Slashdot Mirror
The Tale of Wal-Mart, Jack, and Bully
GamePolitics is reporting on something that seems like a simple decision: Wal-mart is no longer accepting pre-orders for unrated games. As a 'family-friendly' establishment, it makes a certain amount of sense. The catch is that, in the eyes of many, one of the U.S.'s largest retailers is bowing to pressure from Jack Thompson. The company denies these claims, with Kotaku running a short discussion with John Simley, Wal-mart spokesperson. From that article: "Simley says it has nothing to do with Bully, but rather is the outcome of discussions that the company has been in for 'weeks if not months' about how to handle rating pending titles. Bricks and mortars stores have never accepted pre-orders for RP titles, he added. 'I'd like to give credit to Jack Thompson, but there are a lot of Jack Thompsons out there and we are just listening to our customers,'"
The problem is that it appears that Thompson managed to influence one of the larger companies in the States towards his agenda.
Cynical Idealist
Walmart has always been on that side of the fence.
Anyone else think the comments just weren't rendering right before they turned off ABP and saw ads?
Umm... since Walmart regularly carries "R" rated movies, and "M" rated games, etc that's probably not the reason.
More likely the reason is that because the game hasn't been given an "official" rating yet, they feel they could be a civil case risk. If some 12 year old pre-orders the game now, but upon delivery it actually has a "M" rating; in our sue-happy society someone is going to go after the big-money Walmart. And it will cost them millions to just fight the case, or multiple tens of thousands to simply settle it. Theoretically they could possibly be even held legally liable by the government, it's not passed yet but look at Clinton & Liberman's "The Family Entertainment Protection Act", which would make it illegal to sell adult games to minors. (Clinton's made direct complaint's about Walmart's selling of games to minors, so they know they are the politician's crosshairs)
This is simply a CYA move, why would any large company take preorders on a game in limbo like this assuming the significant amount of possible risk associated to it with not much to gain?
That was my first thought too. Then I remembered that the ESRB had raised the rating of GTA: San Andreas to "Adults Only" after the Hot Chocolate mod was released.
Yeah, I know, RockStar would rip out scenes of Bully right and left if necessary to get it down to a "Mature" rating. However, theorectially it could still get rated "Adults Only". Wal Mart doesn't want to be put in the position of having presold a game that it would like to turn around and not sell at all due to company policy. They don't want surprises like San Andreas.
Now, as to why Slashdoters care, that's another issue. I can understand them not wanting speech infringed, etc, but I'm pretty much completely failing to see how this could either infringe free expresion or even provide a "slippery slope" to infringing free expression.
I think this is actually kind of smart for Wal Mart. They're waiting to see the exactly what the product will be before they start to sell it. I'd want to know if a game called "Pleasant Dreams" was a title for 5 year-olds, a soft core pornography game or a game where you hack up bloody nightmare monsters before selling it too.
TW