Illinois Videogame Law Moves Forward

The ongoing trend of legislating the sale of video games moves forward. Gamasutra has news on the Illinois law currently moving through the legislature, which apparently has "overwhelming support". From the Illinois debate: "An industry that is making so much money selling these things to your children is dealing with things like decapitation, defecation on people. There's vivid pictures of nudity. It's an industry that needs help being policed..."

Comments

since when...

[takeya]

do games have people "defecating on eachother"? are they playing porno games or something? Japanese H-games?

can anyone tell me if there are really any american games with this sort of thing, or if it's just FUD.

Re:since when...

[cgenman]

You can get japanese H games in the US legally, though not at any retailers that I know of. There are cute little animal games where your cute little animal takes cute little turds, but not on anybody. There is a webgame version of Puyo Puyo where your special attack is throwing up on your opponent. There were a few games in the 80's where birds would poo on you, though those weren't very good games. There's the 7 sins, where the point is to try to have sex with as many people as possible. There is, of course a PS2 version.

There are a lot of bad games out there. But then, there are millions of games out there. By the same token, I don't have anything morally against making parents come in and buy games for their kids if they want them to have them. I've known far too many people in the retail sector who have told kids no, and been yelled at by the parent for stopping their kid from buying, say, Manslaughter. Inevitably, the parent then comes back the following day and freaks out on the poor underpaid associate for selling such filth to their kid.

I think the generation which preceeded ours has certain expectations about cartoons and videogames which ours does not. To them, more mature cartoons or videogames is like Jack Daniels flavored breastmilk. Or black leather studded diapers. In exactly the same way that movies were seen as kid's stuff at the turn of the century, so too is videogames the realm of kids. And therefore anything that gets released in a videogame is marketed at kids, and all of that stuff that you see in videogames is people trying to mess up your children.

It's a different perspective. While I don't disagree with the idea of restricting the sale of certain videogames to minors, I do disagree with the perspective.

Re:since when...

[Ayaress]

H games are very rarely available retail in the US. Very few companies import them because they're just not that popular here. Where they are sold (I worked at a book store in my area that has a few of them. Even then, not even enough to get their own shelf, and in the eighteen months I worked there, I only remember seeing one customer actually buy one), they're behind the beaded curtain next to the brown-wrapper magazines, and they usually have brown wrappers themselves. Anybody under 18 isn't even allowed in the room where they're kept (this one checked ID, too), and the store I worked at had a policy posted outside the beaded curtain room that if you had somebody under 18 with you, even if it was your child, you couldn't go inside (The justification is that they'd be left unattended, but the reason was just as much to stop people from buying porn for their younger friends). The only way to get H games in most areas is at adult novelty stores, or through catalogs like J-list or Jast USA. Most such catalogs require age verification just to order the catalog, let alone anything in it. Most also require age verification and a credit card to order. Most adult stores are almost religious about making sure nobody under 18 gets through the door. They're often unliked by the local authorities already, so even a small slip can mean getting their land rezoned out from under them.

Here's my suggestion

[QuantumG]

Let's make every game 18+ by default. Then let's set up a classification board, staffed by people who actually know how to play a game, that you have to go to if you want a game which is rated for younger audiences. Then let's change this mantra of the protectorate which I hear all the time: games are for kids. Games are not for kids. Surveys have shown that the vast majority of gamers are over 18 years of age. The fact that games contain elements which are distasteful in ordinary society is no big surprise when you stop thinking about games as entertainment for kids and start thinking about them as an escape from reality for adults.

Re:Here's my suggestion

[QuantumG]

Maybe you should actually read what I wrote before replying. I said, games which are rated for children should be available. Games that are not rated (at all) should also be available -- to people over the age of 18. Parents are obviously free to allow their children to play any game they see fit -- even if it is unrated -- but children cannot buy these games.

I think that's simple and straight forward, but your government (and mine even more so) do not understand that because they think of games as being solely for children. Here in Australia we don't even have an 18+ rating for games. We also don't allow unrated games on the shelves. The result is that the vast majority of people who play games (which, as I said, is mostly over the age of 18) are saddled with kiddie junk. The few companies that actually try to make games for adults have their games effectively banned from my country (as they are refused a classification and unrated games are banned from the shelves). So think yourself lucky that you have any adult rated games there at all.

Re:Here's my suggestion

[bmorton]

The parent didn't say that people under 18 didn't play games. The parent states that survey's have shown that the vast majority of gamers are adults.

The parent also didn't say that games should be banned for people under 18. The idea is that if a company wants people under 18 to be able to play the game, they have to submit it for review.

Review boards wouldn't be necessary for most games, as they are obviously targetted to adults and could go straight to the stores with a rating of 18+. If a game is meant for a younger audience (or for all ages), it can be submitted and reviewed and then deemed appropriate. This also has the effet of stopping violent games from "slipping thru the cracks."

Seems pretty reasonable to me

-B

Re:Here's my suggestion

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

That'll be about as effective as banning drinking and smoking for kids...except games, being software, can't be as easily controlled as physical objects like booze or cigarettes.

And there are a lot more "underage" gamers than underage smokers or drinkers.

Games are not for kids.

Games, like most things, are for people mature enough to handle it. I can play Halo and enjoy the strategy without going trigger-happy and without looking for a game with more gore. (In fact, much as I enjoy Halo, I find games with gratuitous gore very distasteful.)

Surveys have shown that the vast majority of gamers are over 18 years of age.

Ehheh. Right. Surveys show that the vast majority of people are over 18 years of age. I mean, you're comparing what, a group from roughly 10 or 12 to 18 with a group from 19 to who-knows-where? Of course you'll get more in the latter.

Is there a survey that shows that there is a vastly greater percentage of gaming adults compared to the percentage of gaming teenagers? I'm pretty sure that a randomly-selected teenager is far more likely to play video games than a randomly-selected adult.

The fact that games contain elements which are distasteful in ordinary society is no big surprise when you stop thinking about games as entertainment for kids and start thinking about them as an escape from reality for adults.

Except for one thing: lots of developers treat games as entertainment for kids. And lots of teenagers like this kind of escape from reality, and are mature enough to handle tasteful games....

Re:Here's my suggestion

[QuantumG]

My original comment specifically said that game manufacturers should be able to submit their game to a review board which could hand out classifications for ratings other than 18+. I don't want to ban any games, I want all games to be 18+ and available on the shelf until such time as the manufacturer gets a lower rating.

Re:Here's my suggestion

[Eivind]

There's a problem with this, and this problem is obvious in countries that have such a law, for example Germany.

The problem is that in practice, any certification costs money. This means that any game developed by nonprofits in general will not be certified. It would be a lot of work, and quite likely costly, for a OSS developer to ensure that his game was certified according to each of dozens of different classification-boards.

And if you think large groups of countries will agree on one common standard, one common certification board, you're dreaming. That's not the case for movies and wouldn't be the case for games.

Practical upshot ? You can't legally sell a Linux-distro to a minor in Germany. In practice it's done all the time, because the law gets ignored for things which aren't mainly games, and which are obviously not very objectionable anyway.

But in principle, you'll have to strip ALL games (including solitaire, mahjong, minesweeper and tuxracer) from a Linux-distro, or jump trough expensive and time-consuming hoops if you want to legally sell your linux-distro to minors in Germany.

17 year-old linux-users aren't exactly *that* rare.

Errrrr

[schild]

Defecation on people?

I play a _lot_ of games, and I'm pretty sure there's no game out there where you can squat and take a cleveland steamer on someone.

Sure, you can pee on people in Postal 2, but that's surely what they aren't implying, or they would have used the word urinate.

No matter how you slice it, the government's (local and national) obsession with controlling what media our children see is unhealthy. Hell, I don't even know how any lawmakers got it into their head that this is somehow important.

Re:Errrrr

[Bios_Hakr]

The "Bubblegum" crew on CounterStrike (mostly on the Tokyo servers) will spraypaint their balls (an actual, hi-rez, digital picture of each player's manberries) on your corpse. I've seen these guys actually sacrifice themselves to jump across a level and spray balls on me.

Another crew has a pic of poop in a urinal (WTF people) as their spray.

So, yes, people do deficate on each other.

Re:Errrrr

[mausmalone]

I think that if he's talking about stuff like that and graphic nudity, he's talking about games clearly labeled Adults Only. To see how much this plague of bad taste was corrupting the youth of America, I went to the ESRB site and compiled a list of all Adults Only games:

All Nude Glamour
All Nude Nikki
All Nude Cyber
Body Language
Cyber Photographer
Crystal Fantasy
Critical Point
Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude Uncut and Uncensored
Playboy Screensaver: The Women of Playboy
Peak Entertainment Casinos
Riana Rouge
Singles
Snow Drop
The Joy of Sex (CDI)
Tokimeki Checkin!
Wet - The Sexy Empire
Water Closet: The Forbiidden Chamber
X-Change

Some of you may recognize some of those titles from various Something Awful hentai game reviews. I've noted also that the only AO title on a console is "The Joy of Sex" for the Philips CDI, which is a digital version of the classic 1979 book by the same title which is considered to be both in good taste and respectable as a serious look at sex.

Also worth noting for its oddity value, there are exactly 18 games intended only for people over 18. :P Also worth noting is that most video game stores won't touch these games and that the only way to get them is online directly from the publisher.

The reason that congreess people are so up-in-arms about this is because there are 3 sides to this issue. Pro regulation: You think that video game violence is dispicable and the sexual content is deplorable, even though you've never played a video game nor have you ever seen any of this content you're so enraged at. Anti regulation: You think that the industry is doing a good job of regulating itself. You play games and if you have children, you monitor what they play and consider the ESRB ratings before making any purchase. Apathetic: They're just games... who cares?

What makes lawmakers so fervent about this is that the type of people who are for regulation call them and write them constantly to make sure it happens. People who are anti-regulation write reactionary articles and either post them online or send them to the lawmakers, but since the lawmaker doesn't want to look like a "flip flopper," they refuse to change their stance. And the vast majority of people are apathetic on the subject, so even though they really aren't calling for regulation, nobody notices because they're not saying anything at all.

It all went down hill...

[vistic]

...after Custer's Revenge for the Atari 2600.

No more than other media...

[gimpynerd]

Seems to me video games should not be regulated any more than movies or music. If children playing mature video games is a problem then it is their parents' problem not the government's.

Re:No more than other media...

[Bios_Hakr]

Movies and music are (somewhat) regulated. And it should be so. Basicly, nothing Il does will prevent you from playing a game you want. Wal-Mart may not carry it anymore, but you shouldn't shop there anyway. You can still buy Doom3 at EB or online with no problem.

This will prevent 13yo boys from giggling each other to death while playing Vampire: Bloodlines.

And it should be that way.

People need to understand that parents cannot possible watch their kids 100% of the time. It just isn't feasable. The best we can do is to teach them well and hope they make the right choices when we aren't around.

Unfortunately, not every parent teaches their kid properly (whatever that is) and peer-pressure is very strong.

Remove cigiratte laws and kids will smoke.

Remove CD warning labels and kids will listen to fiddicent singing about shooting 2pack and fucking his mom.

Remove MPAA ratings and kids will end up watching violent movies.

Why not limit the avalibility of HL2 to prevent 13yo boys from fragging each other?

I know most people say that watching something or doing it virtually will not cause it to happen in real life. I tend to agree.

Most kids will never shoot an AWP into a crowd. But how many of them will call women "bitches" and "hos"? Kids may never do battle with the legions of hell, but how many will think of shooting a gun as "cool"?

A good quote (badly paraphrased) is: Thoughts lead to actions. Actions lead to habits. Habits build your character.

This law should prevent kids from playing violent games in the same way that it prevents them from seeing a violent movie. It won't be 100% effective, but it'll help when the parents can't be there. And this law will never prevent you from buying violent games, cigirattes, girls gone wild, or anything else that adults generally enjoy.

Re:No more than other media...

[macrom]

I know most people say that watching something or doing it virtually will not cause it to happen in real life. I tend to agree. Most kids will never shoot an AWP into a crowd. But how many of them will call women "bitches" and "hos"? Kids may never do battle with the legions of hell, but how many will think of shooting a gun as "cool"? A good quote (badly paraphrased) is: Thoughts lead to actions. Actions lead to habits. Habits build your character.

I used to not put a whole lot of weight into the rating of games. Until I got married last summer and was suddenly tasked with making parental judgements for 2 young stepsons, 8 and 10. We played mostly Gamecube games, but eventually my wife and I bought them a PS2 and started with Jak & Daxter, Sly Cooper, etc. Then it became Ratchet and Clank, Jak II (both rated 'T', both slightly violent). Then came the phone calls from the teachers. Both kids were talking back, pushing other kids, throwing things on the playground, etc. We took away all but Mario Party and saw results almost overnight. It was then that I became a believer that video games CAN change the way children behave. I can only imagine what changes take place when kids play 'M'-rated games from the time they are 13 and younger.

And before you respond to say, "It's just your kids that have a problem", we have talked with other parents at school and in the neighborhood and they all have seen the same thing. The more the kids play games with violence (even cartoon violence), the worse their behavior.

Note: I am COMPLETELY against censorship. If you want to shoot cops, rape prostitutes and mow down aliens with rocket launchers in a video game, be my guest. But any tools that the government can provide that help us raise respectable children are welcome by me, and I'm sure many, many other American parents.

Re:No more than other media...

[lgw]

The ages of your children are key here (younger than the 'teen' the games were rated for). This is why the existing rating system is pretty good. There's a *lot* of content in games that's not at all appropriate for a 7-year-old, but perfectly fine for a 14-year-old.

I still don't see the need for a law, however, any more than we have a law enforcing PG-13 movie ratings. Unless this is purely focused on X-rated games, of which there are only a handful.

peer 2 peer

[Neo-Rio-101]

Sure, they can ban the sale to minors in order to prevent children buying games with questionable content..... .....but they can't stop kids getting these games from P2P, and they can't stop their parents buying it for them.

Re:peer 2 peer

[keeleysam]

or buying online like I do :-D

PS: Im under 18 and in IL

It's about time...

[robw810]

Yeah, it's about time the government figured out that all of us citizens are too ignorant to make our own decisions. We don't know what's best for us, and we certainly don't want any personal accountability involved. It's easier if they make all of the important decisions for us...
/sarcasm

I for one am sick and tired of living in a nanny state. Government's only legitimate function is to secure individual rights; unless someone else's rights are being infringed upon, government has no legitimate interest.

RW

Re:It's about time...

[aztektum]

The funniest thing is they say "they make a lot of money selling to your kids." Immediately I picture parents totally unaware of what their kids are doing. And secondly, it wasn't until I got a job in high school that I could afford them. So who is REALLY buying these games, is it really the kids or ignorant, lazy parents?

Getting my goat

[tsm_sf]

What would you call a hybrid scapegoat/bandwagon... I like GoatWagon. Senators with too much free time on their hands will jump on any goatwagon "for the children". (This stuff practically writes itself, folks.)

Re:"for the children"

[robw810]

Wonderful point there...

Any time I hear "it's for the children," "the elderly," "less fortunate," "disabled," or some other emotional plea for support of some legislation, I always think:
This legislation must be pretty bad if it can't support itself without blind emotional pleas...

RW

Nudity?

[Leveler of Nations]

There's vivid pictures of nudity.

Where's thier evidence? I've been looking for something to pirate recently.

GoatWagon sounds good.

[DeanMeister]

This is just getting ridiculous. If the government spent half as much time getting guns off the street and making weapons unavailable to kids then half our problems would be solved right there. And I'd really like somone to point out this "defecation" game for me. If no one in this community has heard of it it's probably a terrible game anyway. Maybe game's like Grand Theft Auto wouldn't exist if they didn't have real world models to go off of. Maybe you should focus on that instead of blaming games for bringing violence to your attention.

Re:GoatWagon sounds good.

[robw810]

You contradict yourself... On one hand, you don't want government punishing YOU for someone else's bad decisions, yet you DO want government to punish ME for someone else's bad decisions.

Instead of making sure that all potential crime victims are unarmed and thus unable to resist, perhaps we should punish those who commit ACTUAL crimes (you know, things which violate the rights of another human being).

A law abiding citizen carrying a concealed (or not) firearm violates nobody's rights.

RW

This reminds me...

[illuminatedwax]

When does "Defecator 3" come out?

Re:This reminds me...

[Celestial Avenger]

Around the same time as "Responsibility Dodgers II: The Parents' Trump Card"

I don't understand...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't understand why people who's kids buy games they don't approve of don't just stop giving their kids $50 and letting them go to the video game store unsupervised.

No!

[SoulMaster]

The industry does not need to be "policed". Parents need to be policed. Can't parents in Illinois control their kids?

Damn whiny dems.

I have 10 bucks that says this crap actually passes and wastes our precious $ on its way to the Supreme Court, which of course, will over turn it.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the Illinois Congress, meet Foresight.

Patheitc

[HeavyK]

This law is so vague it would essenially ban minors from buying football games, World War 2 themed shooters or even RPGs because they contain realistic depictions of human on human violence.
If this law was extended to cover movies, music and books also it would essenically (sp?) outlaw the sale of the Bible or Star Wars films to minors. Pretty pathetic.

Re:Patheitc

[HeavyK]

Go to this website: http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/default.asp Then on the left hand corner of the screen is a thing called "Search by Number". In the blank space right below it type "HB4023" without the quotes. Then in the top left hand corner click "Full Text". Sorry i couldn't find a direct link that could work.

Thank You, O Wise Legislators

[MemeSpitter]

I've seen em! Game-tapes awarding bonus scores for defecation! Soon children everywhere will be hurling clumps of fecal matter at each other with simian-like abandon! And this mindless violence modeled for our children... I see kids in my neighborhood jumping on their pet turtles in the street every day.

These kids need to learn that if you want to commit acts of violence for no good reason whatsoever, you coerce Congress to declare war on a random middle-eastern country. That's just the way it's done, damnit!

So I'm glad some legislature finally realizes the importance of applying state-sanctioned blanket age restrictions on videogames. Because it's well-known that everyone is magically at the exact same level of maturity when they reach some arbitrary age, and I sure as hell know that my state's laws kept me from getting any R-rated movies - or beer - before my time.

Re:Thank You, O Wise Legislators

[Zareste]

Exactly! This problem dates back to the Looney Tunes days when reckless children would stand on rooftops and drop anvils on innocent by-passers' heads, chop down trees to land on houses and roll boulders down cliffs to squash anyone in sight.
Hospitals were all occupied by people who looked like accordions! It was a real mess.

Fortunately, Illinois legislators passed the Scwewy Wabbit bill and all kids seen watching cartoons are shot on sight. They haven't had a problem since.

yet another example...

[lucky130]

As someone who lives in Illinois and has had to deal with such things before, this is yet another example of people wanting the government to parent their children for them. People do crazy things, that's a given. And having played my fair share of violent games, I can say I'm pretty well desensitized to CARTOON-esque violence (actual blood still makes me squirm a bit). That isn't to say that is a bad thing and I'm sure my parents don't think so. Hell, my dad got me a copy of Wolfenstein way back in the day (and I only hope I can do the same, or at least similar, for my kids someday).
But I seem to have digressed slightly. If parents have a problem with something, then they should police their own kids; they don't need to force their beliefs on the general public.

Re:Nice knee-jerk, I give it a 9.5.

[Anonymous Coward]

"off the street" is code for "away from the nigras"

Re:Parents can't distribute either?

[servognome]

Doesn't affect parents. From the Bill:
Sec. 12A-20. Affirmative defenses. In any prosecution
21 arising under this Article, it is an affirmative defense:
22 (1) that the defendant was a family member of the minor for
23 whom the game was purchased. "Family member" for the purpose of
24 this Section, includes a parent, sibling, grandparent, aunt,
25 uncle, or first cousin;
Of course the definition of "Violence" is way too vague... I guess Madden or any boxing game is "Mature" game because it allows serious physical harm to another human being
30 (e) "Violent" video games include depictions of or
31 simulations of human-on-human violence in which the player
32 kills, seriously injures, or otherwise causes serious physical
33 harm to another human, including but not limited to depictions
1 of death, dismemberment, amputation, decapitation, maiming,
2 disfigurement, mutilation of body parts, or rape.

shock

[FidelCatsro]

Ive said it before and I'm sure i will be saying it again
Witch hunt
This is nothing more than a simple ploy by some politicians to push ahead on the morals front .
If you don't want your children to play these games then please do so parenting and don't let everyone else suffer from increasingly restrictive laws due to your moral sence of misplaced duty.
Most of us here played games as violent as these when we were kids , The graphics may not have been as good , though kids have great imaginations. I turned out OK,
Most of the other people here turned out OK.

Violent games don't make violent people
go to a maximum security prison and asked some of the inmates about their childhood ,I am willing to place a hefty wager that it was not computer games that made them angry and violent

maybe this is good

[delirium of disorder]

Kids aren't going to stop playing video games because they legaly need mommy to buy the game for them. Its like pornography; its illegal for minors to buy porn, so they aren't able to purchase much...but the age range with the most pron downloads is probably 13-17 year old boys. I think these kinds of restrictions are a good thing because they teach kids how to subvert fascist authority. If we are to live in a free society, we need creative people who can get around the confinements imposed by parents, churches, governments, and corporations. If you give kids too much freedom yearly on, they won't know what to do when that freedom is taken away.

So...lets ban all violent video games, music with naughty words, and any images of the human body that show more skin then an Afghani wearing a burqua! For every prohibition, you create an underground. The more underground our economy is, they less the corporate glutons profit from it and the more average citizens learn to be rebels and freedom fighters.

Re:maybe this is good

[happymedium]

1. There's a deficit of incentive here. Why would POLITICIANS (let that word sink in a bit) make any effort to limit corporations' profits?

2. A society like the one you speak of would produce people as ill-informed, immature, and reactionary as you are, judging from your comment. Keep believing that all authority is "fascist." See where that gets you. Parents, churches, and governments are imperfect, sometimes painfully so, but don't tell me that "Love thy neighbor," "All men are created equal," and the like are not genuinely good ideas.

Um... no.

[Guppy06]

"It's an industry that needs help being policed..."

Enron needed to be policed. Spam needs to be policed. Telemarketers need to be policed. Any industry that relies on fraud, embezzlement or harassment to turn a profit needs to be policed. And, as the video game industry does not (yet) fall into any of these categories...

Oh, and one more industry should be policed: politics. If the state legislators in Springfield have this much free time on their hands, perhaps its time to shorten the length of the legislative session in Illinois.

Just Illinois Politics

[blueZhift]

Nothing to see here folks! This is just Illinois politics. The governor has been a profound disappointment here and is now scrambling for easy targets to win reelection. They all know this law won't stand constitutional muster.

This is just a waste of taxpayer money.

As if young kids didn't pirate enough

[CrazyJim1]

If I'm 17, and want to play the next FPS, I'll download it off the internet instead. Warez 4 Pirates.

dangerous games

[manJerk]

I think there is a more imminent danger that is being marketed directly at our children than the intangible fantacy that is a video game. maybe we sould be spending our time stopping the tobacco companies from selling their very REAL death to our children. If you take away video games, our children are left with shitty TV, Cigarettes, internet porn and homework. governmental bodies need to stop waisting time chasing the boogey man and get after the serial killers.