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http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/02/08/bulletstorm-worst-game-kids/#ixzz1EeMxpiZ7

So apparantly, the Bulletstorm is the new Devil amongst all the violent video games. Author Carole Lieberman states that “The increase in rapes can be attributed in large part to the playing out of [sexual] scenes in video games,” What do you guys have to say about this?

-Tubby

Edited for spelling.

Sexual scenes?
Doesn't it just use sexual phrases in terms of killing?

Sounds like another "18 times the speed of light".

Also, Fox say it's bad, I must buy it.

Why doesn't America just get a legally binding ratings system and stop crying about how evil vidjamagames are?

There are people who profit from this prolific hate for videogames. I can imagine quite a few rightist special interest groups giving the Liberman's quite a bit of money for saying that videogames cause rape. (which is complete and utter bs)

The Dreadnote wrote:Why doesn't America just get a legally binding ratings system and stop crying about how evil vidjamagames are?

Because the industry has its own rating system which is less arbitrary and stupid than a government one?

Content is getting worse but the content is often what sells.

A bit opf crudity makes up for a lack of quality, and if you get quality and crrudity together you have a sure fire seller.

Parental ratings are a badge of honour for rappers and games, a bit like ASBO's and hooligans. The answer is not to 'rate' videos music and games, the answer is to tax them.

You want extreme language go ahead thats 5% on top of RRP, violent sex scenes, thats another 10%. All governments need to do to sell this to the people is apportion some of the tax revenues to such things as victim support battered wives and correctional methodologies for juveniles.

Record companies in particular encourage swearing and trashing hotels, it sells. I bet they would be teaching their artists something else if it cost them 10% on album receipts to the government for doing so.

Limiting free speech, not at all, by taxing extreme content one can in fact justify its place far better than a censor-not censor decision.

Melissia wrote:

The Dreadnote wrote:Why doesn't America just get a legally binding ratings system and stop crying about how evil vidjamagames are?

Because the industry has its own rating system which is less arbitrary and stupid than a government one?

So just make that one legally binding. Why must a system that the government implements be arbitrary and stupid?

The Dreadnote wrote:

Melissia wrote:

The Dreadnote wrote:Why doesn't America just get a legally binding ratings system and stop crying about how evil vidjamagames are?

Because the industry has its own rating system which is less arbitrary and stupid than a government one?

So just make that one legally binding. Why must a system that the government implements be arbitrary and stupid?

Because the government is run by politicians, whom use stupid and arbitrary reasoning for everything they do.

I think it would be unlikely that the politicians would come up with a ratings system themselves. They'd just get somebody else to do it, like the BBFC in Britain.

Fattimus_maximus wrote:There are people who profit from this prolific hate for videogames. I can imagine quite a few rightist special interest groups giving the Liberman's quite a bit of money for saying that videogames cause rape. (which is complete and utter bs)

Censorship is hardly a rightwing phenomenon. Tipper Gore was the one who led the crusade against violent media for a long time.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Orlanth wrote:Record companies in particular encourage swearing and trashing hotels, it sells. I bet they would be teaching their artists something else if it cost them 10% on album receipts to the government for doing so.

Limiting free speech, not at all, by taxing extreme content one can in fact justify its place far better than a censor-not censor decision.

If you give government a direct profit incentive, you'll quickly see them classifying all kinds of things as undesirable content. Creep is inevitable.


The best option is to get parents to pay attention to the ratings system.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Melissia wrote:Because the government is run by politicians, whom use stupid and arbitrary reasoning for everything they do.

Whereas the people at the top levels of industry make informed and rational decisions at all times. This is because of magic.

I mean, I get the idea behind the profit incentive, I dare say I'm a stronger believer in it than most people here. But this thing where simply being government or simply being private sector somehow makes you incredibly foolish or incredibly savvy just by the nature of being one or the other needs to die, because it is silly.

I mean, what happens to a person who was in the private sector who then moves to government, does he become stupid overnight? What happens if he moves back?

You know what we should do?

We should put achievements in games for fining in-game representations of Jack Thompson and killing them, ripping off their heads, and violently fornicating with it.

That's a reason to complain.

chowderhead13 wrote:You know what we should do?

We should put achievements in games for fining in-game representations of Jack Thompson and killing them, ripping off their heads, and violently fornicating with it.

That's a reason to complain.

Would you believe me if I told you it's been done already?

Emperors Faithful wrote:

chowderhead13 wrote:You know what we should do?

We should put achievements in games for fining in-game representations of Jack Thompson and killing them, ripping off their heads, and violently fornicating with it.

That's a reason to complain.

Would you believe me if I told you it's been done already?

Not gonna lie. I wouldn't be surprised

Terje-Tubby wrote:http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/02/08/bulletstorm-worst-game-kids/#ixzz1EeMxpiZ7

So apparantly, the Bulletstorm is the new Devil amongst all the violent video games. Author Carole Lieberman states that “The increase in rapes can be attributed in large part to the playing out of [sexual] scenes in video games,” What do you guys have to say about this?

-Tubby

Edited for spelling.

The funny thing about the Lierberman argument is that rape has gone down in prevalence from ~2.4 of all US women in 1980, to ~0.4% in 2010.

Granted, under reporting is a factor., but its hard to imagine how all the many and varied programs to help victims that have taken off since 1980 could possibly have caused the rate of reporting to go down.

I have to say, "Gangbang" for killing multiple enemies? I certainly wouldn't be comfortable playing that game.

sebster wrote:
Whereas the people at the top levels of industry make informed and rational decisions at all times. This is because of magic.

I mean, I get the idea behind the profit incentive, I dare say I'm a stronger believer in it than most people here. But this thing where simply being government or simply being private sector somehow makes you incredibly foolish or incredibly savvy just by the nature of being one or the other needs to die, because it is silly.

I mean, what happens to a person who was in the private sector who then moves to government, does he become stupid overnight? What happens if he moves back?

What I've never understood is why there is this myth that there is no profit incentive involved in governance. Maybe because there seems to be an Anglican ideal of governance as something that is done out of duty to the nation? Or because the money that is made through governing tends to be seen as illicit?

Its all very strange, and as you said, silly. Government is necessary, and good governance requires that the governors don't take whatever they please, but its certainly not a huge issue that they set up the system to ensure their own profits insofar as everyone else (or at least most of everyone else important) gets in on the action as well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Emperors Faithful wrote:I have to say, "Gangbang" for killing multiple enemies? I certainly wouldn't be comfortable playing that game.

But seriously, gang bangs aren't a huge deal, its gang rape that gets you in trouble.

I can't take anything fox news says seriously. So I just see this as mindless banter, though the game itself isn't exactly helping the image of gaming... but that's the developers fault for trying to target the teenage demographic.

@dogma: I haven't actually watched Pulp Fiction so that reference was lost one me.

Wait, don't 90% of people involved in Gangbangs enjoy it?

chowderhead13 wrote:Wait, don't 90% of people involved in Gangbangs enjoy it?

Well, 90% of people involved in gang rape enjoy it, too...

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.

WON'T SOMEONE THINK OF THE CHILDREN!

You wouldn't download a bear....

No wait.... *Ahem*

You wouldn't let a 9 year old watch Saw.....

Orlanth wrote:Content is getting worse but the content is often what sells.

A bit opf crudity makes up for a lack of quality, and if you get quality and crrudity together you have a sure fire seller.

Parental ratings are a badge of honour for rappers and games, a bit like ASBO's and hooligans. The answer is not to 'rate' videos music and games, the answer is to tax them.

You want extreme language go ahead thats 5% on top of RRP, violent sex scenes, thats another 10%. All governments need to do to sell this to the people is apportion some of the tax revenues to such things as victim support battered wives and correctional methodologies for juveniles.

Record companies in particular encourage swearing and trashing hotels, it sells. I bet they would be teaching their artists something else if it cost them 10% on album receipts to the government for doing so.

Limiting free speech, not at all, by taxing extreme content one can in fact justify its place far better than a censor-not censor decision.

Are you really comparing rap to video games?

I am of legal age and sound mind, why should I be penalized because a game I want to buy just so happens to be a little "crude" in another persons eyes?

Parental ratings are indeed a badge of honor.

Dead Space 2's 'yourmomhatesthisgame' campaign is a sign of that.

Right wing and left wing wingnuts love to jump on videogames. The right wing says that they're protecting conservative values while the left wing says that they're protecting the children.

Both sides hate the videogame industry.

And the industry loves to fuel the fires of that hate!

The ultimate flame war that keeps us gamers warm.

Dreadwinter wrote:
Are you really comparing rap to video games?

A useful and easy example of how parental ratings are as marketing tool not a warning in the eyes of media producers.

Dreadwinter wrote:
I am of legal age and sound mind, why should I be penalized because a game I want to buy just so happens to be a little "crude" in another persons eyes?

What has that to do with anything. A box doesn't ask who picks it up, proliferation is pretty much inevitable. What can be targeted is the concept of soiling media content as a selling point.

Take the trailer for Bulletstorm everything about the gamer indicates marketing for a teen audience. It would not be the only game out there to be directly marketed at an age group technically prohibited on the cover. You cannot stop games from getting lewder or more violent but you can give incentives not to. Currently through ratings and low brow content the encouragement is to sink lower and lower. An accompanying tax scale with ratings would do more to clear up the media than anything else.

I could argue that the commercial was aimed towards young adults.

Orlanth wrote:What has that to do with anything. A box doesn't ask who picks it up, proliferation is pretty much inevitable. What can be targeted is the concept of soiling media content as a selling point.

Take the trailer for Bulletstorm everything about the gamer indicates marketing for a teen audience. It would not be the only game out there to be directly marketed at an age group technically prohibited on the cover. You cannot stop games from getting lewder or more violent but you can give incentives not to. Currently through ratings and low brow content the encouragement is to sink lower and lower. An accompanying tax scale with ratings would do more to clear up the media than anything else.

To make my point again, "If you give government a direct profit incentive, you'll quickly see them classifying all kinds of things as undesirable content. Creep is inevitable.


The best option is to get parents to pay attention to the ratings system."

Bought and played through the campaign for Bulletstorm today, and I don't think it's any worse than many other violent games on the market. The whole "gangbang" thing is a rather tongue-in-cheek crack at a certain..well..we all know-what and a quite literal meaning of one "bang" taking out a "gang" of enemies. The gore was rather cheesey and - if played a certain way - can be prevalent. The gore can also be avoided.

That aside, violent video games don't breed violent people. I hate to beat a dead-horse, but I believe that indifferent and apathetic parents lead to violent people. My parents took a strong emphasis on teaching me the difference between real-life and fantasy. They let me play whatever video game tickled my fancy. I grew up to be a fairly controlled and reserved person. Fox is probably just bashing this game because the ads and trailers generated a lot of hype, and by talking down about it they, in turn, generate ratings. I'm willing to be that the majority of them couldn't care less about what's actually in the game.

I can't wait to hear what they have to say about Duke Nukem Forever!