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Need for Speed Unconnected to Fatal Crash
BStorm writes "There was a horrific crash in Toronto yesterday. It involved two 18 year olds, each racing their parent's Mercedes. One of racers hit a taxi turning left killing the taxi driver. The other left the scene. EA's Need for Speed was found on the passenger seat of one of the racers. Police are investigating the possibility that the racing and subsequent crash was connected with the game." Update: 01/26 20:53 GMT by Z : GamePolitics points out a more thorough article on the subject which quotes the officers involved as being against the jist of the Globe and Mail article. From that article: "Det. Lobsinger was careful not to blame the video game for Tuesday's accident. 'There is a small percentage who have difficulty separating reality and simulation, fantasy. It's a very, very small percentage,' he said. 'This was not the game's fault. There are millions who play this game and don't go out and do this.' The way to prevent these tragedies is to teach young drivers to have respect for the road, he said." Title changed to reflect more accurate article.
What if they found a copy of the fast and the furious in one of the cars? i guess it'd be the movies fault then right? oh wait... movies aren't a pariah subject like gaming, my bad.
The game has nothing to do with it. This was caused by a couple of people acting like idiots. Illegal street racing has been around since... well, since cars were invented.
That won't stop people from holding this up as more evidence that games are evil, though. I should take bets on how long it takes Jack Thompson to chime in.
psmylie's dictionary: Godzillion (noun) Any number large enough to destroy Tokyo
Investigators found a copy of the video game Need For Speed in one of the cars. The game involves street racing, drag racing and pursuit racing, where players attempt to evade police.
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The discovery prompted police to point out the difference between the digital world, and reality.
"A game is a game," Toronto Police's Det. Paul Lobsinger told CTV Toronto. "And when you get behind the wheel of a car it's not a game anymore. And when something tragic happens in a huge crash with a lot of smoke, there is no reset button. You can't start over with a new car and a new life."
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNe
Its pretty silly to blame a video game; if they had a copy of Spyro the Dragon or Grand Theft Auto and the news hit the media this hard I'm sure they would have blamed those games as well..
"Correlation does not imply causality"
May I present another scenario? The kids were already attracted to racing because its hella cool, and that caused both the interest in Need For Speed as well as the accident
Throw the kids in jail.
If the parents make a peep about suing EA under the pretense that "they are just kids and didn't know what they were doing", charge them with child negligence -- first, with providing them access to such a dangerous video game, and second by providing them access to their cars.
Guys... lets just not do the "but... how can you blame X" comments. They don't work. We can see that... guess I better break my own advice.
There is nothing linking the game to the accident, besides the theme of the game, and the kids being idiots. So what, it's about racing. So's a bunch of movies, and a big American past-time (NASCAR). If that were a NASCAR DVD, would it be blamed? Well, I suppose it's not in an "urban" setting. Ok, what about "Fast and the Furious", or it's sequel? "Gone in 60 Seconds"? I suppose they weren't specifically stealing the cars...
NEWS FLASH: TEENAGERS DO STUPID THINGS.
As a teen myself (for another month) I can say yes, that's a very fitting description. Now, these parents have some nice money (they were racing "luxary cars"), sent them to an exclusive high school (at 35 grand a year, more then I pay for out of state tuition!), and were OUT OF TOWN.
Now come on... you leave the kids at home, nice luxary car, and they go do crazy things like drive 130 kilometers per hour... oh, yea, that's only 80 miles per hour. Having played Need For Speed, I can tell you it is VERY easy to exceed that speed VERY quickly, in fact, 80 mph wouldn't win you even the first race. Hell, When I drive home, I average 85 mph, though the speed limit's only 75, and I get passed. Why? Because that's not such an unsafe speed, surely NOT racing. This is a little bit of joyriding, and the idiot driver didn't see a taxi. Now, someone is dead, and it's time to play the Blame Game.
Can we blame the boys? No, "They're very nice kids. Very quiet, soft-spoken. They both did well academically. Certainly not the kind of kids you would expect at all to be racing down a highway." If they wouldn't be expected to, something must have made them, right?
The parents then? nope, it's never the parent's fault in this day and age. Even though they were out of town. "Defence lawyer Edward Prutschi, who represents Mr. Ryazanov, said his client's parents were out of town at the time of the accident and are heading home to Toronto."
Perhaps the car then? "...Mr. Shrimpton said, adding that neither had a car at school." Damn, no history of driving a car at school, guess they weren't reckless.
Or.. wait... idea. These kids finally get out of school, feel like normal teenagers, unable to be hurt, and go joyriding. Just this once, right, since our parents are out of town. Not racing, just speeding. BAM...uh-oh... we've got a problem. Cops show up, and have to have a motive (everything has a motive). In the end, the game gets blamed.
Interesting thing to note here, no one ever says that they've played the game. No one said it was out of the package. They might've just bought it have no clue about game-play, yet that doesn't matter. Some lawyer will jump on this, make a big outcry about the horror of video games (of any genre) and politicians will all conspire and pass condolances. In the end, it'll be like every other suit, these "boys" will get sentenced, and life will go on.
Except for the man they killed. negligence, manslaughter, call it what you will, he's not coming back. That is the real travisty here, not that a game is being blamed, that's natural today, but a man died, due to stupidity. Let this be a lesson, not to game manufacturors, designers, or players. Not to lawyers, or politicians, but to parents, adults, and kids. When you do something stupid, someone might get hurt. Someone might get killed, and you have to live with it. These "boys" (legal adults, mind you) will forever have to live with the fact that they killed a man trying to earn a living, something they won't have to due to their parent's money. I hope they're happy, and I hope ya'll have fun fighting out how stupid it is to blame the game, missing the real point once again.
Rest in Peace, Mr. Khan.
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