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Who is Responsible for Advice Labels on Games?
AccUser asks: "So, I spent the day in the local hospital with my son after he suffered a seizure while we played a computer game (that shall remain nameless). The game was labeled as one for younger children, but had no warnings about photosensitive seizures on either the packaging or associated documentation, and I assumed that it would be a safe game for him to play. Many games (Halo and others) come with these warnings, and rightly so - I expected that any game that was a potential risk would indicate this. To be honest, all was fine until the final level, when there were a significant number of special lighting effects, and I guess this triggered the subsequent events. So, is the labeling of games to indicate risk of photosensitive seizures and other dangers mandatory, both in Europe and the States, and who is responsible for placing this information? Is it down to the distributor? The publisher? The developer?"
He/She will figure it out for you.
Don't the major consoles have these disclaimers in their user manuals? Not to be rude, but if you knew your child was susceptible to seizures then you were negligent in allowing him to play them. You must be the reason my hair-dryer has a tag with an oversized representation of itself and a disproportionately small bath tub crossed out with the universal NO! symbol.
Can anyone explain or point me to some URLs about why and how lighting effects induce seizures in certain people?
I've known for years that it does happen, but it still boggles my mind that something as inocent as a little bit of flashing light could cause so much harm to a person.
As far as I know, seizure warnings aren't mandatory on video games anywhere in the world - though many publishers include them just to cover their own asses in situations like these.
If you would kindly refer back to his question, it seems that he does check for the warnings.
One of the reasons he let his son play was because of the lack of a warning.
"However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation."
Without discussing who's job it is, I'm sure we can all agree that determining whether a video game can be made to create the particular type of pattern that may trigger any person's epileptic seizure might be quite difficult. There are two potential solutions. Labeling, if done conservatively and cheaply would pretty much require every video game developer to put "Danger, this videogame has flashing lights that will give you seizures" on the packaging, and the result would be the same: you wouldn't know which ones were actually dangerous for your son.
The other option would be for some developers to either design the game with photosensitives in mind (unlikely) to put "disable all lighting effects" in the options menu. "Disable all lighting effects" doesn't sound like a bad idea... and probably not as expensive to code or QA as a photosensitive-conscious game. It might decrease the quality of the game for y'all epileptics... but you wouldn't be foaming and twitching on the floor. Personally, I'd take that trade.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
No, no he wouldn't have. That's the point. He saying he knew his kid was sensitive to this sort of thing, and did check. He's probably extremely upset with himself right now, whether or not it's his fault, so I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't have everything right side up.
You watch your kid have a gran mal seizure, and we'll gauge your rationality afterwards for comparison.
There are no trails. There are no trees out here.
Just because this game didn't have a warning doesn't mean that it should have been necessary. Your knowledge that some games had these warnings initially should have been enough to tip you off that this game might not have been safe for your child. The fact that it omitted a warning doesn't shouldn't imply anything. Does a fork set imply that it's safe to stick one of its forks into a light socket if it does not include a warning? No, even if there are others that warn you that it's not a bright idea.
I have a feeling that you're wanting to sue somebody in this situation. Instead, you should accept the fact that you made an error in your parental judgement. You shouldn't have let him play the game without consulting his doctor, whether or not the game had a warning, because you knew that video games could potentially cause a problem before you let your son play the game. Besides, you can't go around trying to protect everybody from everything. Don't try to pass blame onto anybody else, just apologize to your son and move on.
Until Slashdot fixes the funny modifier, use insightful or interesting. The poster knows your intentions.
that came with the game system. It may will indicate that the system should not be used, period, by anyone who suffers from photosensitive seizures. For instance, the Playstation 2 manual (available here) clearly states on page 2:
WARNING: READ BEFORE USING YOUR PLAYSTATION(R)2 COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM. A very small percentage of individuals may experience epileptic seizures when exposed to certain light patterns or flashing lights. Exposure to certain patterns or backgrounds on a television screen or while playing video games, including games played on the PlayStation 2 console, may induce an epileptic seizure in these individuals. Certain conditions may induce previously undetected epileptic symptoms even in persons who have no history of prior seizures or epilepsy. If you, or anyone in your family, has an epileptic condition, consult your physician prior to playing. If you experience any of the following symptoms while playing a video game - dizziness, altered vision, eye or muscle twitches, loss of awareness, disorientation, any involuntary movement, or convulsions - IMMEDIATELY discontinue use and consult your physician before resuming play
Moral of the story: Don't assume that merely because the game manual does not repeat this warning that the game is safe for your child; any game (indeed, anything that flashes light, including your TV when it is not being used by the game system) can trigger a seizure.
... and the unfortunate truth is that I have yet to find a game that's 100% safe for her. She's been affected by pretty much everything, with the exceptions being Mahjong and Solitaire. Even Tetris Worlds wasn't completely safe as some levels use different lighting effects than others. One trick she's found is that if the room lights are alot brighter than the computer screen it doesn't affect her nearly as much! Hope this helps and I wish your son a speedy recovery!
Kleedrac
Sure we wang, can.
Xbox Instruction manual, page 4, directly after the "electricity is dangerous, do not chew on the powercord" section (no link, I am quoting from the physical paper manual in front of me that was included with my Xbox):
"Important Health Warnings
About Photosensitive Seizures
A very small percentage of people may experience a seizure when exposed to certain visual images, including flashing lights or patterns that may appear in video games. Even people who have no history of seizures or epilepsy may have an undiagnosed condition that can cause these 'photosensitive epileptic seizures' while watching videogames"
Then it goes on to talk about children being more likely than adults to have these problems and preventative steps to avoid them.
This information is repeated in French on page 24 and Spanish on page 45 - it's quite a big instruction book. Oh, and the shrink-wrapped package that the book came in has a big "STOP - READ THE INSTRUCTION MANUAL BEFORE DOING ANYTHING ELSE" wording on the outside (again - in three languages).
But of course, being a concerned, overzealous, ready-to-sue videogames-babysit-my-kid parent - you read all this... didn't you?
What percent people actually are suceptible to such flashes?
Was this a PC game or a console game? And if a console game, which console?
I work for Sony and AFAIK every single game has these warnings on - and rightly so. Every parent should be aware that any video game (and many TV programs) can potentially cause seizures in photosensitive individuals. The only safe route is abstinance.
In any case, you should inform the game's publisher of this event, to ensure they tighten their act up.
like the flasher on superbowl? might answer the one question about what percentage of the population is affected by said flashes...
oh wait, the search engine stories reported that as the most popular search of all time.
just turn down the refresh rate on your vid settings until it goes away, then turn it back up until they start. get empirical. and perhaps keep the wean away from computer games!
I think it is irresponsible to let your son play any video game when you know that he suffers from epilepsy. Warnings on the packaging can only indicate that there might be a higher risk because the game makes extensive use of lighting effects but in general seizure can be triggered by almost anything and it will depend on the individual.
I wonder, is it more the light that really triggers it? Could he play a Gameboy Advance (not SP) or maybe even an old school Gameboy?
After taking a random sampling of game manuals I have lying around, *every* single console game had this warning printed in both the manual for the game and the manual that came with the system. I know this has been a common practice going back at least as far as the NES.
No PC game manuals I looked at had any such warning, however the EULAs (for whatever they're worth) all contain passages disclaiming responsability for damages, including personal injury.
After some brief googling, it would seem that 15-20hz is the key danger frequency for triggering photosensitive epilepsy, as well has high contrast patterns in a cycle of 1-4hz per degree. So having guidelines that would make games safe most photosensitive people seems to be a possability, but I think it would be rather difficult to make all developers aware of this. This may be a good thing though to have an independant organization like the ESRB evaluate, I think it would be a worthwhile cause to take up with them.
Every video game system you buy has just that warning included. So now because this one game doesn't warn you it MUST be safe? Come on.
Just because you were playing a videogame at the time does not automatically make this the game's fault.
A pizza of radius z and thickness a has a volume of pi z z a
What's missing here is an ASSUMPTION OF INJURY. When you have a condition that could be aggravated by certain things, ASSUME YOU WILL GET HURT BY DOING THEM. Warnings or not, ASSUME THE WORST. You should know by now what might trigger your sons seizures, so you should ALWAYS play the games before he does. This isn't a foolproof method, but it's better than nothing.
'Standards' in computing only impress those who are impressed by things like 'standards'.
I know epilepsy can be triggered by the flashing effect that results from driving along a row of trees with the sunlight behind them. SO if it is the same in video games then not all games have to come with a warning. A chess game wouldn't flash.
I find this a difficult story. On the one hand I am all darwin. You know you have a disease. Don't play games. Read a book. On the other hand game companies know about the problem. Just print a warning. I am sure any lawyer will insist on it being in the manual.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
I did some googling for peanut allergy and photosensitive epilepsy. It seems peanut allergy occurs at about 25x more often; however, I was not aware that either of these are as common as the statistics show. This is quite an eye opener for me.
Peanut allergy affects about 1:125 people
Photosensitive epilepsy affects about 1:3000 peopleNOTE: This post is actually meant to be informative; I went with a humorous title to get noticed.
If your kid is susceptible to gran mal siezures, WHY LET HIM PLAY VIDEO GAMES AT ALL.
Imagine your some video game designer, how do you determine it's likelihood of causing siezures?
A siezure warning on the back of the box is just some disclaimer the good lawyers at big companies tell all their developers to put on the box. I mean give me a break, how many people in the country are there who have this problem, and would it even matter sales wise if they ALL put it on the box?
If this guy isn't planning on suing, then I sincerely feel sorry for his situation.
I believe it would be disingenuous of the game manufacturers to label certain games with seizure warnings and leave others without when they really have no way of knowing which ones will or will not stimulate a given epileptic.
That said if I were you I would consider the following things. Maybe use PCs and not consoles for gaming so you have more control over the frame rate and refresh rate, hoping to avoid the certain frequencies that may cause this. Also something like a Gameboy Advance or one of those small LCD screens that attach to the console may prevent this, I would investigate this.
Also if you have and HD TV or an available computer monitor you might try using progressive scan capable consoles as they should have higher refresh rates and less flicker. And I'm sure there a websites/blogs/forums for epileptic gamers. Check them out and see what works for them.
I hope your son is feeling well and good luck.
STOP ROCK VIDEO
Nor are Producers, Artists, or anyone else involved in the creation of a video game, except by complete coincidence.
The reason they put the labels on the games is as a fail safe, not because of any knowledge about their game's potential for inducing seizures. Because this is a lawsuit-happy society we live in, they figure it's easiest to put labels on everything.
I'm sure that in 20 years time there'll be big disclaimers before every television show saying that there may be a risk to viewers of seizures, just to prevent lawsuits.
My advice is to presume that video games are going to cause seizures, whether there's a label or not. Game creators have no way of preventing them at this point, so unless one comes out with a label that says that it doesn't cause seizures, I think it's best to avoid the lot of them.
=Brian
There is nothing so good that someone, somewhere, will not hate it.
Interesting - I didn't know peanut allergy was that common, but is it actually connected to photosensitive epilepsy in any way? (Serious question, your post just implies it is somehow).
This is my Sig, this is my Gun. One is for Slashdot and one is for Fun.
You should be held responsible for buying your spaz son video games. It's not the publisher's duty to do your parenting for you.
.... that some games have these consequences.
Games should be properly labeled, period.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Using a VGA adapter to a very small screen? Does the screensize play a role for epilepcy?
Actually I originally thought they were both 1:1 million things that hypochondriac parents were using to scare the rest of society. The original intent of the post was to make fun of both groups for being alarmists. However, once I saw the actual numbers, I realized it's a bigger problem than I thought. Then I felt silly for trying to trivialize the matter. :[
they later proved that the episode wasnt the cause there werent any more seizures than normal that day, another case of the media blowing something out of proportion... http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/tv/seizure.htm
"Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."
They not only insist of placing standard warnings inside their instruction manuals, but every game they ship also comes with a small "precautions" booklet citing the exact same things!
What a good way to promote an environmental friendly attitude.
Let's say that the cause of the problems is a change in brightness of x% ocurring between a and b Hz. Maybe the device could sense that and reduce the brightness, or even drop the framerate to below a or something.
Maybe people don't know the exact parameters that cause a seizure, or maybe it would be too expensive... but maybe it would work.
You can pretty much assume, as games did back on the Sega consoles for instance, that it will, regardless of the title, trigger these responses in certain individuals. I haven't seen a single game that I would play had I epilepsy or some other photo-sensitive syndrome.
~~~
Actually, I didn't know my son was sensitive to this sort of thing before letting play the game. When I choose a game, I check everything I can about it, and this also includes lighting effects because I am aware that there can be issues with some kinds.
Any fool can talk, but it takes a wise man to listen.
I'm not looking for someone to sue. I'm looking to find out if the community thinks that this is an important issue or not. I'm looking to find out if I can bring pressure to the industry to tighten the labelling of games up. I'm looking to make sure that this doesn't happen to my son again. I'm lucky - I was playing the game with him at the time. What if I hadn't been?
Any fool can talk, but it takes a wise man to listen.
AccUser,
I think i speak for most decent ppl by fully supporting action against the people at fault here. As games become a huge part of our culture they need to be strictly policed to make sure they dont have sensitive content without warning, this includes hazards to health.
It doesnt matter if you knew about your sons problem before, if the game was published correctly it would have a warning.
By pushing this issue maybe you could make these warnings mandatory.
It seems odd that your game had no warning. I don't believe that I've ever purchased a game that did not have a list of warnings including the possibility that the game may trigger epileptic attacks, and that you should break from the game at least once an hour. Where did you find this game?
...on photosensitive epilepsy:
http://www.epilepsy.org.uk/info/photo.html
In summary:
* The high flicker rate of CRTs means they present a very small risk to people with photosensitive epilepsy.
* LCD and TFT screens do not flicker at all.
* Increased brightness and sharpness of LCD and TFT screens may increase the risk to people with photosensitive epilepsy. This risk can be minimised by reducing the brightness of the screen.
* Any material being displayed that contains flicker or repetitive patterns on any type of screen poses a risk to people with photosensitive epilepsy.
* If you primarily use 'Office' or similar packages, an LCD/TFT screen is the better medium.
* For watching DVDs at full screen, a CRT is the better medium.
Whether the game had a warning or not is not relevent. See 4th * above.
If you add too many lawyers, you start to need a bigger box for all the labels and disclaimers.
;) ).
As for the epileptic stuff, even if the game doesn't have flashing lights if your computer has a good enough vidcard, you can often do the equivalent by just moving fast enough - e.g. wiggling/moving the mouse so that you rapidly switch between a dark frame and then a light frame.
Anyway, there are drugs to control this epilepsy stuff. If you don't want the drugs or want to cut it down (the drugs have side effects), ask some decent docs about a special low carbo diet which works for many epileptics (the diet has side effects, but may be healthier than the typical anglo-western diet
...keep your child away from this site.
As for the labelling, I've seen it by the game publisher (PS2 games) and by the manufacturer (Gamecube Games). PC games are different. I don't remember seeing the photo-sensitive warning in every one.
On PC games I suggest you read all the README files and any other TEXT file on the game's main directory. This is especially true of games that have no manual or printed documentation.
Games without flashing effects are obviously your best bet. Almost every game has them. Even games without flashing could trigger you. I'd say try out the game first, but in your example, you wouldn't know it.
This essay on Epilepsy on the Screen mentions the warnings are completely voluntary.
So far, every single Game Cube game has the warning. I take that as a sign that part of the licensing agreement requires the Nintendo-written warning.
Was this a console or PC game? From your description, I'm assuming PC, since that's where most learning/children games are, but I just wanted to verify.
Does your family have a history of seizures? You mentioned that you were carefully looking at manuals to find one that didn't have the risk listed, and I'm wondering why you did that, if your child hadn't shown signs of possible seizures in the past (if you were just being extra careful, that's completely understandable).
Was it a game by a major publisher, or a bargain bin, jewel-case only game? Often times, a jewel-case only game will have a very abbriviated manual (with the full manual/FAQ online or on the disc), so the abbreviated manual might not have mentioned the risk for seizures.
As to your question on who is responsible:
Developers usuall have very little say about what goes into the manual. They might provide some of the contents (ie, character stats, control layouts, history), but everything else is done by the publisher, such as warnings, hint line phone numbers, and so on. Distributors generally simply mass duplicate the game discs, boxes, and manuals and send them out, not modifying anything.
As a previous post said, however, you'll generally find the 'general case' warnings on your game console and computer systems (and TV, and...). Those are just as important as the ones found in game manuals.
Here's the question you're not answering: If he had never had a seizure, why were you so careful to check for it? Previous diagnosis? Family history? Paranoia? Hindsight? What?
Most (if not all) publishers place a blanket warning that it could cause seizures.
Most console games come with a warning, many PC games do not. None of my PC games have a warning. AccUser has said several times so far that it was a PC game. He has also said that it was the first time his son has had a seizure, and that his son has played games before. It seems that he just wants to know who labels the games so that he has more information for parenting, not so he can sue.
I'm sure he wouldn't have posted this if he knew that this would be the response he'd get. I'm sorry that some people have to assume the worst.
"What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
Notice that he/she doesn't bother posting what game it is his son played. A convenient way to prevent us from shooting down his complaint. How are we to know that ALL documentation was there with the game? That this guy actually did bother to check for the warning? That the kid was taking the time to BLINK, and wasn't playing for an excessive amount of time??
Perhaps some kind of heuristic filter could be written that would try to detect sharp lighting effects and shut off the display (or cause it to fade gently from screen to screen, effectively disabling the computer but still allowing you to see the ctrl-alt-dlt window).
It would just be one layer of security -- I'm sure whoever writes it will be sued by the first person to have a seizure while using it. But, it could cut down on situations where people unexpectedly get flashed.
I think about these banner ads that flash at you.
Upstairs Dog, Downstairs People.
First, I hope your kid gets better. As a gamer/nerd, I also watch out for what my kids play and I have to respect any parent that says they read the labels and buy accordingly. Kudos to you.
Second, from reading over the posts, it sounds like you've done nothing wrong. You have the right hardware (PC with LCD using a digital and not analog video card), your kid had no seizure history, and you've been responsible in the titles purchased. While there may be no legal reparations possible (IANAL) the publisher and developers both deserve to know about this incident. It allows them to possibly make personal reparations to you and your family. It allows them to possibly look into their development, publishing, labeling policies. And being a PC game, it might also push them into the development of a patch for the game to reduce the intensity of that final level.
Finally, I'd go ahead and post the name of the game here since this crowd is not likely to start a news jihad against the companies for this incident. And other people may have similar problems with that title, or other titles from the same developer. Useful knowledge to have for any letters you choose to write.
Again, good luck to you and your kid, and kudos to you for taking some responsibility for your kid in this day-n-age when most parents think it's everyones' responsibility but theirs.
I'm not looking for someone to sue. I'm looking to find out if the community thinks that this is an important issue or not. I'm looking to find out if I can bring pressure to the industry to tighten the labelling of games up. I'm looking to make sure that this doesn't happen to my son again. I'm lucky - I was playing the game with him at the time. What if I hadn't been?
The problem is figuring out where to draw the line between games that need it, and games that don't. Clearly, a game like Civilization that has no high-speed graphics changes doesn't need a label, and a game like Tetris for the Nintendo, with its black-and-white "lightning" effect every time you clear four lines at once does. But what about the games in between those two extremes?
"They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
before properly testing it for crashes and other things that make the game unplayable without patches later.
What makes you think they have the resources, knowledge, money, or time to do a study with epileptics? They don't.
For it to be even worth putting on the box it'd have to be a clinical study, and that would totally fuck up a release schedule. It's impossible. Just stick a EULA in the installer.
Publishers, if they have the presence of mind, will add a seizure warning just to cover their bases. This is, of course, if the warning doesn't interfere with the box art (or otherwise enhances it... )
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
The monitor can't induce a seizure by itself. The video game designer has to purposefully draw images that flash from light to dark at 5-20Hz.
Now, it could be that in a _game engine_ they never intended it to do that, but the uses puts himself in a situation where that occurs. Imagine barrel rolling in a fligh simulator while out of control over a dark landscape and bright blue sky. Imagine the sky and ground roll in and out of view about 5 times a second. That could induce a seizure, even if the designer didn't intend to.
But the monitor has nothing to do with it. They are fixed refresh rate.
THIS THING CAN TURN ON A DIME, MACROSSZERO STYLE ALSO FUCK BETA, ~NYORON
Actually, I didn't know my son was sensitive to this sort of thing before letting play the game.
Well then, you don't have a leg to stand on, since you wouldn't have paid attention to the warning anyway, not knowing that it applied to your son.
Of course, you wouldn't really have a leg to stand on even if you did know about your son's condition, seeing as how any doctor of any competence at all would've told you that video games (all video games) are a prime cause of photosensitive epileptic seizures.
Rob
Photosensitive epilepsy is one of many rare dysfunctions of the human body that can cause incapacitation and death.
Much like other defects of the body, there are several things in this world that are readily accessible that could trigger a seizure from photosensitive epilepsy.
What do you want from the world? You CANNOT shield your child forever in this whizbang-electronic world from seizure-inducing situations. Eventually your child would have had a seizure despite your efforts, and even with your current knowledge he may very likely have more over the course of his life.
My sister almost died from an extreme allergic reaction when doctors treated her with penicillin as a child. She also discovered over the course of her life that she was allergic to several other things, but that initial experience facing death taught her caution and preparation. She has since been careful about using new drugs ( prescription or OTC ), and always carries an ephedrine shot with her.
Don't think of this as a bad thing; celebrate the fact that your son is alive. Just be thankful that you were there with your son, and were able to come to his aid.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
If pressure were put on the industry over this, and let's say maybe even a court case found a publisher liable for not including the warning, all that would happen is that *every* game would include the warning. (And this is already the case with every Nintendo game since back in the time of the NES).
You'd be right back where you started -- having no idea which games your son could safely play without playing every one all the way through.
I'm currently working on an independently developed game. This article has prompted me to include "this game could cause siezures in photosensitive players" in the readme just to cover my ass. I don't think that it's something that would cause siezures, but at the same time I don't want some pissed off parent with a team of lawyers coming after me and my team because I didn't include it.
--Jeremy
Jesus was a liberal
Of course it is an important issue. However, I think the video game industry has done a fair job in letting the public know about the "dangers" that could be caused. Growing up, I had a friend with epilepsy. We were both avid video gamers, and would just play in spurts so he wouldn't be staring at the screen on hours for end. Like you, we took his problem very seriously (except when I made him watch the time warp scene in Space Quest IV, hehe). I think the point I'm trying to make is that you and your son knew he had a problem. You also obviously knew video games can cause seizures. Just because a game might not have a disclaimer doesn't mean it is some magical game just developed for people with epilepsy. I'd say from now on, like other people have said, just assume every game is "bad" and take the necessary precautions.
First, of course I hope your son is feeling better.
:
;)
Now, I can't help the uneasy feeling that you use weasel-speak in your description. A lot of things are worded in that subtle way to make a casual reader assume things that you don't actually say. Specifically :
- You hint (without actually saying so) that you always check warnings on video games
- You hint (without actually saying so) that the presence or absence of warnings is a major factor in your decision to purchase a game.
- You hint (without actually saying so) that you knew that your son was particularly sensitive.
Basically what you say is "many games have warnings", "I assume that a harmful game would mention so" and "I assume that some game I buy will be safe". You know, I ignore this kind of warnings since I have no known health problems and I consider them to be meaningless legalese "cover your ass". Yet, everything you write also applies to me.
I might sound paranoid but recently some politicians have been trying very hard to convince me of things without actually saying them that clearly. (I say this to explain my suspicions, not to start a political flame war). So it would be interesting if you could bring a short (and clear) answer to the following questions
- Did you know prior to purchasing the game that your son had a special senitivity to light?
- Do you always check warnings prior to purchasing a game?
- Have you ever purchased a game that portrayed such warnings?
- Had such a warning shown on the box, would you have purchased it anyway or refrained from it?
Again, I wish your son the best. Please accept my apologies if my suspicions are unfounded. Maybe it's just a poor choice of words. Maybe I'm really paranoid and I should consult a shrink
It would be nice to be sure of anything the way some people are of everything.
"I'm not looking for someone to sue."
Kudos to you for your sense of responsibility and civic duty; I can see why you didn't want to name the game involved.
"I'm looking to make sure that this doesn't happen to my son again."
Well, first, let me say that I hope it doesn't. But are you sure that the game was responsible for the seizure? You mention that he has no history of photosensitive epileptic episodes, so is it possible that it was something physiological that just happened to coincide with that stage of the game? Ask these questions, because the seizure could be a sign of other things. I don't wish to alarm you, but my brother's photosensitive epilepsy was a symptom of what turned out to be a fatal brain tumor...but this was before MRI, and CT scans were the newest thing. For perspective, the opening sequence of Speilberg's E.T. with the swinging torches induced a seizure. This was in a cinema three weeks after it opened, so if your son is suffering photosensitive epilepsy he may need to be very careful in the future, not just of games but any source of flashing lights.
"I'm looking to find out if I can bring pressure to the industry to tighten the labelling of games up."
The problem here is that there is no precise threshold of stimulus that induces a seizure, as even an individual's susceptability can change with factors such as tiredness, illness, or medications. Unfortunately, with the unpredictable nature of the ailment, the only safe bet is to say: any game more visually stimulating than solitaire is a risk. It really is impossible to be any more precise than this. I'm not saying this to be a jerk, I'm saying that there is the potential in any graphics intensive game (or movie/television program/rave) to induce epileptic fits. The only solution is to label ALL games risky, but that defeats the point of labelling standards.
"I'm looking to make sure that this doesn't happen to my son again."
Then you want to be absolutely certain that it is photosensitive epilepsy, and not something else. Again, ask questions, get blood tests, and if they are inconclusive then look for environmental factors (eg had the exterminators in recently?). But until you know for certain, pushing this may be wasted effort on your part that does nothing to help your son; he's what's important here, right?
"I'm lucky - I was playing the game with him at the time. What if I hadn't been?"
True epileptic seizures are rarely fatal in themselves, and frequently more distressing for the people around the sufferer than the epileptic. Most return to normal (albeit shaky, exhausted and with possibly a few minor strains) relatively quickly. Often, epileptics experience warning signs such as hallucinations; in my brother's case, he heard garbled voices and experienced a strong metallic smell about 30 seconds before a seizure started, which gave him enough warning to lie down before falling down (most injuries suffered by epileptics are caused by either falls, or well-intentioned people trying to hold them down or stop the shaking. DO NOT TRY THIS! EVER! It hurts to see a loved one in difficulty and beyond your help, I know, but it really does do more harm than good. Just put something soft under their head and clear the area around them of hard objects). So to directly answer your question, if you hadn't been there, you probably would have found him asleep and hard to wake, or sore, groggy and disoriented (and probably rather frightened). Don't get me wrong, I'm not downplaying the seriousness of this situation, but epilepsy is not as dangerous as it seems, as long as good sense prevails. A good example (you're from the UK, you should appreciate this), think of South African ex-cricketer Tony Grieg, who has controlled epilepsy and, it could be said, achieved something in his time.
Look, your concern is natural and well-founded. But stop and consider, is this response entirely rational? Is it the best thing you can do for your son, and is it really the best avenue to expe
"Serious question, your post just implies it is somehow"
Now you know why public forums are called "the peanut gallery"
BizDiz, I have no idea what kind of a sick person you are, but when someone is suffering from a horrible medical condition like that, it is not funny in the least to make fun of it. Do you have some kind of dysfunction, or are you just completely immature and immoral?
In all of the examples you mentioned (the plane spinning, the ducking behind a crate, and the wall glitch) the contrasting colors would not be happening nearly fast enough. In order to trigger most photosensitive seizures, the flashing has to be at a rate of at least two or three times a second.
-I have played several flight sim games, and I have never witnessed a tail spin anywhere near that fast.
-In order to duck behind a crate enough to cause a seizure, one would have to be trying to push the crouch button as quickly as they could. (I doubt any photosensitive gamers would do this)
-The wall glitch is not as predictable, but in most cases, the player has to move the camera or otherwise send an input signal to the game to cause a change in what they are seeing.
With the exception of the possibility of a very rare glitch, it is easy to be aware of anything in the game that might have the speed and contrast necessary to cause a seizure.
I agree that it is impossible to predict some things that could happen to some people depending upon what they did in the game, but some labels should be put on game boxes if anything was written into the coding that is known to cause seizures. Flashing, contrasting lights in some parts of the game, for example. And for god's sake, this is just a dad trying to look out for his son's safety, why is it necessary to slam him like this with every reason that his question is irrelevant?
If everyone would stop assuming that everyone else is evil and just looking for ways to make money and please themselves, maybe the world would be a better place than it is.