.

 

Worse than that, and all the avoidance of using the term 'death' is the fact that they just cut arbitrary background information, like the reason Kain joined the Dragoons.

 

EDIT: They had relaxed a LOT between then and FFVI, which had all its death and suicide and teen pregnancy intact. Hooray!

 

The movie ratings board is just as stupid, of course. They gave South Park: BLU an R, but refused to let it be called South Park: All Hell Breaks Loose. Yet they have Hellboy, Hellraiser, From Hell....

[AndrewTS 0]

http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp...0705video_games

 

Video Game Player Guilty in Ala. Slaying

 

By JAY REEVES

 

FAYETTE, Ala. (AP) - A 20-year-old whose lawyers claimed the video game ``Grand Theft Auto'' and childhood abuse caused him to kill three small-town police officers was convicted Tuesday of capital murder.

 

The jury deliberated for just over an hour before convicting Devin Moore.

 

Jurors were to return Wednesday to begin the sentencing phase. Moore could face the death penalty.

 

Defense lawyers had partly blamed Moore's actions on the hours he spent playing video games from the ``Grand Theft Auto'' series, in which players shoot police officers and steal cars.

 

While the judge barred jurors from hearing testimony linking the 2003 shootings to the game, defense lawyer Jim Standridge reminded them that Moore, after his arrest, told police ``Life is a video game; everybody has to die sometime.''

 

 

Moore had pleaded not guilty and not guilty by reason of mental defect.

 

 

His family and friends left court without comment, while the victims' relatives and friends gathered to hug and thank prosecutors.

 

 

Prosecutor Lyn Durham said Tuesday that Moore knew what he was doing when he grabbed a patrolman's gun and killed two officers and a radio dispatcher.

 

 

``And he knew it was wrong,'' she said.

 

 

Officers had taken Moore to police headquarters for booking on a stolen auto charge. Authorities said Moore, who was 18 at the time, grabbed one of the officer's guns and fatally shot all three victims in the head before fleeing in a patrol car.

 

 

The victims' families have filed a civil suit against the video game manufacturer and two stores, claiming Moore killed the three after repeatedly playing ``Grand Theft Auto III'' and ``Grand Theft Auto: Vice City.'' No trial date has been set in the civil lawsuit.

 

 

A spokesman for Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc., parent company of ``Grand Theft Auto'' manufacturer Rockstar Games, did not immediately return calls Tuesday seeking comment.

 

08/09/05 22:43

 

The list of links on the page are also worth noting, like the "Eight Myths about Video Games Debunked."

 

The Federal Trade Commission has found that 83 percent of game purchases for underage consumers are made by parents or by parents and children together.

 

That's game purchases PERIOD, and not M games.

 

Which is what I've been saying and certain people (Ripper, mainly) deny it.

 

One quarter of children ages 11 to 16 identify an M-Rated (Mature Content) game as among their favorites.

 

And it's obvious to me how they get those games, and I don't think it's a retailer covering their eyes as they hand over the game boxes.

 

8. Video game play is desensitizing.

 

Classic studies of play behavior among primates suggest that apes make basic distinctions between play fighting and actual combat. In some circumstances, they seem to take pleasure wrestling and tousling with each other. In others, they might rip each other apart in mortal combat. Game designer and play theorist Eric Zimmerman describes the ways we understand play as distinctive from reality as entering the "magic circle." The same action — say, sweeping a floor — may take on different meanings in play (as in playing house) than in reality (housework). Play allows kids to express feelings and impulses that have to be carefully held in check in their real-world interactions. Media reformers argue that playing violent video games can cause a lack of empathy for real-world victims. Yet, a child who responds to a video game the same way he or she responds to a real-world tragedy could be showing symptoms of being severely emotionally disturbed. Here's where the media effects research, which often uses punching rubber dolls as a marker of real-world aggression, becomes problematic. The kid who is punching a toy designed for this purpose is still within the "magic circle" of play and understands her actions on those terms. Such research shows us only that violent play leads to more violent play.

[Open the Muggy Gate 0]

The flood gates have really opened in the past couple of weeks. I hope to God we don't get no radical changeover or banning GTA or violence or any of that stuff.

 

And this Devin Moore fuckwad may be the poster boy of it all. If anyone says video games don't cause people to kill, all people have to do is point to this guy.

[AndrewTS 0]

Except anybody with common sense and without an agenda to push can see he was a frickin' loon. It could have been reading a bible, watching TV or renting a crime drama that could have set him off.

 

I'm less concerned about the GTA series being banned than I am any dangerous precedents being set.

 

Oh, and I'm not going to post them here, but Thompson has allegedly been being sent death threats. The funny part (or rather, shamelessly and thinly disguised suspicious part)? He sent a letter to Hillary and Lieberman in which he claims it "proves conclusively" what he thinks about violent video games.

 

I hope the FBI discovers he lied to them, he gets disbarred and jailed. Although I don't doubt he has been getting some, but nothing with serious intent behind them.

 

Although you'd think with all these thousands--perhaps a million or more--trained video game soldiers Rockstar created that they'd have gotten him by now.

[Toshiaki Koala 0]

The movie ratings board is just as stupid, of course. They gave South Park: BLU an R, but refused to let it be called South Park: All Hell Breaks Loose. Yet they have Hellboy, Hellraiser, From Hell....

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Not to mention the fact that "Bigger, Longer, and Uncut" is an obvious reference to... well, you know. It's obvious.

[AndrewTS 0]

The movie ratings board is just as stupid, of course. They gave South Park: BLU an R, but refused to let it be called South Park: All Hell Breaks Loose. Yet they have Hellboy, Hellraiser, From Hell....

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Not to mention the fact that "Bigger, Longer, and Uncut" is an obvious reference to... well, you know. It's obvious.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I never noticed that before, actually. That's probably how it slipped by them.

[Special K 0]

How come no one's called Thompson on his gigantic fuckup about The Sims, though? He said that the gamie displayed labia, penises and pubic hair, when even with a hack, it displays no such thing.

 

(.)(.) <---- There's some tits. More explicit than The Sims right there. BAN THE INTERNET!

[AndrewTS 0]

Most of the gaming sites have, but many journalists who have never gamed in their life don't know anything about it and accept it blindly as fact.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

When I worked 12 hour midnight shifts in 2003 I used to call the ESRB hotline to pass the time to listen to their vilarious readings for rating descriptors. The reading for "violence" was the funniest.

 

Sadly they ended that service.

[AndrewTS 0]

BTW, Thompson isn't just a guy who recently became a media whore. He's always been one.

 

A native of Ohio, he is a 1976 JD graduate of Vanderbilt University School of Law and has been practicing as a medical malpractice attorney in Florida since 1977.

 

So he started--and presumably still makes bread--as an ambulance chaser. Big shock.

[therealworldschampion 0]

Well he's from Vandy, so that's one strike against him already...

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

Just a quick word, while we're sliding down this slippery slope together, I hope those on this board that feel violent video games cause normal, sane people to commit violent acts, I hope to God you aren't watching wrestling. Or MMA. Or football, either type, or much anything because there has been violence in popular culture since the dawn of popular culture. Normal people can deal with it.

[MrRant 0]

WHO on this board thinks that?

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

WHO on this board thinks that?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I'll quote an above post for you

 

If anyone says video games don't cause people to kill, all people have to do is point to this guy.

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[MrRant 0]

He doesn't think that. He's saying that people will start holding this guy up as an example.

[Masked Man of Mystery 0]

My mistake for misreading the statement then

[Open the Muggy Gate 0]

My quotes are taken out of context. I feel like Gary Sheffield now.

[AndrewTS 0]

My quotes are taken out of context.  I feel like Gary Sheffield now.

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MMoM misunderstandimates alot.