Why Is the Grand Theft Auto CEO Also Chairman of the ESRB?

donniebaseball23 writes In an editorial at GamesIndustry.biz, Brendan Sinclair asks an important question about the game ratings board in America. Should Strauss Zelnick, the CEO of Take-Two, which owns the Grand Theft Auto franchise and has been at the heart of the ESRB's biggest controversies of the last decade, really be serving as its chairman? "No matter how removed from the day-to-day running of the ESRB Zelnick might be, his current role invites accusations of impropriety," he writes. "It's the sort of thing any critic of the games industry can point to as a clear conflict of interest, and many reasonable outsiders would probably look at that as a valid complaint. At least when titans of industry in the U.S. become the head of the regulatory agencies that oversee their former companies, they actually have to leave those companies."

Comments

Same reason as MPAA

[Jax Omen]

Probably for the same reason the people in charge of the MPAA, who rate movies, all work for the big companies in the movie industry?

"age-restricting" content ratings always have existed to selectively restrict competitors or undesired content. MPAA, ESRB, same thing.

Re:Same reason as MPAA

[whoever57]

Indeed. Watch the movie "This film is not yet rated" for a very clear explanation.

Wait

[Anonymous Coward]

Do people actually take the ESRB seriously?

Re:Wait

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Firethorn said "violence and/or sex"(and, in practice, even in games that tempt fate by having sex as well as violence the two are usually largely separate, freaky Japanese imports aside).

That correction aside, though, there is one point of argument that I think doesn't get enough attention in the 'violence and stuff in videogames' disputes:

Since videogames are interactive, which makes player choice at least possible(if the developer doesn't force you onto rails), the existence of bad, even (literally) atrocious, things in the game can actually make it more morally salient, and more effectively challenge the player's "hehe, violence is lulz!" approach.

Just by way of example: in Fallout games pre-Bethesda(so everything before Fallout 3), you could kill children. In Fallout 3 and later there are some children but they are invulnerable and can only be talked to. However, your character's options, and likely his survival, strongly depended on the attitudes and cooperation of NPCs in the gameworld. You were free to kill kids; but (surprise surprise) most of the decent-human-being NPCs strongly disapproved, to the point of overtly refusing to deal with you and/or trying to kill you.

The option to kill children didn't really make it a 'sick child murder simulator!!!'. You could do it; but you paid a high, and fairly plausible and realistic, price: nobody wants to associate with, or assist, the sort of sick fuck who does that, and so you probably died in the wasteland. Fallout 3 and later just whitewashed that moral choice, and it wasn't even possible to commit that particular crime or pay its penalty.

This doesn't mean that any game with grotesque transgressions is a veritable font of moral wisdom, it'd be pretty trivial(and isn't uncommon) to have games that gleefully glorify (sometimes even without much ironic detachment) various sorts of mayhem; but it really ought to be remembered that one of the powerful, and morally relevant, possibilities of an interactive medium is to have all manner of choices, good, bad, indifferent, downright depraved, be available; but have the gameworld respond appropriately.

(Dishonored did a pretty good job with this one, I thought, even for its poor generic-guard-mooks: it was typically easier to kill them than to evade or stun them; but you knew that the poor bastards were just city guards, who thought you'd assassinated the empress, doing their jobs. How many could you justify killing 'for the mission'? 'Just because it was easier'? 'For fun'? Depending on that number, the NPCs you interacted with, and the city itself, would change its own tone. You could play 'clean', you could leave a trail of bodies for the plague rats; but the consequences would be felt.)

Two Reasons

[kwiqsilver]

1. The controversy is good for sales. The kids want the taboo stuff.

2. It allows him to set the line for "too extreme" as one step past GTA, meaning that he sells the most taboo title available.

Okay but...

[Anonymous Coward]

GTA5 is rated M. As is GTA4 and GTA3.

If he has some sort of unfair influence, he's obviously not using it...

Re:Okay but...

[Jax Omen]

On the other hand... what content had to be cut from competing software to "only" get an M rating, while GTA gets away with it?

I strongly recommend watching "This Film is Not Yet Rated"... it applies just as well to the ESRB as it does to the MPAA.

ESRB was created by Game companies

[Anonymous Coward]

The ESRB was created by the game companies so that they wouldn't get government involvement and can set ratings themselves. Of course it's going to be populated by Game company execs.

Re:ESRB was created by Game companies

[Sowelu]

Wish I could vote you up. The purpose of these organizations are for the industry to SELF-police and self-categorize. It's not supposed to be hostile to the gaming industry, it's a way for them to collaboratively set categories for the benefit of the consumer (and themselves by avoiding media firestorms, but really, having labels is good). The alternative is each publishing house having their own proprietary scale...yeah, that won't be confusing at all. I'm betting Rockstar isn't the only super-violent-game maker to be represented.

Remember way back when ratings were new, and Apogee rushed to cram extra viscera into Rise of the Triad so they could claim the most violent rating? Those were the days.

FMH

[fyngyrz]

Near as I can tell, every official "ratings" operation I've ever encountered has been, to paraphrase OWK, a hive of scum and villainy. Almost never do the ratings make sense, they pay absolutely no mind to the actual state of knowledge / interest / sophistication of young people, they routinely ok violence and they pull their virtual lace panties up over their own heads if sex rears its terrifying, world-destroying head... seriously, on the list of people I'd like to bitch slap until my hand hurts, ratings boards are right near the top.

Seriously. Ratings boards. Ugh.

Re:FMH

[Kiwikwi]

I've seen an example that works: The Danish film and video game rating system.

It differs from e.g. the US system in a number of ways:

* It's run by an independent government-sponsored organization, not the industry.
* For children not accompanied by an adult, the highest rating is "15 and older".
* Children ages 7 and up can see any movie if accompanied by an adult, no matter the rating.
* The board is charged only with determining if a film could be psychologically damaging to a typical child. They do not judge the "morals" and message of the film.
* The board features actual child development experts. As such, they know that cursing and nudity is not harmful to children, and if that's all the film contains, it will be rated "All audiences".

Example: "Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle".

USA (MPAA): 17+ (unless accompanied by an adult) due to "strong language, sexual content, drug use and some crude humor".

Denmark: 7+ recommended (but all ages admitted) due "strange and threatening persons, assaults, fights and accidents [...] all in a comedic context" (a context which could be lost on very young children).

To quote the ratings board:

The Media Council classifies films based on a perspective purely concerning harmfulness. The classification decision shall be made on the basis of an assessment of whether a film is considered harmful for children in that particular age group. When classifying films, we look at film effects, depictions of grievous loss, degree of realism, possibility of identification, inclusion of redemption within the course, genre and the expected media competences of the age group in question.

The Media Council’s view on child protection is that
* Children can manage a good thrill.
* Children are not likely to fall to pieces by the slightest push.
* Children are active users of media and, therefore, already in an early age, they have accumulated both media competencies and experiences.
* Media are good resources in children’s everyday life.
* It is acceptable that films frighten, though, only to a certain limit. The Media Council sets these limits.

The ESRB is a rating agency, not a regulatory one

[Shadow of Eternity]

The film industry also handles ratings internally and despite the bullshit brought to light by "this film not yet rated" is still largely doing an acceptable job of it. It's nonsense to take potshots at the gaming industry over this.

Or rather, its nonsense if you take it at face value. Really it's transparently obvious that this is just astroturfing. It's a sad attempt at appearing to care about "ethical" issues betrayed by their utter inability to drop the moralistic, censorious, and authoritarian Jack Thompson 2.0 rhetoric even for long enough to get one good lie out.

Disclose who wrote or paid for this article

[Anonymous Coward]

This is an advertisement not news.

There is no coincidence to this headline, weeks before the launch of GTA V for PC. It motivates the stupid to talk about GTA, and search for it raising its profile. I mean read the fuckin' title:

"Why is the Grand Theft Auto ..." why didn't they say "Why is the Rockstar ..." or whatever the conglomerate is? Specifying the game in the title, to an audience as well targeted as we are is mostly obvious.

Increased awareness == increased revenue.

Rockstar loves controversy because of it...

More importantly is this question: who gives a shit about the ESRB?

The people who are paid to...

Sex is more dangerous than violence

[rsilvergun]

I don't worry about my kid going on a killing spree and being taken down by the national guard. I _do_ worry about her getting knocked up. That's the difference.

Re:Sex is more dangerous than violence

[Anonymous Coward]

Making sex taboo and withholding information about it is precisely why so many teenagers get knocked-up.

Re:Sex is more dangerous than violence

[serviscope_minor]

Your sweeping statement (which may be true) needs evidence.

It has plenty of evidence. All thouse European countries where sex isn't nearly such a taboo have lower rates of teen pregnancy. The number of teen pregnancies seems to correlate well with how uptight people are about sex. It's one of those hilarious things I can be smug and annoying about because the people trying hardest are the ones doing the worst.

Take-Two does not own GTA

[Piata]

Strauss Zelnick and Take-Two DO NOT OWN GTA. Take-Two is Rockstar's publisher. Rockstar owns GTA. But don't let basic research get in the way of a sensationalist click-bait article...