Here's one that will undoubtedly send some gamers into a craze. A study from two Swiss human rights organizations, Trial and Pro Juventute, has found that some video games depict war and battle actions that in real life would violate international human rights laws.
The study attempted to determine if the acts gamers engage in while they play violent titles would "lead to violations of rules of international law, in particular International Humanitarian Law (IHL), basic norms of International Human Rights Law (IHRL), or International Criminal Law (ICL)."
To find out, Trial and Pro Juventute picked up 20 games, including Call of Duty 4, Metal Gear Solid 4, Far Cry 2, and others. It had "young gamers" play the games as three attorneys watched to find actions in games that in real life would violate rules and regulations that govern armed conflict.
The organizations said the study is not intended to "prohibit the games, to make them less violent or to turn them into IHL or IHRL training tools." Instead, the groups want to work with developers to ensure that in the future, their games observe real-life human-rights laws.
After evaluating the 20 games, the group found that in many cases, "shooter" games failed to take into consideration international humanitarian law.
... Read moreLast week, an ad from the Change4Life Campaign was placed all over the U.K. depicting a young boy holding a video game controller with large text over his head reading: "Risk an early death. Just do nothing." Nowhere in that ad did it explicitly say video games could cause children to die early, but the message was there, and a handful of video game developers took offense.
Codemasters' CEO Rod Cousens said, "Governments have a unique ability to get it wrong." Sega Europe President and COO Mike Hayes said in an interview that he and the rest of the employees at his company were "very disappointed" with the ad. He went on to say that "it remains a deep frustration that video gaming is selected to present a negative image of the U.K.'s children, youth, consumer at large and the industry."
Atari issued a statement saying "at best, the campaign is misleading and at worst, damaging to the industry, its reputation and its potential." It followed that up by registering a formal complaint with the U.K.'s Advertising Standards Authority.
Unfair advertising? You decide.
For its part, the U.K. Department of Health said in a statement that the ads are "not saying that children shouldn't play computer games or eat treats, but parents and children need to be aware of the benefits of a balanced diet and an active lifestyle."
This wasn't the government's first attack on the video game industry. The U.K. government, through this Change4Life campaign, earlier this year released a commercial showing a child playing a video game and then used the camera to zoom in to his body to show fat building up. He's later shown as an effigy of himself in the video game, with the phrase "Game Over" displayed on-screen.
Once again, the U.K. Department of Health said in a statement that it wasn't attacking video games, but it wanted to remind parents that an "unhealthy lifestyle, including poor diet or being inactive, can lead to health problems in later life."
Where's the outcry? Where are the major developers, like EA and Activision, speaking out against this? Why isn't the video game industry doing more to battle this Change4Life campaign? Sega and Atari, with their cryptic messages, won't do anything to change how video games are treated. More needs to be done.
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Sorry, Nico, you won't be going to 13-year-olds in Utah.
(Credit: Rockstar Games)Jack Thompson, the former lawyer who made a name for himself by speaking out against video game violence, is at it again.
Thompson co-authored a bill in the Utah legislature with Rep. Mike Morley that would fine video game retailers a whopping $2,000 each time they sold an M-rated game to a minor. The bill hasn't passed just yet, but the state's Business and Labor Committee voted 10-3 to keep it alive and it's quickly making its rounds in the Legislature.
To clarify some of the finer points in Thompson's bill, Joystiq recently sat down with him for an interview and, as expected, Thompson was unapologetic at what some gamers are calling an outlandish plan.
"The concept is this," Thompson told the video game blog. "If you, the retailer, say that you don't sell mature rated games to someone under 17 then you're in effect engaging in communications with the public and assurances to the public which is definitely advertising, then you have to adhere to that policy.
"The issue becomes the truthfulness of the corporate representations. We're addressing the fraud of deceptive trade practices issue rather than the nature of the product itself. It's an across the board attempt to hold to their word the retailers of music, movies and video games [in any format]."
As much as I can't believe I'm saying this, given my history discussing Jack Thompson, for once, I can't help but agree with him.
... Read moreVideo games are under attack again and in a show of solidarity, I explain why violent video games don't cause violence and more importantly, why I support them.
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Last week, Democrat Rep. Joe Baca introduced "The Video Game Health Labeling Act of 2009." If passed, the bill would create a new rule in the Consumer Product Safety Commission forcing developers to affix a warning on any game rated Teen or higher.
The label would read, "WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior."
In a press release sent out by the Congressman's office, Baca defended his position and explained that the video game industry must be held accountable for violence.
"The video game industry has a responsibility to parents, families, and to consumers--to inform them of the potentially damaging content that is often found in their products," he wrote. "They have repeatedly failed to live up to this responsibility. Meanwhile, research continues to show a proven in young people. American families deserve to know the truth about these potentially dangerous products."
He continued: "We must hold the video game industry accountable and do everything in our power to ensure parents are aware of the detrimental effects that violent games can have before making decisions on which games are appropriate for their children to play."
While video games entertain people, cigarettes quietly kill them.
(Credit: Medical University of South Carolina)Let me get this straight: lawmakers now , much like those already placed on cigarette packs, to warn the world about the possible danger violent video games can create? What a joke.
First off, video games should not be treated the same as cigarettes at any time. One entertains people, and the other quietly kills them. Secondly, there is no solid evidence to support the claim that violent video games cause children to be more aggressive.
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The Army Experience Center in Philly: Recruitment tool or fun?
(Credit: U.S. Army)The U.S. Army has spent $12 million on a new facility in Philadelphia that abandons the use of recruiters selling the Army life in favor of video games and loud rock music, according to a Reuters report.
Dubbed the U.S. Army Experience Center, the facility at the Franklin Mills shopping mall in Philadelphia sports 60 computers preloaded with military video games, 19 Xbox 360 controllers, and video displays that "describe military bases and career options in great detail," Reuters reports.
Visitors to the center can play games that allow them to fire on enemy combatants from a Humvee or engage in helicopter missions where the player is firing on the enemy from an Apache or Black Hawk helicopter.
The center first opened in August as the first step in what is a two-year experiment on the part of the Army to recruit more service people. So far, the experiment has proven successful: Reuters reports that 33 full-time soldiers and 5 reservists have have joined the U.S. Army since its inception. More importantly, that recruitment tally bests the five "traditional" recruiting centers it replaced.
For its part, the Army says it's not necessarily trying to recruit young soldiers. Instead, it says the Experience Center is being used as a way to inform the public.
"What we are doing here is reaching out to Americans, giving them the opportunity to understand their Army," Maj. Gen. Thomas P. Bostick, head of the U.S. Army Recruiting Command, said in a statement. "Oftentimes, people have a negative perception of the Army, but the negatives are a very small part. Our soldiers are well-trained, well-equipped, and serving a great mission."
That's an interesting take, but one that deserves some more contemplation. Is the U.S. Army Experience Center really just a place to teach people about the "real" Army? Or is it a place to coax people into joining through video games?
... Read moreThe National Institute on Media and the Family, a media watchdog group that has spent considerable time taking the gaming industry to task for continually churning out violent titles, turned its attention to parents recently. It gave parents an "Incomplete" grade in its annual report card Tuesday. According to the group, parents aren't paying enough attention to ESRB ratings and don't have any interest in using parental controls.
The study poses an interesting question: "Are parents doing enough to protect their children from violent video games?" The answer, though, isn't simple.
On one hand, we can say that parents haven't done enough to educate themselves about video games since Mortal Kombat and Doom became household names on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers have focused their attention on monitoring retailers and imposing strict regulations on developers, in the hope that these actions will help parents who want to keep their children away from violent titles.
But how much control does a parent really have? They can't be expected to watch their children 24 hours each day, nor can they control a child's activity when he or she is at a friend's house where the parents do allow violent video games to be played.
For years, I've seen watchdog groups attack the video game industry for "intentionally marketing to children" and "not doing enough to stop the sale of violent video games to children." And yet, during all those years when the industry was getting hit from all sides, I never heard one group specifically target parents until now.
Now that the NIMF has finally set its sights on parents, does this mean it's time for more parents to take notice and realize that the decisions they make related to violent video games in the home have a major impact on the development of their child?
Absolutely.
... Read moreViolent video games don't make children more violent. Is it that hard to understand?
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Jack Thompson has been officially disbarred. What will the leading anti-video game agent do next?
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Much has been made about violent video games and how they impact children over the past decade and legislatures and activist groups alike have tried to find ways to stop them from getting in the hands of minors. And with the help of retailers, most laws have tried to make it impossible for those under the age of 17 to buy an M-rated game. But according to a recent Nielsen survey, 17 percent of Grand Theft Auto IV buyers were underage.
Nielsen found that of the 6,000 respondents, 17 percent of all buyers were younger than 17 -- the children were aged between 6 and 17 -- and of those younger buyers, 61 percent bought the game themselves, while 39 percent had a relative or friend buy it for them. In those cases where someone else bought the game for the kids, 80 percent were the child's parent or guardian and 10 percent said their older siblings bought the game for them.
Of course, anti-video game hacks will use this survey and say that it demonstrates to us all that retailers need to be more prudent in who they're selling games to and parents should be ashamed of themselves for giving a violent video game to a minor.
But I have a different take. I don't see anything wrong with underage kids buying any video game from any store at any time. And why should I? It's abundantly clear that they'll just have their parents get the games for them anyway.
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