Archive for the ‘Ignorance Watch’ Category

I don’t usually care to think about anti-videogame attorney Jack (John Bruce) Thompson lest it give him credence or, worse yet, a notion that his voice is relevant in the overarching debate over videogame censorship. But this time he’s really outdone himself with such a noteworthy argument that it’s worth sharing.

After the recent Show Cause order by the Florida Supreme Court, in order to overcome “the Court’s inability to comprehend” his arguments, they imposed a limitation on his ability to submit any further filings after a stunt involving his submission of a children’s book-styled motion in illustrated form containing clip-art images between the text depicting “swastikas, kangaroos in court, a reproduced dollar bill, cartoon squirrels, Paul Simon, Paul Newman, Ray Charles, a handprint with the word “SLAP!” written under it, Bar Governor Benedict P. Kuehne, a baby, Ed Bradley, Jack Nicholson, Justice Clarence Thomas, Julius Caesar, monkeys, a house of cards, and the motion concluded with the cover of Thompson’s book, Out of Harm’s Way“.

Class…

I just read that THQ picked up the award for Best Animated Videogame of 2007 at the 35th Annie Awards. That’s very impressive in a year that also brought us Assassin’s Creed and Team Fortress 2. The complete list of nominees were:

• Avatar: The Last Airbender “The Burning Earth” – THQ, Inc.
• Bee Movie Game – Activision
• Ratatouille – THQ, Inc.
• Transformers: The Game – Blur Studios

Congratulations to the team at THQ - beating off such stiff competition must have really taken a lot of hard work and talent, and I look forward to your future output. And congratulations to the Annie Awards jury for such a keen and incisive analysis of the current state of my industry - I also look forward to your future output.

A lot has been said over the past few weeks concerning the sexual content of Mass Effect, most notably the controversially unresearched Fox TV spot below. As a former member of the dev team responsible, (who directed a portion of the motion-capture actors involved - though full cutscenes weren’t my gig), I can perhaps speak with a little more candor on the subject.

To recap, the story so far:

1. Conservative radio journalist posts 3-page condemnation of “Virtual Orgasmic Rape” allegedly portrayed in Mass Effect.
2. Fox picks up the story, (shown above), draughting book author and panel to blast the game’s supposed pornographic nature.
3. Gamers take offence to the author’s comments, particularly the fact that all of the commentators neglected to actually play the game, spamming reviews of her recent book on Amazon, (some of which is hilarious).
4. EA, (now the parent company of BioWare), issues a statement to Fox, requesting that they officially correct their misinformed allegations.
5. Fox responds to EA, inviting them onto the show for a second, predictably biased, debate.
6. Original conservative radio journalist apologises for his error-strewn piece, surreptitiously removing the initial post.
7. Author apologises, retracting her erroneous statements after finally observing someone play the game.

EA is correct in saying that this is not only a gross misrepresentation of the game but is also disappointing to someone that worked on a project he considers offered a somewhat more mature and substantial experience than that described in the segment. For an altogether more accurate description of the “Romance Plots”, as they were always named during development, Marie-Jo has posted an excellent write up. I know that others still at BioWare share this sadness that the game has been run through the mud due to a combination of ignorance, self-publicity and a prescribed agenda masquerading as journalism.

However…

Can we honestly, as an industry, say that these kinds of criticisms leveled against us are wholly without merit?

One thing I’ve been repeating a lot recently is that I’m sick of games that involve nothing more cerebral than just shooting people. That kind of baseless content is indefensible against mass-media criticism, and to be perfectly honest, is hard to justify as a daily job let alone a creative one. There’s an almost automated reaction against any form of censorship of videogame content but how often do we, as developers and as gamers, stop to consider the cultural validity of the way we spend our downtime?

I’m not here to argue whether “adult” games are influential to minors that shouldn’t be accessing that kind of material as that’s another debate more well-trodden elsewhere, nor am I to take apart the arguments and sheer lack of research present in the above piece, (which hardly deserves debate), but regardless of the answer, consider this. Videogames, by their very virtual nature, can conjure up any kind of experience imaginable. In the words of my first Lead Programmer, “Anything’s possible, it’s just a question of time“. Why then do we continue to churn out endless waves of purile and/or conflict-orientated entertainment, and more to the point, why does the general public continue to lap it up?

Our greatest mission going forward, (one that is shared with all the most passionate developers I speak with), is the search for legitimacy as a creative medium and cultural validity as a form of entertainment. I believe Mass Effect is one of a small but growing number of videogames that can stand against the generic criticism thrown around by the sensationalist press, which makes it all the more frustrating that it should be singled out in this way.

You know you’ve hit the big time when your cutscene gets a Penny Arcade strip all of its own, so congratulations to Brad on making headlines with his bi alien sex scene - reportedly the lone element that pushed the game into the Mature ratings bracket in North America.

I seem to recall him spending an awfully long time on this one, despite the ESRB’s guidance that naked bodies can’t be on screen for longer than 10 or 15 seconds - presumably after which time North American teenagers’ heads explode.

There’s nothing new here as Jade Empire also allowed same-sex relationships, though the consummation was hidden by a fade to black unlike the heterosexual variations. Interestingly, this wasn’t the result of homophobia within the team, but instead a quick fix to disguise the mismatches given the sheer number of different sized characters that could become intimate with one another.

This embarassingly naive statement by unfortunately non-ficticious graduate of Generic Game Design Course appears in Game Developer magazine on a regular basis.

In his defence, the offending graduate offers this forum post on Garage Games.

“Yea (sic) that quote was def NOT from me…. I wasnt even alive when pong was released! So i do understand where you guys are coming from as far as seeming to (sic) cocky. It may have been a little overboard but at least its (sic) getting some notice. But sorry to make it seem like that was from me.(?) If you know me on a personal basis you would know thats not my character.”

So marketing genius strikes once again. Not only has Mr. Hartlieb’s chances of ever gaining employment in our industry been dramatically reduced, but Academia as a whole takes a blow.

Almost too close to the bone, this pretty much sums up the alsoran’s parents’ idea of how their son spends most of his days - because videogames are made by simply playing them. It could be a not-so-elaborate hoax, were it not for the actual existence of the website, let alone the course itself.

At first glance, this humourous cliche that UNDERMINES THE VERY CORE OF THE ALSORAN’S CHOSEN CAREER seems passable for a youthful industry given the 70s outfits, hair-styles and sound effects, until one realises that the two goons are in fact holding PS1 joypads, placing this effort firmly post-1998.