The Unfriendly Side of German Game Development

As hysterical as American media and politicians can get over 'violent' videogames, the folks making games in Germany have it a whole lot worse. Tim Partlett (a developer at Crytek) shared his experience with the Quarter to Three forums, describing what it's like to be raided for making a videogame. He describes what it's like to be hated for your job, and laments the attitude of the nation towards his chosen line of work. From the article: "At the time of the (2002 Erfurt school) shooting, we were already in development of Far Cry ... We were just across the state border from Erfurt in northern Bavaria. Tensions in the region were high ... In 2004 the Bavarian authorities sent in the state troopers... When the small tech team appeared to inspect our computers, they were accompanied by over one hundred flak-jacketed riot police, all armed with Heckler and Koch sub-machine guns. It was a total overreaction... They arrived first thing in the morning, and kicked down our doors. They even raided the nearby private residences ... I was caught just outside the office ... We were all shepherded into our Mo-Cap room, and there we were forced to remain until questioned, prevented from leaving by dozens of armed guards."

Comments

Interesting

[badenglishihave]

This explains why those villains in Far Cry all look like Germans.

Obligatory

[inviolet]

Für die Kinder, Kamerad!

So the question is

[drinkypoo]

When will the game developers leave Germany? And what will the next industry chased out of that poor deluded country be? Germany has a complex over the whole Third Reich thing - it's understandable, but let's face it, if you weren't involved or responsible somehow, you need to build a bridge and get over it. Any people could go that way given the right (wrong) circumstances.

Re:So the question is

[MuChild]

That's the f*cked up thing, it's like they're so focused on becoming a social/political utopia that they don't notice the paradox of forcing people to be free and using a miltitarized police force to stop violence.

It's the same with us. Sigh

Re:So the question is

[TnkMkr]

Actually there is something in the Human condition that lends itself toward the Nazi like behavior. It comes from the pack mentality or the need to belong to a group. A highschool teacher actually did an experiment with his world history class, I read about it in college as part of a study of human group behavior. There was a formal paper written on the experiment but I could only find a link to this article.

http://www.vaniercollege.qc.ca/Auxiliary/Psycholog y/Frank/Thirdwave.html

Enjoy

Another Obliatory..

[me_mi_mo]

We Germans are not all smiles...

Re:Another Obliatory..

[Rude Turnip]

What do you expect from a nation whose language has no translation for the word "fluffy?"

Re:Another Obliatory..

[BeeRockxs]

Haha, very funny, the only thing that's wrong is that you're wrong. Try 'flauschig'.

Re:Another Obliatory..

[heinousjay]

Thank you, kind sir. I was in danger of laughing, and it would be most unfortunate for me to find something humorous. Without your service in destroying my mirth, I could, even now, be in a good mood. I shudder to consider the consequences.

Nobody

[MoOsEb0y]

expects a Spanish^H^H^H^H^H^H^HGerman inquisition!

I liked Austria's better

[Palshife]

And this is how we develop games in Germany, Herr Jones. *punch*

Over one hundred flak-jacketed riot police

[Anonymous Coward]

They were probably worried about those jumping mutants with those fucking arms that seem to reach out forever. I hate those!

In Fascist Germany

[Anonymous Coward]

In Fascist Germany game plays you

Its Bavaria

[Anonymous Coward]

Note that this happened in Bavaria, by far the most conservative German state. I like to compare them to Texas, to give americans a better idea ;)

Bavaria is also the state leading the current initiative to make the laws regarding violent games more stringent, while other states are taking a much more sensible position.

Re:Its Bavaria

[BoberFett]

Which is odd, because Texas is a hotbed of game development. I'd imagine either New York or California are far more likely to ban violent games before Texas. Perhaps conservatism isn't to blame in this case?

Re:Its Bavaria

[henni16]

Conservative means here:

• "law-and-order" hardliners, secretary of the interior is the biggest police and surveillance state supporter there is
• "War on drugs", "War on terror", "Zero tolerance", "Glass.Parling.Lot" would really fly in Bavaria
• the same party has had absolute majority in parliament since Bavaria was founded (hello cronyism and corruption)
• that party is the most right-wing party in Germany (except for Neo-Nazi parties); actual slogan "To our right there mustn't be room for another party!"
• "christian values" as in "Think of the children!" and "video games make our children violent"
• The way to "solve" a social or criminal problem is: real solutions might cost money; instead we'll use more laws, harder punishment, prohibition of every morally bad thing we don't want to see. If the problems aren't visible, they are gone.
  To paraphrase a _leftie_ politican on the video game issue: "They support a ban of violent video games in case a game triggers some whacko kid to finally go out and kill someone. We would like to prevent the kid from becoming whacko in the first place."
• Example: media reports about school children showing each other pornos and viloent video clips on their cellphones. Bavarian solution for the problem: ban cell phones at school
• "traditional values": beer, sausage, Lederhosen isn't typical for Germany, it's typical for Bavaria
• some common things with Texas might be
  • a "the rest of you states suck, we're better; in fact, we're basically independent"-mentality
  • conservative=>dislike of immigrants (Mexican border..)
  • gun nuts - lots of "traditional" hunting and gun clubs; the yearly "shooting fair" is the social highlight in every little town
  • "shoot first, ask questions later"

What the AC refers to is that many people in Bavaria will think of what happend as a good course of action.
And that there won't be problems abusing state power for such a useless thing.
And that the main reason for those actions - including the use of riot police - is getting pictures that show "We aren't like those soft leftie cowards, we're HARD on that issue. Don't mess with Texa..eh.. us! We're taking ACTION, something is done about it, don't worry, we'll keep you and your children save."

And also: "If we make enough noise about that school shooter playing Counterstrike, everybody will ignore the fact that he was in a gun club and that that was the reason that he was good at shooting and had access to the guns he used in the first place. Everybody shut up about that! Or someone might ask questions about stuff like why we want to further loosen gun control laws or lower the minimum age requirement for childrens to start using firearms!"

Re:The Nazi gene...

[infestedsenses]

Way to make a ridiculous populist generalization about some evil "Nazi gene" FUD (I can't believe you're being serious.. or are you?), and get this modded so high. If you're looking for some "Nazi mentality", I think this is a good display of how it works. Sad, really.

Re:The Nazi gene...

[nutshell42]

So based on anecdotal evidence you come to the conclusion that all Germans have a Nazi gene making them racists? You are aware that this statement itself is racist? Not to mention pointless. 5 mins on Google could provide half a dozen anecdotes of disgusting behaviour by just about any nationality.

Of course, if you were German your post itself would provide another anecdote on how Germans are racists. =)

Re:The Nazi gene...

[henni16]

She'd queue up, and when she got to the front the store-keepers would just serve whoever was behind her. This happened frequently, in multiple shops (in Berlin).

Shenannigans.
I live in Berlin, have Turkish friends and have never seen or heard of something like that.
And the media and lawyers would be all over cases like that.
Did she shop at Nazis'R'Us or where?

Berlin is the largest Turkish city outside of Turkey.
Among the 3.4 million people (~14% foreigners) there are alone 120000 Turkish people registered as living in Berlin.
And those are only the ones without German passports. You can add several tens of thousands for 2nd or 3rd generation immigrant children or people who already obtained citizenship.

Chances aren't bad that the person in line behind you is also Turkish or of Turkish origin.
Depending on the district, that chance will be well above 50%.

Re:Who did this?

[vega80]

When they came for the videogame developers, I did not speak out. Then they came for the violent videogames, I did not speak out. Then they came for the videogames with sex, I did not speak out. Now I have nothing to play but Nintendo videogames. Apologies to Martin Niemöller.

Let Me Get This Straight....

[darkonc]

A flaming, violent neo-nazi who scrawls 'Heil Hitler' in his jail cell gets royally blitzed and kicks in the head of some poor schmuck, and you blame his run amok on the fact that he played a wrestling game?.

So what happens the next time The Summer Olympics come to Germany?

Lessons Not Learned.

[Shihar]

I swear, there has to be a Godwin's law joke in here somewhere. I mean come on. A fucking German riot squad raiding computer geeks busy making video games. How fascistic could you possibly get?

The EU has a problem. I know that the EU is all scared from World War II and what not, but they need to get over it. Violently repressing anything that might encourage violence really is not an effective method of keeping the fascist away. Further, this isn't just a problem with one little backward German providence. Many European nations have anti-free speech laws preventing various forms of 'blasphemy', racism, and ideology. This isn't an effective way to confront these forces.

The silly talk in Germany and the EU about more stringent rules against video games is going to accomplish only one thing; giving the US more German programmers and designers. Didn't Germany learn a lesson about the stupidity of driving perfectly intelligent people to the US during World War II? The Americans will happily take them in, make some product that can't be made in Germany due to fears of this Gestapo bull shit, and make a buck off of it.

This raid should be a cry for MORE free speech laws to prevent backwards providence from pulling this bullshit, not a cry to clamp down and regulate speech further. Is Germany, with its negative population growth, TRYING to drive out the few remaining young and technically minded people they have left?

No, you didn't learn any lessons...

[thecountryofmike]

The US has the highest incarceration rate in the world. It's a land where hate speech is just dandy, and inciting violence is protected, by hiding behind the 'free speech' defense. Unless it's demonstrating against the government, which these days gets you cordoned off into 'free speech zones'.

Germany, and these other countries (which of course you don't name, or can't spell, or just haven't heard of before) all have lower crime rates than the US. Their people are more aware of fascistic behaviour. And they make a distiction between free speech and hate speech.

Somehow you concluded:

Many European nations have anti-free speech laws preventing various forms of 'blasphemy', racism, and ideology. This isn't an effective way to confront these forces.

Clearly, you've lost your mind. You're mixing blasphemy, RACISM, and ideology?!?! Western European countries with hate speech laws are clearly different than religious theocracies with laws against blasphemy and ideology. These hate speech (or 'anti-free speech', doubleplusgood) laws you conflate with fascism aren't the only thing controlling crime, but they don't hurt. And yet you 'conclude' that they're ineffective! Guess I'll just have to take your word for it, right?

Oh, and another thing. Intelligent people were driven to the US during WWII because there was a fucking war going on. Bombs weren't landing all over the fucking US during WWII!

.....................
Having said that, the cops clearly overreacted, and whatever reason they were there for, should have handled it professionally and proportionately...it's a video game company, for crying out loud, not the Hell's Angels headquarters.

Re:No, you didn't learn any lessons...

[Shihar]

Western European countries with hate speech laws are clearly different than religious theocracies with laws against blasphemy and ideology. These hate speech (or 'anti-free speech', doubleplusgood) laws you conflate with fascism aren't the only thing controlling crime, but they don't hurt. And yet you 'conclude' that they're ineffective! Guess I'll just have to take your word for it, right? Anti-hate speech laws don't make hate speeches magically disappear. The idea that you can ban an idea and some how make it disappear is insane. The Soviets tried and failed to do this for a solid 50 years with methods far more brutal and absolute then anything a European nation has tired, and they still had their ideology overthrown.

The only thing anti-hate speech laws manages to do is make debate illegal and drives any sort of discussion of the topic underground. Instead of being able to confront the racism head and exposing it is a crock of shit in the open, you pave the way for those ideas to go underground where they can't be confronted out in the open. People who are disposed to believe such racist non-sense are not magically converted to good citizens when they see police breaking down doors and throwing people in jail. When a government needs to use violence to suppress an idea, people are going to question what exactly it is about that idea that the government fears so much.

The holocaust deniers are a perfect example of this foolishness. Making it illegal to deny the holocaust just means that these ass holes can't stand up in public and take their licks. I would rather see this shit get sorted out in the open where people can respond, rather then have little underground groups that stew in their hate (rightfully) convinced that the government is out to get them.

Further, you keep trying to argue that you can some how have "free speech" while at the same time making "hate speech" illegal. Free speech means free speech. You are damn right that anti-hate speech laws are anti-free speech laws. If you can't express an idea, no matter how repugnant, then it isn't free speech. What exactly do you think the point of free speech is in the first place? To protect the common consensus as to what is and is not acceptable to talk about? The point of free speech is to protect all speech, even the speech that the vast majority loathes.

If you need a reason as to why free speech should be protected in its entirety, simply RTFA. A form of speech that is considered socially deviant by the majority of Germans just had a a few dozen police is riot gear get raided. If the majority consider this form of speech to be socially unacceptable. Does that mean that the raid was a-okay? This isn't an abstract slippery slope argument. Fucking police stormed a video game companies office.

The US might have a stupidly high incarceration rate due to our stupid prohibition laws, but you can bet your ass that we don't have police in SWAT gear kicking in the doors of video game companies for making games that might be considered too violent by the moral majority. Free speech needs uncompromising protection for this very reason.

What he fails to mention

[zerojoker]

http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/46094 (it's german, you might want to put that into the google translator). It basically says that the police raided Crytek because the Business Software Alliance (BSA) got several evidence that Crytek was using unlicensed software

Now I'm not sure what came out of this, but I think if the police raids a whole company it's quite standard procedure to come up with some armed guys.

Re:What he fails to mention

[mabinogi]

He mentions exactly that. Did you actually read the article?

from the eight paragraph:

In 2004 the Bavarian authorities sent in the state troopers. Ostensibly it was as a response to a claim made by a former employee that we had illegal software installed on our machines.

operation Sun Devil

[madeye the younger]

Really? What about http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/SJG/ ? I'm sure Steve Jackson might have a word or two to share about armed law enforcement raiding a game company in the U.S.