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Gaming Naysayers Have Little Context for Criticism
Buzzcut.com has a nice piece on the lack of context video game critics have in making their arguments. It should be noted he is not referring to today's report card, but a list of Top Ten most violent games put out by the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility. From the article: "I followed up with a simple question, "Who on this panel has played which of the games?" Burke answered first, "I haven't played any of them." She backed up her willful ignorance of the games by suggesting that she didn't need to play Soldier of Fortune to know that she was opposed to its glorification of killing. "I think it's an irrelevant question," she concluded."
Maybe someone should condemn reading the Bible, and put out a list of their own Top Ten most violent books of the Bible.
I'd then like to respond to the question "Why do you condemn these books of the Bible?" with "I haven't read any of them."
I'd continue, "I don't have to read the chapters about God slaughtering a bunch of people to know that I'm opposed to the Bible's glorification of killing. I think that's an irrelevant question."
One wonders how many respondants to this story will have read the article before they click Submit....
(and yes, I DID read the article before posting this.)
This, unfortunately, is an all-too-common theme - a bunch of People With Too Damn Much Free Time Who Have Decided They Are The Guardians Of The Public Morals seeking to "protect" us from ourselves.
In addition to the question of "How many of you have played any of these games" I would add another - "How many of you have spent any time at all with your children today?"
Funny how these folks have plenty of time to have these meetings - they must REALLY spend a lot of time with their kids.
Just remember - whenever you have the chance to attend something like this - ask them "And how many games have your played with your children in the past month?"
It's much more statisfying that saying STFU.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Is the blurb saying that you can't criticize something unless you have tried it first?
Does that mean that I have to become a Heroin addict before I can say, "Heroin use is bad". Do I have to kill someone before I can come out against murder?
This doesn't sound like a good way to confront these zealots. How about a more direct approach - ridicule.
Laugh in their face.
When they walk away from a conversation with you, they should know that you think:
1 - that not only is their cause based on junk science (or no science),
2 - but the leaders of their cause are the worst kind of charlatans motivated only by personial enrichment,
3 - and that they are fools for being so easily taken in.
I was wondering how Doom 3 could be considered more violent than GTA: SA in the eyes of religious and censorship groups until I went to the Interfaith site myself.
Personally, I thank Interfaith for compiling this year's Christmas shopping list for me.
Learn the words to this song:
t tr ouble.htm
http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/themusicman/yago
Sing it loudly as they walk away in disgust.
I know these people are hated here on slashdot (and I certainly don't love them), but come on now, it IS an irrelevant question.
I think we all know just from screenshots and descriptions what the games generally involve. These people, in their glorious wisdom, decided that anything involving shooting guns is too violent. I really don't think knowing that game A has a riviting storyline, or that game B involves fighting evil oppressors, will at all change their opinion.
It's like people who think cars are from the devil. Will it matter to them that car A is fuel efficient, or car B is fun to drive, or car C is practical? No, they just hate cars, and they don't need to drive one to know it's a car.
Here's the press release in question with the list at the bottom. Not only does the ICCR not play any of the games, they can't even spell them correctly! Look at GameSpot's treatment of this press release for some simple corrections.
I can't wait to play some of the Top 9 games that they recommend as "non-violent" at the very bottom. Either "Antigrav" (which as of this morning was spelled "Antigrave") or "EyeToy: Antigrav" (which was simply called "Eye Toy" earlier today) should be good. They're listed separately, by the way.
For more information, click here.
You can tell that their little list is complete crap seeing which games were ranked more violent than Postal 2. The game where you can beat a stereotypical arab to bloody death with a shovel and then piss on his corpse while lighting it on fire. Yeah, I'm sure Half-Life 2 is more violently offensive.
The only thing Postal 2 was missing was corpse raping... and many fans were upset that it didn't have that feature.
If you need an article to tell you that the ICCR's list is trash, you're one of them!!!
Odd how that's a non-violent choice.. Seeing as how football involves people more or less throwing each other around.. trying to knock each other down.. and lots of mean words *sad face*.
I am a football fan and play Madden, but come on: Football = Violent
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
It was supposed to be the Center for Relative Advancement of Public Policy, not CAPP.
These are the same type of people who think that D&D is satanic because some of the characters in the game can cast magic spells. The fact that you roll a dice to see what happens doesn't matter to them and when asked about that little issue they just ignore it.
is that most, if not all of these games, have an M rating; meaning kids shouldn't be playing them in the first place unless a parent agrees. Yes, these games are violent, have blood, contribute to negative stereotypes, etc, whatever. However, they are clearly labeled as something not fit for a kid. Rather than get in a fit over content, this group really should get in a fit over how lax the enforcement of ESRB rating is. The system is in place, and working in so far as stating that these games are for mature audiences. It's the next step, retail distribution, where the biggest failing is.
You knew the answer to the question before you asked it, and I presume that most people on slashdot did also. So what's the point of this article?
Ironically, my urge to go on a homocidal rampage isn't provoked while playing Doom 3, but rather while reading the consistent bullshit propagated by these ignorant, self-righteous soccer moms.
I can see Postal as a valid entry, since the whole premise of the game is rooted solely in bad taste. What was the result? Mediocre reviews and lukewarm reception from the crowd. I don't think anyone above the age of 13 played the game for more than ten minutes at a time.
Does Halo even involve shooting at any humans? And what the hell is some imported anime-based game doing there?
I'm just glad that my precious Metal Gear Solid 3 passed under their radars, what with its new "close quarters combat (CQC)" feature that lets you knock out a sentry with an anesthetic-soaked rag, use him as a human shield against other sentries, and then slit his throat once his usefulness has been exhausted. Not to mention Snake's smoking habit that Kojima has been quite open about since the first MSX title.
Bull. Halo 2 doesn't belong on that list. The game is by far one of the cleaner FPS games out there.
No JFK Reloaded?
You quitting proves that the karma kap worked. The most annoying of the whores shut up. --CmdrTaco
It's already been commented that the list is not a ranking. A casual glance will indicate that it is simply alphabetically ordered.
We have both kinds of religions here, Catholics and Protestants!
Okay, so is Metroid Prime good are bad? I mean, the only woman is the main character, but she goes around killing different enemies. There's no blood, but there's "graphic" animation when you shoot or kill a space pirate. How about Super Smash Bros Melee, where Samus, Peach, or Zelda can be beat up? I see they listed Mortal Kombat, so I can only guess that any fighting game with a woman means violence against women. Back to Metroid Prime, if you're careless you and wonder into slime or shoot yourself with the right type of beam off a different beam lock door. Of course, I make mention of Samus Aran precisely because the character isn't as oversexed (read, unrealistic boobs) as Laura Croft, yet there's still clearly some things (ending cut scenes) which could be interpreted as demeaning.
I guess I want to know if it is only bad when you show blood squirting out. To mean, there being blood is actually *better*, because it shows kids that there's consequences to killing someone. Ie, they're likely to be soaked in blood in the process, unless they're rather careful--I don't believe that's much of a deterrent, btw. I really don't have any problem with wanting ESRB to be more descriptive. I'd love for sex and violence to be treated more sanely--ie, I do sort of wish there was less violence and more sex in games. I like the idea of having non-violent games or non-sexual games. And I like the idea of there being information to choose such. Hell, maybe if people got over the shock value of sex and violence, media companies wouldn't be putting out trash games whose only real quality is the sex/violence.
Censorship won't work. Being informed is great. But only by removing the source of the edge that drives sales of games you don't like do you have any chance of truly reducing the consumption of such games. Treat the source, not the symptoms. And just so you know, I am slightly offended Samus Aran always ends up in shorts and such. The idea for the character is what is great. Expanding on that would be the true reward for gamers.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h
They didn't say the games would make you go out and kill your next door neighbor, but that's a decent list of the most violent games of the last year or so.
Actually from the press release:
Dr. Bernice Powell Jackson, executive minister and officer, Justice and Witness Ministries of the United Church of Christ, and president, North American Region of the World Council of Churches, said: "Our concern about these violent video games is not guesswork. For example, there is ample evidence today that playing violent video games leads to increased aggressive thought, feelings and actions. "
"I haven't played any of them." She backed up her willful ignorance of the games by suggesting that she didn't need to play Soldier of Fortune to know that she was opposed to its glorification of killing. "I think it's an irrelevant question," she concluded."
I am an athiest but I still went to see the Passion of the Christ because I love movies and I was a Mel Gibson fan. That and I wanted to see it so I could at least have an opinion on it when I talked about it within my circle of friends. I don't see how you can have an opinion on something if you haven't seen or played it. Let me correct that sentence. I don't see how you can have a VALID opinion when you have not seen or played what you have the opinion on.
Might I add that there was at least 10x the violence in the Passion as there is in most of those games listed. Prior to that movie, I thought video games had desensitized me. Boy was I wrong!
And I say this because I will wager my house on the fact that the same people complaining about GTA San An would still take their kids, or at least allow their kids, to see that same movie.
Hypocrits!
Really, what the mothers are all REALLY complaining about and are REALLY trying to say, is that they don't want their kids to grow up. They'd rather have little Johnny paying attention to mommy, rather than watching him "waste" his time giving that console more attention.
I used to play games as a kid to the ire of my mother, and now that I live with a woman I've finally discovered what the fuss was REALLY all about with her.
It just seems to me that women just can't stand it when a man's hobby gets in the way of attention being paid to her. In this case, it's video games. Before then, it was other hobbies. Maybe driving around town "wasting time" would result in a car accident, or building model rockets was a waste of money, or reading books would hurt your eyes, or hanging out with friends too much would put you in risk of meeting "bad" people. etc. etc. etc.
And then when you finally get a girlfriend, your mother hates your new hobby with a passion.
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
Only idiots number lists that are in alphabetical order.
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
Maybe editors should read slashdot and the postings instead of posting double articles and waiting for the emails to flow in.
How can they possibly understand if they never fragged their neighbor in the face with an RPG.
If you look like your passport photo, you're too ill to travel. - Will Kommen
This was a great article. Don't you all wish the media would confront and challenge head on groups like this instead of just swallowing what they shovel out.
So they don't like video games. Since their opinion is not well researched it should be given little or no weight.
there are actually only 8 non violent games left in the industry, so one had to be listed twice. They where hoping nobody would notice...
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My guess would be...
Gunslinger Girls 2: It has "gun" in it.
Shadow Heart: must be some evil black hearted game.
Amazing what comes from such simple minds. If I were evil I'd find a way to scam them out of every dime they have. Sucks having a sense of morality.
Well I've wrestled with reality for thirty five years doctor, and I'm happy to say I finally won out over it.
They listed it because they probably saw a list of upcoming game releases including Japan and saw it had "gun" in the title.
Well I've wrestled with reality for thirty five years doctor, and I'm happy to say I finally won out over it.