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How Videogames Help Fund the Arms Industry
FhnuZoag writes "Eurogamer has an expose of the shady world of games developers licensing guns. From the article: '"We must be paid a royalty fee — either a one-time payment or a percentage of sales, all negotiable. Typically, a licensee pays between 5 per cent to 10 per cent retail price for the agreement. [...] We want to know explicitly how the rifle is to be used, ensuring that we are shown in a positive light... Such as the 'good guys' using the rifle," says [Barett Rifles'] Vaughn.'"
So there's a copyrighted look, a trademarked name, and a patented design. Players demand real brand-name stuff in their games, so developers deliver by licensing real brand-name stuff in their games. To do this legally means getting a license.
What's so shady about that?
More Twoson than Cupertino
That they're licensing a company's depictions of a legal product? Can you explain how this would be different than licensing cars, planes, soft drinks, sports teams, comic book characters or anything else that goes into a video game? What exactly is new about this story that isn't already well known?
This article is pure flamebait. Slashdot should be better than this, but I guess the website traffic must be trending down.
Gun runners? Are you implying that companies like Colt, FN, and Barrett are smuggling illicit firearms to drug cartels and African warlords? They sell almost exclusively to the US government...which is far worse.
I would imagine that this situation exists for games featuring cars, airplanes, or any other product that has a corporate brand identity. But a headline decrying "Video Games Fund the Automotive Industry" just doesn't have any punch.
I believe the Resident Evil series uses more generic names (or at least it used to). Goldeneye 007 (N64) is a good example of a game that uses similar-sounding names, such as PP7 instead of PPK. It doesn't really make that much of a difference in 99.9% of the situation.
However, there are people who like their games to be as authentic as possible. Would the Madden series be so popular if the teams were made-up? Would Gran Turismo be popular if it had fake cars? (Okay, it does have some fake cars, but the vast majority are real.) For a game that strives for realism, little details like names and model numbers make a big difference.
Furthermore, I have to object with the assertion that the licensing deals are "shady". It is the same kind of deal as is made with car manufacturers, sports teams, etc. To call it shady is to reveal your political bias.
If you can't convince them, convict them.
Van Halen used to have a clause in their performance contracts that they must be provided with a bowl of MM's with the brown ones picked out. What does 'fairness' have to do with a legal civil contract?
love is just extroverted narcissism
Exactly these games are all about selling a specific FANTASY about war, in that fantasy everybody is Rambo and nobody is Joe Blow the nameless nobody getting the shit jobs like digging ditches or hauling canned goods, its all fantasy.
And those specific guns play into that fantasy, which is why you see the same damned guns in every game, just as you can't sell a football game in the USA without the NFL because those logos and outfits all play into the armchair quarterback's fantasy of being the big football star.
So on the one hand while I'm no fan of arms dealers and think we've been overboard for many years when it comes to what can and can't be copyrighted on the other hand these companies know EXACTLY what guns to get, they've done countless focus groups and know EXACTLY what the people that play those games want which is why we see the same thing over and over. While I personally find it boring as hell and would rather play something like Borderlands with infinite variation if somebody is willing to pay the money to play with virtual military hardware? Meh whatever floats your boat I guess.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Actually most of the products you can identify in movies have either had the rights paid for by the movie company or if the movie is a big name flick will often get money from the company in return for showing their product in a favorable light. Why do you think every person that uses a laptop in a movie is always using a MacBook when IRL that is less than 10% of the population? Product placement.
So its not like you haven't been seeing the same thing in hollywood for years, with the smaller movies paying a fee for licensing while the big names get the product for free or even get a check for showing it, its common practice. Watch the horribly bad movie "Jack & Jill" sometime which rumor has it even though it bombed Sandler and pals actually came out ahead thanks to how much product placement was in that movie. they might as well have called it "Jack and Jill, sponsored by *" for all the products from dunkin donuts to Sony electronics you see on the screen. i honestly don't think there is 4 minutes in the whole movie where a logo isn't visible, its THAT obvious.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Shut UP.
You can make a point and offer criticism without experiencing it.
can't walk a tight rope, but when I see someone fall off one I can say 'That wasn't good'
People who use that type of 'logic' are when is wrong with people today.
It's a legitimate concern.
Misplaced in this case becasue that event is pretty well documented.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Oh please! Call it what it was, which several agents even called it, a "false flag operation" to try to build a connection where none existed of American guns going to Mexican dope dealers so they could try to push tougher gun laws HERE.
And its not even the first time the US government has been busted pulling a false flag, 58,000 Americans and countless Vietnamese died thanks to the false flag Gulf of Tonkin incident, and just like in this case the full details won't be learned until the principals involved are long dead and can't be prosecuted, then the MSM will just do a "Oh BTW" and then act like we should just pretend it never happened, just like Vietnam.
The simple fact is Mexican dope dealers can just trade their dope to any of the Bumfuckistan former Warsaw Pact countries and get all the Soviet era fully auto weapons they want, including grenades and rocket launchers and even a fricking sub if they want one, they don't need American semi auto anything which is why they had to cook up "Fast & Furious" because the data they were finding showed the vast majority were carrying AK47s, just like every other guerrilla force on the planet NOT American guns.
THIS is why they should be rotting in jail, THIS is why we need a full investigation, not because somebody fucked up and people got killed but because you have the US government running a false flag op on its own people to try to manipulate them into going along with the political plans of the ones pulling the op.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.