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Orlanth wrote:

sebster wrote:

Once they're bringing fines into government coffers, they'll get a whole lot less independant.

The bigger problem is that we already have a really hard time figuring out exactly what is high level sexual content and what's moderate sexual content (a common marker between 15+ and 18+ classifications). You want to include as subjective a term as 'gratuitous' to that and then make the term actually lead to a direct tax. It'd be a nightmare to quantify.

All media classification is subjective, always has been always will be..

No, it isn't.

The PEGI system has a rigid questionnaire which the publisher has to fill in. Once the check list has been filled in, you have the classification and associated content logos objectively specified.

Postal 2 was still worse, and in spite of what Former Vice President Tipper Gore, Honoured Gentleman Mister Liberman, and the rest of the old curmudgeonly cronies would have thought, we managed to rebuild society once from the hellish apocalypse that we all remember so distinctly occurring for real eight years ago when it was released. What? No, I'm sure that happened. It caused the moral degradation of society. I'm sure of it.

This seems somehow appropriate: http://downlode.org/Etext/zappa.html

It's quite long, otherwise I would have posted the entire thing here. Some bits I like:

Zappa wrote:
No one has forced Mrs. Baker or Mrs. Gore to bring Prince or Sheena Easton into their homes. Thanks to the Constitution, they are free to buy other forms of music for their children. Apparently, they insist on purchasing the works of contemporary recording artists in order to support a personal illusion of aerobic sophistication. Ladies, please be advised: The $8.98 purchase price does not entitle you to a kiss on the foot from the composer or performer in exchange for a spin on the family Victrola. Taken as a whole, the complete list of PMRC demands reads like an instruction manual for some sinister kind of “toilet training program” to house-break all composers and performers because of the lyrics of a few. Ladies, how dare you?

Zappa wrote:
While the wife of the Secretary of the Treasury recites “Gonna drive my love inside you” and Senator Gore’s wife talks about “Bondage!” and “oral sex at gunpoint” on the CBS Evening News, people in high places work on a tax bill that is so ridiculous, the only way to sneak it through is to keep the public’s mind on something else: “Porn rock”.

Is the basic issue morality? Is it mental health? Is it an issue at all? The PMRC has created a lot of confusion with improper comparisons between song lyrics, videos, record packaging, radio broadcasting, and live performances. These are all different mediums, and the people who work in them have the right to conduct their business without trade-restraining legislation, whipped up like an instant pudding by The Wives of Big Brother.

I miss him so much.

Orlanth wrote:

Gibbsey wrote:
So wait, your saying you dont want to tax games that are aimed at 18 year olds, just the ones that get the 18 rating? Parental ratings are not 'medals' they are used to restrict who has access to a game to people of a certain age, why should they be taxed for selling to a narrower audience?

Read above thread, its all explained, several times.

Gibbsey wrote:
So because of your personal moral outrage certain video games should be taxed higher, and the difference between violent games and alcohol/ smoking is the later have been proven to cause health problems and addiction.

Try again please. Its ironic that you are the only who is personalising this. My distain, I wouldn't as far as to say outrage' at shock media has been explained. Your argument appears to be 'it will cost me more'.
Alcohol and smoking are not taxed for that reason, they are taxed on that excuse. The logical response would be a ban on tobacco but that issue is all about revenue and not about public health.
Still both alcohol and tobacco duty do work to limit its proliferation, untaxed cigarettes would have a lot cheaper of course and would encourage those who have the habit to smoke more. Cigarettes are not like crack cocaine, it is rare that someone must have their fix to the point that any cost is acceptable so price is a deterent.
in any case media tax would have different effects, tobacco duty targets the consumer primarily by encourageing a limit to consumption, media tax targets the producer as it is avoidable my editing content and cost is only passed on once by the consumer, unless you smoke dodgy videos.

Still your 'distain' for 'shock media' (see 'my personal opinion with no basis on playing the game and no real understanding of content') would lead to me paying more for a game and making it harder for creator to get their games out there, the creator has already limited their audiance by having a higher rating. Your apparent concern is that this media deteriorates society so it should be discouraged, even though the audiance for these kinds of media is already limited to a group of people who can decide for themselves. Any 'deterioration' at this point would already be in society. Tobacco and Alcohol do have serious health risks and even thought much of the tax is probably based on moral view and not health concerns it does not mean you can go increasing taxes on things that you personally do not like.

Orlanth wrote:
OK. It's time you read what your commenting on.

Did you?

Orlanth wrote:

Gibbsey wrote:
There is already set limits on what can be in video games, so because your view is "omg society is deteriorating" we should have to pay more?

A whole less cow eyed than you would like to imply, no 'zomg' comments here. I type in joined up, metaphorically speaking.

I was simply pointing out how your apparent view that games like this are deteriorating society is a little sensationalist, literally speaking.

Once again Fox news has half a clue and is speaking in half truths, which I might add is actually worse than having no clue or speaking in outright lies.

The in-game awards system, called Skill Shots, ties the ugly, graphic violence into explicit sex acts: "topless" means cutting a player in half, while a "gang bang" means killing multiple enemies. And with kids as young as 9 playing such games, the experts FoxNews.com spoke with were nearly universally worried that video game violence may be reaching a fever pitch.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/02/08/bulletstorm-worst-game-kids/#ixzz1EuBhqQgc

Ow nooooo the video game is making a direct link between murderous violent acts within the game to sex acts, and fox news only has half a clue. Gamers have been doing that for years, and you'll hear gamers on every first person shooter that has an internet multilayer capability do the same thing. Everybody here who plays 1st person shooters know how the community is, knows just how bad the bad apples of the community is, knows how much gak talking goes on between players, and knows just how completely inappropriate of a place it can be for young children.

And then Fox news takes those facts and twists it into a case for government regulation completely ignoring the personal responsibility aspect in that parents should have a F'n clue what their kids are doing. The worse part is the stinking hypocrisy of Fox news because when it comes to damn near everything else they are the first to attack regulation and expound the virtue of personal responsibility, unless it's a censorship issue where the offending party might make the baby Jesus cry. Nine year old children who play Bulletstorm will probably grow up to be screwed up, but it's not going to be because of Bulletstorm or any other video game. Those kids are going to be F'd up becaues they probably either have parents who are way too lenient, have parents who just don't give a gak about what their kids do, and/or have parents that are clueless dittohead fox news tools. In any of those cases the last thing any of those parents want to hear is the truth ie they are bad parents and need to take some personal responsibility for raising a rotten brat, so let's just censor video games instead.

Kilkrazy wrote:

Orlanth wrote:

sebster wrote:

Once they're bringing fines into government coffers, they'll get a whole lot less independant.

The bigger problem is that we already have a really hard time figuring out exactly what is high level sexual content and what's moderate sexual content (a common marker between 15+ and 18+ classifications). You want to include as subjective a term as 'gratuitous' to that and then make the term actually lead to a direct tax. It'd be a nightmare to quantify.

All media classification is subjective, always has been always will be..

No, it isn't.

The PEGI system has a rigid questionnaire which the publisher has to fill in. Once the check list has been filled in, you have the classification and associated content logos objectively specified.

Sound a very european legislation way of doing things, in european law interpretation is to be discouraged, unlike English common law as practiced in the UK and US.
If that is the case then a threshold for taxations will be even easier to establish, technically, though any fixed non interpretive system like this throws up problems, but thats a wider legal issue not a film classification issue at heart.

Gibbsey wrote:
Still your 'distain' for 'shock media' (see 'my personal opinion with no basis on playing the game and no real understanding of content') would lead to me paying more for a game and making it harder for creator to get their games out there, the creator has already limited their audiance by having a higher rating. Your apparent concern is that this media deteriorates society so it should be discouraged, even though the audiance for these kinds of media is already limited to a group of people who can decide for themselves. Any 'deterioration' at this point would already be in society. Tobacco and Alcohol do have serious health risks and even thought much of the tax is probably based on moral view and not health concerns it does not mean you can go increasing taxes on things that you personally do not like.

Sigh. First 'my personal opinion with no basis on playing the game and no real understanding of content'. Where did you get this drivel, I am talking about a general principle not a specific game. My only comments on Bulletstorm are from the trailer where the concepts of what is done to market the game are valid.

Your apparent concern is that this media deteriorates society so it should be discouraged, even though the audiance for these kinds of media is already limited to a group of people who can decide for themselves.

Obviously you have a problem with basic comprehension: Customers can still choose for themselves.

would lead to me paying more for a game and making it harder for creator to get their games out there, the creator has already limited their audiance by having a higher rating.

Higher ratings do little when a game is obviously marketed at an age group it is restricted for. This is a common theme amongst some more extreme titles that are nevertheless aimed at a target audience under the age threshold society put on the title. The system is being flaunted, very deliberately, so its time to try something else.
This does not hurt production because it discourages shock not actual content, shock is easy to add or omit, content is what requires time and skill. you could add shock to anything with a choice vulgarism. So keep those two where they have thier place. Threaten a game with a percentage and the producers keep the same game but take the crude edge off the script, threaten an album with a percentage and suddenly you will find 'cop killa' lyrics aren't fashionable. Hope you arent one of these people who naively thinks those industries are artist driven?

Any 'deterioration' at this point would already be in society.

Indeed, but that is no excuse to stop trying. It would be like customs saying, might as well not scan for drugs in imports because there is enough on the streets. also its an ongoing battle, the moral thrsshold is getting lower and lower, shock ensures this, it can climb back up when a shocvk genre pases but with modern media few things truly pass.

Gibbsey wrote:
I was simply pointing out how your apparent view that games like this are deteriorating society is a little sensationalist, literally speaking.

More realism than sensationalism. like I said I cut out the 'zomg' comments and replace them with a long term view of the modern media. You simply would not get away with what many TV comedians get away with in the 80's, back then content we see on TV now would not pass censorship. People get inured to things because the boundaries are pushed back. At each stage free speech or restrcition is brought out as an excuse but if censorship rerlents the media pushes anew to the next boundary.
Anyway this is part of the issue, not the whole issue, but a part that nees to be addressed and the correct pressure point is at a production level, where the major decision making and profits are. Of course the actual senasationalists here will then wail and rant and say 'zomg higher prices, do not want!!!'. Sound familiar.

Fox News wrote:And with kids as young as 9 playing such games

Last time I checked 9 year olds couldn't buy 18 rated games, so someone must be buying them for them... You know... like their parents?

SilverMK2 wrote:

Fox News wrote:And with kids as young as 9 playing such games

Last time I checked 9 year olds couldn't buy 18 rated games, so someone must be buying them for them... You know... like their parents?

Yeah, surely if their parents are uninvolved enough that they'll allow nine year olds to have these games, then playing on an 18 rated game is the least of these kid's problems?

Also, this article is quite good concerning the actual fox article

Orlanth wrote:Of course the actual senasationalists here will then wail and rant and say 'zomg higher prices, do not want!!!'. Sound familiar.

Oh god forbid i should not want to spend more of my money out of my pocket because someone finds a rated game apprehensible, my point is "why should I?" so far your only explanation for why me personally should pay more is because "sometimes we have to pay more".

Also

RockPaperShotgun wrote:When Kotaku and Game Politics spoke to Lieberman, they had called her without prior warning. Claiming to not have the evidence for her claims at hand, she instead explained that it was just “common sense” that sexually violent games cause people to rape each other. She continued to imply that rape is increasing in the wake of these games (despite all available statistics showing a remarkable, consistent drop in rape figures over the last thirty years), and made reference to an elusive collection of “thousands” of studies that demonstrated she was right.

This thread seems far too full for a game that is so absurd/ridiculous in its portrayal of violence. I'd think this would be more of a fit for like... Condemned or CoD:World at War (where you can shoot off bodyparts and they lay screaming on the ground).

They also swiped my ID at Target when I bought Deadspace 2, just so you know.

Also, whenever a politician talks about video games, I'm pretty sure they are talking out of their asses, because they don't play video games, or even know anyone that does for proper impressions.

I mean hell, remember the SEXbox debacle about Mass Effect? That gak was hilarious.

Completely irrelevant, but I just woke up and still am a little groggy. I misread the thread title as Fox News Condoms Bulletstorm.

Disturbing image.

daedalus-templarius wrote:This thread seems far too full for a game that is so absurd/ridiculous in its portrayal of violence.

We are having two discussions here, a little on Bulletstorm and a lot on a larger genre of media presented in this way and what or what not to deal with it.

daedalus-templarius wrote:
Also, whenever a politician talks about video games, I'm pretty sure they are talking out of their asses, because they don't play video games, or even know anyone that does for proper impressions.

How many politicians do you know? Care to quantify that statement. Also politicans often speak outside of experience, not due to their ignorance but because they would need several human lifespans to cover all they have influence over. Hopefully they are advised by experts in those fields. Politicians are not a dumb as you make out, if they don't play and their advisors don't play someone on the bodyguard team or an intern will. Asking around is not uncommon, besides getting a geek in the tech department to wheel in a laptop or an xBox so they can see for themselves is not exactly hard to do either.
Politicians are usually very well informed, a bigger question is what they choose to do with that information, and by far the biggest contributor is playing to the crowd rather than making the right choice on any issue.

Orlanth wrote:Also politicans often speak outside of experience... Hopefully they are advised by experts in those fields.

usually howver they take their cue from whoever is filling their pockets, supporting their party, or whoever makes for the best photo-op...

if politicians spent as much time applying rational thought to what they say/support as they do worrying about focus groups, political favor, poll numbers and getting a witty soundbite on the news maybe they could actually accomplish something meaningful once in a while.

But yeah Politics functions to serve politicians and their interets not the people they claim to serve...

Politicians hide behind God and children for their excuses

Anyway more relevant articles on the same site showing quote sniping and ignoring informed opinion entirely:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/10/the-fox-news-debacle-techsavvy-update/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/09/churnalism-fox-news-selective-quoting/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/23/bulletstormgate-weichman-clarifies-position/


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Aaaaannnddd:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/21/bulletstorm-gate-fox-news-responds/

Gibbsey wrote:Politicians hide behind God and children for their excuses

Child safety is a big dogma, but our lot did not so much as hide behind God as say 'we don't do God' and hide behind 'progress'.

Gibbsey wrote:Politicians hide behind God and children for their excuses

Anyway more relevant articles on the same site showing quote sniping and ignoring informed opinion entirely:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/10/the-fox-news-debacle-techsavvy-update/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/09/churnalism-fox-news-selective-quoting/
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/23/bulletstormgate-weichman-clarifies-position/


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Aaaaannnddd:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/21/bulletstorm-gate-fox-news-responds/

Some great articles.

Orlanth wrote:

Gibbsey wrote:Politicians hide behind God and children for their excuses

Child safety is a big dogma, but our lot did not so much as hide behind God as say 'we don't do God' and hide behind 'progress'.

Well im in America at the moment... so God is defiantly something politicians hide behind over here (honestly the only difference between some politicians and "god hates ***" westboro is that westboro comes out and says it (hatred of gays not hatred of America / whoever they can sue for the most money for disrupting their protests))

Orlanth wrote:

How many politicians do you know? Care to quantify that statement. Also politicans often speak outside of experience, not due to their ignorance but because they would need several human lifespans to cover all they have influence over. Hopefully they are advised by experts in those fields. Politicians are not a dumb as you make out, if they don't play and their advisors don't play someone on the bodyguard team or an intern will. Asking around is not uncommon, besides getting a geek in the tech department to wheel in a laptop or an xBox so they can see for themselves is not exactly hard to do either.
Politicians are usually very well informed, a bigger question is what they choose to do with that information, and by far the biggest contributor is playing to the crowd rather than making the right choice on any issue.

Wow you really think that, huh?
I'm not saying its not possible, but I have a feeling most of the people in the house, senate, governance have little to no experience with gaming as we know it. Nor do I think they'd bring in "a geek in the tech department" to give them a demo. That statement is literally hilarious to me. They could be very well informed, but the driver of what they present is "what spin can I put on this to benefit myself or who I represent/is-lining-my-pockets-with-wads-of-money".

Besides, a politician would have likely already made up their mind before ever seeing the game, they go into it with their disgust face ready and waiting for when "the geek in the tech department" wheeled in an xbox to show them... as for being advised by experts in the field, have you seen the sideshow that our government senate and house, and state houses, put on every day with comments from representatives? I'm sure they will have some rep on Fox to yell about how Bulletstorm is corrupting our youth and has graphic sex, that you can influence, plus gang-bangs, and also you kill kittens. Playing the game, or watching the game, for less than 5 minutes would show you that is absurd, yet those kinds of statements come out all the time from the media (not necessarily politicians exclusively).

If you think a politician has your best ideals/knows-what-is-best-for-everyone at heart... well, you shouldn't. They are probably looking out for #1, more than anyone else.