Talk about a kick in the nuts

[morgorath]

This is 100% censorship... it maybe candy coated and what ever else may have you but it is wrong... Hell all the games labled M (mature) aren't suppose to be sold to those under that age. SO what's this just a down and out right censorship...

http://www.gamespot.com/all/news/news_6028717.html

Tell me what you think....

[JunkieJoe]

WTF? isnt there already a governing body that rates the video games ESRB... and so some lame ass state government desides to have some dibs into the pockets of video game industry.... Enter the Matrix is rated TEEN... but since u kill cops there now it should be rated M? .... sounds like all the people from that state will order their video games online from different states.... woopty do... what a great way to kill an industry in their state... guess they dont need the revenues anyways.

[Prophet Hero]

Surely kids will just get older friends/relatives/parents to buy the game for them?

In the UK, GTA is rated Cert. 18 and stores won't sell it to kids under that age. However, if a parent is with them all the store can do is issue a warning and little else.

Typical scene:

"Madam, this game is rated 18."

"Hmmm?."

"It features guns, violence, swearing and prostitutes."

"Mum, I want it!"

"Okay, we'll take it."

On one occasion this kid came up to me in an independent game store asking if I was 18 and could I buy a game for him. I checked with the sales assistants and they said that they couldn't sell it to him. Dubious reasoning (they wanted the sale), but I took the kid's money anyway and bought it for him. It wasn't cigarettes or alcohol and if the kid was going to be scarred for life it would be from blowing his money on a crap game (State of Emergency).

[kakoi_sugoi_yama]

It makes me hate Washington even more. weatdrop:

I will buy any game a little kid wants me too. (except state of emergency weatdrop: )

[kakomu]

I don't care, I'm over 17, also i refused to let kids rent M games when I worked at blockbuster. Last thing I needed was some 8 year old renting GTA3 and learning from that. Also, you wouldn't believe how cluless most parents are. I had to explain why I didn't let them rent that video game, at which point they didn't want them renting it either.

[Berserker]

Like Prophet Hero said, they will just get a parent or someone else to buy it for them.

So I guess this means that games like Final Fight now have a mature rating? Remember the police cop boss at the end of the level...

[Kroova]

WOuldnt resident evil be counted as a mature rating since Jill is a cop?

[Zagatto]

I just want to clarify something from the beginning of this post.
The ESRB, which classifies video games to make it easier for parents to pick appropriate games for their kids to play, is NOT a government body. It is a board put together by members of the video game community to police themselves. There is no lawful requirement for these ratings to be put on games. The game industry is censoring itself in the hopes of avoiding laws being passed censoring games.
This is much like what happened in the comic industry in the 60s with the Comics Authority Code. It wasn't a law, it was the comic industry policing themselves with the help of distributors and retailers.
Another rating system that most people treat as law is the Motion Picture Association ratings. There is no federal law that says an 8 year old kid can't get into a PG13 or R rated movie. There may be local by-laws but I imagine those would be rare. It is the actual movie theaters that are enforcing the ratings on behalf of the MPA.

So we don't have to worry about the government squashing the 1st amendment. Each industry is doing it in their own. The music industry has made a few attempts at self regulation but the "Explicit Lyrics" warnings are still ignored by a number of major record labels. Imagine the book industry trying to regulate itself. What would happen to all those Harlequin romance books?
The best thing anyone can do for their kids is to be aware of what their kid is reading/watching/hearing/playing and talk with them about it. Help them understand what it is they like about a particular thing and talk with them about right and wrong. Just plugging a kid into a cartoon/video game/comic book is not good parenting.

[JunkieJoe]

Zagatto, I didnt say ESRB was a government body, but a governing body over the ratings etc etc... ;p

[Vicious]

I could care less. I've been buying videogames for my little brother since he was 5 years old. I'll go and get him whatever game he wants, except maybe DOA Beach Volleyball (I think that's what it's called). If some kid is dumb enough to go and reenact what they see in a videogame, that's just stupidity. My brother's never gone and done what he's seen in GTA3 or Halo or Resident Evil or whatever othe games they would consider M.

[Prophet Hero]

Originally posted by "Vicious"

I could care less. I've been buying videogames for my little brother since he was 5 years old. I'll go and get him whatever game he wants, except maybe DOA Beach Volleyball (I think that's what it's called). If some kid is dumb enough to go and reenact what they see in a videogame, that's just stupidity. My brother's never gone and done what he's seen in GTA3 or Halo or Resident Evil or whatever othe games they would consider M.

Then your brother is a fine, well-adjusted person.

Unfortunately, some kids are either unable to distinguish between reality and television/movies/video games or else give credence to that tired "Video games cause violence" argument.

The tabloids, particularly in the UK, leap at the chance to denounce video games. We've had the kid who set his friend alight after playing SFII (they didn't say if he was playing as Dhalsim or not); young offenders in institutions being allowed to play "bloody" games such as Tekken and Street Fighter and the Counter-Strike players (I think this was in LA) who finished their session and decided to shoot each other for real outside.

I guess these are isolated incidents and, thankfully, as posts have already mentioned, the video game industry is self regulating. I don't think (or at least I hope not) that governments will step in and enforce draconian measures although Germany did make sure that SNES Wolfenstein 3D had giant, mutated rats rather than Dobermans.

As Zagatto mentioned the best course of action is for parents to take an interest in what their children are reading/watching or playing rather than taking the path of least resistance. However, I'm not a parent and so cannot even imagine the rigours of bringing up a child.

At the moment (in the UK anyway) video game debate still mainly revolves around pricing.

[Kroova]

It's not video games that lead to killing cops,students,principles,your parents,etc. it's bad parenting,im guessing if extreme depression is a reason.

[kakoi_sugoi_yama]

There are some things that are treated so that they may as well be a law. I'm twenty-one years old, and not too long ago I went to a movie theater to see an R rated flick, and was denied. I had to go all the way back home to get my I.D., I slammed it on the counter, and they said: "Okay, we just had to make sure childern weren't getting into the theater" I had a full beard! How could I possible be mistaken as a child?! At the same theater (years before) when I was sixteen I went to see "Alien Ressurection", and got in without a hitch. weatdrop:

Seeing violent images don't make kids violent! Bad parenting in conjunction with the childs mental state (depression, which is, a chemical in-balance. The only way a parent can help that is through drugs like: Zoloft, and Prozac). I have seen violent images all through out growing up, and never once have I gunned someone down.

[morgorath]

Ok yes we could all argue that we are adults and parents should but let's face facts...

1. in 80% of all house holds it is either a two parents each working or a single parent family. Now with that being said look at this example. Johnny age 13 says to single mom, "Hey Mom can I go to the movies with Jimmey?" What are you going to see? "Well, we are going to see Finding Nemo...." OK sweety have a good time and when they get to the theater the buy tickets to see The Real Cancun. Now I want the guy at the counter to go hey boys where is your parents... And put a little stop to it.

2. The reason I call it censorship is because it is black listing an area of games. Hell Duke Nukem is liable under this law it states "The killing of officers in uniform" No where does it say they have to be human. So Duke Nukem whould get a Black flag...

IT's dumb but I want laws that are made to help us or keep stuipd people from fucking up what we have...

[kakomu]

THere are a few things I want to say about all this parenting and Video Game talk. I recently, did a research project on video games, parenting and negative effects. First I want to point out that there is no definitive proof to say that kids are influenced by video games, but while I can say that, there is no proof to say the contrary. While we can blame everyone we want, the blame isn't solely on one person. First off, we blame the parents saying they aren't doing hteir jobs, but then we also defend TV and video games saying they don't do anything to the kids either...so what makes kids violent? We all have a natural tendancy to be playful energetic and such, but we don't have a natural instinct to fire weapons, kill things and be devoid of any guilt in killing. There is plenty of blame all over the place. First off, for some reason, the general video gaming public is acquiring a larger and larger bloodlust. Why? I'm not exactly sure, I'm not a psychologist. But this leads to some dangerous mind sets. We have parental units who are OK with sporatic and bloody murder being shown on TV during prime time, and exposing their children to it. I will admit that i was exposed to it as well. Movies such as Terminator and Terminator 2 were no help in sculpting my mind. But I also had very engaging parents. I don't think that violence in video games and movies was all that big a problem for my generation. The violence in movies while being realistic was only graphic in certain situations (movies that no parent would ever willingly let their children see, like Pulp Fiction) and the video games were far from being the least bit realistic.

With newer video games and younger minds, we present ourselves a dillema. Games like Counter Strike produce kids that competitively play games of killing and death against each other. On top of that, we see very erratic and bad behavior when losing. So not only are we seeing glorification for who gets the most kills, but we also see inappropriate and maladjusted behavior...the type of behavior that we learn from playing games, sports and other little League things. I can honestly say that I learned a lot about guns from CS, and I'm sure other kids are as well.

Youths are impressionable. If you have a parent that participates with their children, they will most likely emulate them. You play ball with them, they will do the same thing, same with many other activities straight up to shaving. It's naive to think that setting your 8 year old child in front of a PS2, Gamecube or any other system with a violent video game is not going to influence them in the least. We have kids playing with GI Joes, pretending to be commandos. We have kids beating up people pretending to be Power Rangers. Do you think the ability to control that guy in GTA3 isn't going to glorify and make car jacking, assassination and any other bad dead look like fun? THe game is fun, why not real life? In that sense, parenting is at fault, parents need to know what their kids are up to, but in the same light, we can't just immediately lift all blame from the kids as well. They are the ones engaging the games.

The ESRB is a good idea, but no one enforces it because they receive flak from people (mostly parents) complaining that their kids aren't able to buy a game. I was pleased when I didn't rent GTA 3 and State of Emergency to kids, and even more pleased when I would show a parent why I didn't rent it to them...and they agreed on the decision. It wasn't because I relished joy in denying people the chance to rent (I reserved that for stuck-up prep kids who drove in their parents BMWs at 16), but because I feel that the current generation of kids are being raised in a world that is innapropriate for them. I'm no christian fundamentalist that thinks that everything is sinful. But I do think that in the current world we are living in, punishing your child (spanking them) is grounds for social services, all advertisements make kids feel that they are so much more special than anyone else and that they are more capable of doing anything they want (In reality, we already know that they aren't, anyways Confidence is good, arrogance is bad). And I think the last thing they need is a violent video game to feed into their impressionable sponge-like minds.

I think restricting video games is a necessity nowadays.

To address what people say:

Kakoi - YOu are one in a million. I'm sure you've seen plenty of mal-adjusted kids in your time. You can't just say, It work for me, it must work for you. Also, what about bad parenting makes kids violent? bad Parenting won't make a kid just snap and leaving them to their own devices allows for other ideas to flow into their mind. Parenting allows for a filter to throw out bad ideas, promote good ideas and set the kid straight. Bad parenting removes that filter. So whatever happens, it's usually because bad stuff comes into the kids mind...and I lump video games, bad TV and violent movies into that catagorey. Anyways, people with mental disorders constitutes a mild percentage of everyone in the world.