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'Hot Coffee' Scandal Officially Resolved

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the oh-goodie dept.

kukyfrope writes "Take-Two Interactive today announced that the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) inquiry concerning hidden sexual content in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas has formally closed. All outstanding matters pending before the FTC have been settled and no penalties or fines have been assessed. Although Take-Two was not fined, the company will be subject to civil penalties of $11,000 for future violations. 'We look forward to putting this behind us and focusing on what we do best - creating videogames,' said Take-Two President and Chief Executive Officer Paul Eibeler."

12 of 189 comments (clear)

  1. Problems like this are easily solved by krell · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...when, if someone does not like what is in a game, they simply refuse to play it and move on (no screaming, no lawsuits, no complaints to the government).

    --
    Where were you when the voynix came?
    1. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by ElleyKitten · · Score: 5, Insightful
      This was a "truth-in-labeling" violation. Parents thought they knew what they were buying for their kids, and may have been okay with the violence but not the sexuality of the "hot coffee" scene.
      Yes, killing hookers is fine for young'uns, but consensual sex? Corrupt their poor minds!

      Any kid who's not able to handle the hot coffee is too young to handle the rest of the game. Not to mention, they'll find more explicit porn just looking for the patch to unlock it.
      --
      "What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
    2. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by digitrev · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's true. And any child who's smart enough to unlock it on his own is probably smart enough to get access other porn.

      --
      Cynical Idealist
    3. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by meringuoid · · Score: 4, Insightful
      Parents thought they knew what they were buying for their kids, and may have been okay with the violence but not the sexuality of the "hot coffee" scene.

      From esrb.org:

      MATURE
      Titles rated M (Mature) have content that may be suitable for persons ages 17 and older. Titles in this category may contain intense violence, blood and gore, sexual content and/or strong language.

      ADULTS ONLY
      Titles rated AO (Adults Only) have content that should only be played by persons 18 years and older. Titles in this category may include prolonged scenes of intense violence and/or graphic sexual content and nudity.

      So, parents bought San Andreas for their 17-year-old kids, thinking it contained sexual content, but not graphic sexual content...? Or perhaps they bought it for their 12-year-old kids, not giving a damn what it contained as long as it shut the little sods up for a while? How many parents actually know what the little symbols on the game mean anyway?

      --
      Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
    4. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by KDR_11k · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How many parents actually know what the little symbols on the game mean anyway?

      Of course they know what those letters mean. They are review scores. Apparently out of 17 because why else would the children ask for games with a 17 and dismiss games with e.g. a 6?

      --
      Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
    5. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by ElleyKitten · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It was labeled not for kids. A quick look at the rating's content descriptors will tell you that it's not for the squeamish. This isn't Wind Waker. This is one of the most mature games available in mainstream stores without hot coffee. As for hot coffee itself, it's a lame psuedo-porn scene where the guy leaves on his pants. If your kids have ever seen a rated R movie, and if they're playing rated M games they probably have, then they've seen more explicit "porn" than in this. If you allow them enough access to the internet to find the patch to enable it, then they've seen way more explicit porn.

      I just don't see why it was that big of a deal.

      --
      "What is Internet Explorer 7? Are you saying we can't access the normal internet?" - I love tech support. Really.
    6. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by ScottLindner · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're all right, but at the end of the day a parent needs to be able to make informed decisions to raise *their* child the way *they* want to and not leave the Internet to do it for them.

      --
      Slashdot.. where people join together in deliberate ignorance.
    7. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by bonk · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yeah. If I want to raise my kid to be a violent sociopathic gangster with no respect for human life or property, that should be my right. And I'll be DAMNED if someone tries to go behind my back and teach my kid that consensual sex with a female is acceptable.

      --
      I hope to die peacefully in my sleep like grandpa, not screaming like his passengers.
    8. Re:Problems like this are easily solved by ehrichweiss · · Score: 3, Insightful
      You talk trash about liberals, some/most of which likely don't believe what you're implying that they do, and yet still have the nerve to act like someone else is trolling beside yourself. You ever stop to think that every goddamn one of us is a mixture of liberal/conservative, republican/democrat all in one, that we all have a wide variety of beliefs, that even some democrats are NRA members, that some republicans would like to balance the budget, etc...... unless we're really, really retarded?

      I know you're trolling, but to a certain extent it is your right to raise your children however you want. It certainly shouldn't be the government's job! Just don't try to tell a libby that.

      Nope, never crossed your, lack of, mind. Keep up the fight to make sure we're all ignorant and polarized against one another so we can be distracted from the real problems that do NOT involve political affiliations.

      --
      0x09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
  2. Re:slap on the wrist by Surt · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Shouldn't they have gotten off easy?

    1) They weren't OTA, and they didn't use public resources to distribute their speech.

    2) This is the F T C not the FCC.

    3) The content in question was not accessible without a DMCA violation.

    Why should this have even been an issue for Take 2?

    --
    "Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
  3. Re:they do that best? by gregbains · · Score: 5, Insightful

    IIRC an AO will not be sold in shops like WalMart who prefer to keep such games away from their "good family morals" business, losing out on the WalMart market is a bigger loss than just losing out on the 17 market

  4. Uhhh except all games do that by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 4, Insightful

    All the time games leave assets in they don't use. It's a problem that MS is actually working to solve with the Xbox 360 dev kits (to save space). You make an asset for a game, maybe a level, model, texture, or even whole mini game that just doesn't make it in to the final product. However you don't remove it since you don't know what else relies on the presence of that, and since space usually isn't short.

    My bet is they made the Hot Coffee game, realised it'd get them an AO rating, and so cut it. Pure and simple.

    You can see a similar thing with Civ 4. There's mods that will add some "lost wonders." These are wonders with full videos, info and everything, they are fully produced. Basically, Firaxis planned on using them, but then cut them later, I believe for game balance reasons. However they didn't bother to remove the assets so witha bit of XML and LUA modificaiton, they can go back in the game.