Hey folks, it's that time again. Time to point fingers, jump on bandwagons and try to shift the blame of all the worlds evils onto the video game industry. I suppose it was about due, with about nine months since the whole Manhunt furor. This week it's the turn of Eidos' 25 to Life to take the flack - despite the fact it hasn't even been released yet.
Firing off the first salvo on Monday was New York Senator Charles E. Schumer. In the press release, he asks stores not to stock the game, and calls upon both Sony and Microsoft to refuse to allow the game to be released on their systems - to which Microsoft quickly said 'No'. Amongst those responding was Press the Buttons, and Penny Arcade and - both of whom have a much better idea of what it is they're talking about.
Never one to miss a bandwagon, CNN had the follow-up attack ready in the form of Tuesday's Nancy Grace (it's near the bottom). Reading through, the phrase 'media circus' kept popping into my mind, especially when you consider the 'panel'. Veteran anti-game laywer Jack Thompson (whos contempt for gamers is well documented), Michael Jackson's parents attourney, another random lawyer, and a pyschotherapist - whos only contribution to the whole thing actually raises a valid argument, but the focus is hurriedly shifted away. Gamepolitcs, Game Girl Advance, Press the Buttons and Cathode Tan all have good counters that essentially destroy any credibility the program may have had. Which, if we're being honest here, wasn't too much to begin with, the sensationalism of American news TV being what it is.
What Sen. Shumcer and Nancy Grace failed (or refused) to acknowledge is that 25 to Life actually allows you to play as a cop, letting the player take down criminals the good ol' American way. Part of the problem may in fact stem from America's gun culture. It may be a constitutional right to keep a gun in your house, but increasingly it seems people are unwilling to take responsibility for their child taking that gun and unloading it into someone, preferring instead to find a scapegoat to try to get money from.
What the whole thing boils down to is that parents are refusing to accept responsibility for the upbringing of their children, instead using the TV and game console as surrogates. It doesn't help matters when research shows exactly what us gamers have know for years - that parents don't care. I was in a game shop a few weeks ago, when a dad was looking at games with his son, who couldn't have been more than six or seven years old. As the boy looked over the shiney cases with the pretty pictures, struggling to read some of the titles, he soon saw one he recognised. "Daddy look, it's Grand Feft Auto!"
Games like Grand Theft Auto and Manhunt are given age ratings for a reason - big, prominent symbols, often now on the front of the box - although it seems some still don't look hard enough. While the system here in the UK is enforced by the law, in the US (Illinous notwithstanding) the ESRB's guidelines are voluntary. Surely the whole point of having these ratings is to limit the sale of adult-oriented games to adults? And if it's not going to be enforced, by either the parents or retailers, you have to ask, why bother? Of course this has all been said before, most recently and elloquently by Brian Clevinger of 8-bit Theatre (scroll down a bit from the comic to see).
Another thing that this new report confirms, is that sticking an 18 certificate on the cover of a game is only going to make it more desireable. It's to be expected - it's human nature. The more you can't have something, the more you want it - the complete sellout of Manhunt days after it was pulled from various store shelves is testament to this. I know the feeling - I played the original GTA when it first came out, when I was about 14. Knowing you're playing something you're not supposed to adds an element of danger to an otherwise mundane game, with the fear that you could be discovered and the whole thing taken away.
The irony is, that it doesn't matter how good or bad 25 to Life is when it sees daylight. It's going to sell like hotcakes. People now know the name, and will give it that bit more attention. It's a sad, strange state of affairs, and I can't see it getting much better.
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Thought I would suppliment my good frends work with a little insight of my own. I reciently read that a man was killed, several people took it upon themselves to take a steel tube insert it up his anus before sticking a red hot poker into his rectum... Nasty hey? the fact that the man was homosexual made it "humerously ironic" in those peoples eyes. so when was this? I hear you ask what vidio game did it come from? news like this must have made it to the media? It did it was Edward the III in the 1300's. Oh my god I hear you cry, what could this possibly have to do with a topic like this? We are a FAR more enlightened society now!! Ok ill let you have that one. over 300 years later Jack the ripper slaughters prostitutes, their bodies displayed almost as macarbre art. Depraved hey? Not soon enough tho?. ok. Lets see, beliving the superiority of a racial few, millions of what are deemed "lower" people are systamaticly wiped out. Oh wait, sorry, yes, the Nazis were a pure evil mistake of History... How about this one? To maintain power a government leader brutaly has killed anyone who so much as looks at a picture of him the wrong way. No sorry the communists were Godless monsters wernt they? ok. In a small village a loveing farther walks in on his son masterbating, he beats and toutures him while screaming that he is saving his immortal soul, driving the devil out, who was making him commit, what is in reality a natural act... Getting closer am I? In a gas station a tramp walks in thumbs through some magazines, he walks up to the teller, the teller notices the man has the shakes, the man pulls out a gun and shoots the teller before emptying $50 from the cash register, his reason vido games? No he just wants to secure a fix to get him through the night. Vidio games are not, im afraid societys evil (boy it would be easy if they were hey!) they do not enspire young men/women to go out and commit acts of murder. Sure there are similarities but as I think I have just proven people were pretty inventive before the old digital demon spawn. Where do these politicians think the ideas from these games come from? The ideas for games are often born, from the actions of the very same failures in a society that then choses to blame them for its own ills. But then I guess thats easyer isnt it? and I wouldent expect any less from a society where a man can sue a ciggaret company for his catching cancer. From a society where people sue fast food chains for their being fat. From a society where its easyer for a parent to blame the electronic bogy man, for what their offspring has done to another human being. Rather than look in a mirror and face their own shame, face this shame and say the words "I failed". Am I saying these games are wrong then for portraying the evils of mankind as entertainment? Ever see a war movie? ever enjoy it? yes? ever thought they should be banned? Ever read a horror book? was it graphic? could you use the "ideas" from it? yes? should it be banned?... I rest my case.
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