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Guy Game Results in Lawsuits and Injunction

Posted by Zonk on from the stupidity-beyond-my-comprehension dept.

Several readers have written in to report on Tuesday's lawsuit regarding 'The Guy Game'. The PC/console offering, which strings a weak trivia game around footage of naked college age girls, has come under fire after the revelation that a woman featured prominently in the game was under the age of 18 at the time the footage was taken. The lawsuit names Sony (PS2), Microsoft (Xbox), Take-Two Interactive (Publisher), and Top Heavy Studios (Developer) as defendants. Commentary available on GamesIndustry.biz.

12 of 111 comments (clear)

  1. Well... by th1ckasabr1ck · · Score: 5, Insightful
    According to the Cox News Service, the lawsuit explains: "Plaintiff is still a teenager and wishes to attend college, develop her career and be active in her community and church."

    I wonder what the church thinks of the game. Maybe if she wants to be such a model citizen, she should start out by not running around topless during spring break.

    1. Re:Well... by EnronHaliburton2004 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      be active in her community and church

      That's a typo, it's really supposed to say "be attractive in her community and church"

      But honestly, any time you hear some person trying to act holier then thou and bragging about how the go to church and have a personal relationship with Jesus, it's because they are lying.

      --
      94% of Repubs and 21% of Dems voted to renew the Patriot Act
    2. Re:Well... by thefirelane · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Maybe if she wants to be such a model citizen, she should start out by not running around topless during spring break.

      Insightful? You realize that's why we have the concept of 'a minor' right? So that dumb youthful indiscretions do not tarnish one's life for ever?

    3. Re:Well... by acousticiris · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Lets be realistic here... if the lawsuit explained that "Plaintiff is still a teenager and wishes to operate as a high-priced hooker to the stars but now cannot because everyone can get a look at the goods..." it probably wouldn't go over very well with a jury.
      It's most likely something along the lines of "Mom and Dad found out I was in the game so now we all have to act like good Christians and sue the world over to prevent the tarnishing of our reputation."
      It does irritate me when people try to make themselves look better by professing that they attend church, and it's ironic (in a very disturbing way) when it is used as part of a lawsuit who's purpose is to prove that the individual at hand should not be held accountable for their actions.
      I understand the LAW protects a 17 year old from being an idiot, but lets not kid ourselves and assume that a 17 year old girl didn't know flashing your breasts around town (or in a video game) was probably not a very good idea. And if she was worried about tarnishing her reputation, it seems that bringing a very high-profile lawsuit against some very high-profile companies is going to make this whole thing quite public and will probably cause the game to be far more successful than it otherwise would have been...even if it only gets to exist on the black market from here on out.

      --
      "God is dead!" - Nietzsche
      "Nietzsche is dead!" - God
    4. Re:Well... by JuggleGeek · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Yeah right. And when a minor kills someone and the courts let them off easy 'cause their only 15, it's OK. They shouldn't be responsible for stealing the gun, shooting the victim, etc - they are just a minor.

      She was 17 years old running around topless on a beach because she wanted people to look at her cute little titties. And now she's bitching and whining and suing over it.

      You may believe that people should be able to do any damn fool thing they want with no repercussions, but that's an unreasonable belief. Real life doesn't work that way.

      The very idea that one would be "tarnished forever" for running around partially nude is nonsense in and of itself.

    5. Re:Well... by Romeozulu · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's something that happened in a public place, and as such it shouldn't be any less legal to photograph it than it is to witness it.

      It's perfectly legal to photograph someone in a public place, but it is not legal to use that image for commerical purposes. This is a issues that photographers deal wih everyday.

    6. Re:Well... by arkanes · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I have to agree with the stupid whiny thing, but on the other hand, it's not like it's well known what you have to do as far as release forms goes for crowd footage. And if the crowd footage happens to be of very young college girls with thier tops off, then anyone with half a brain should realize they need to go the extra mile to make 100% certain than they aren't shipping anything with underage girls in it. If she was an out of focus background character cause she streaked by while they were filming someone else, that'd be a different story.

    7. Re:Well... by BenEnglishAtHome · · Score: 2, Insightful
      ...depictions of underage nudity in this country are illegal in their own right.

      Uh, no.

      Go to your local, large, well-stocked bookstore. Ask to see all the books by David Hamilton (or any of a dozen other artists who do similar work). Browse for a while. Report your findings back here.

      Yes, I'll grant you that in this instance a case could be made for criminal prosecution and that underage nudity is usually prosecutable. Your blanket statement, however, overstates the situation rather badly.

  2. Re:why is anyone surprised? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    If when you were 14, you had sex with another of the same age, and you later think back about that experience when you are 30 years of age, are you a pedophile?

  3. too bad so sad... yeah, right by ChipMonk · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Maybe someone should charge her parents with contributing to the corruption of a minor by allowing her to go there unsupervised.

  4. Re:You think the US laws are stupid?? by Max_Abernethy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Actually, you're mistaken. Our laws are less consistent. In my home state, Pennsylvania, it would be legal for me (as an 18 year old) to have sex with a 16 year old girl, but not to photograph her. In the state where I go to school, New York, it's illegal for me to have sex with an 18 year old. In some places it's legal to look at pornography at 18, in others not until you're 21. Everything varies from state to state.

  5. Re:Lawers are so short-sighted... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Neither Sony nor Microsoft published the game. Take-Two's The Gathering publishes the game. The role Sony and Microsoft have is basically to see if the game is essentially 'bug free', ie it won't cause their console to burst into flames. They usually don't care about the content or the quality of the game itself, just whether or not it'll destroy their hardware.

    Both Sony and Microsoft have to approve the content of the game first before it receives their approvals. First when the game is submited (generally before development actually begins) and last when the game has to go through the TRC (SCEI), TCR (Microsoft) or LotCheck (Nintendo) process.