Only in America...

[Keiichi]

I just read this on IGNPC...

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>What's Up With My Nipples?

Giants developer responds to the decision to cover naughty bits and change blood to green goo.

December 8, 2000

In light of the recent decision (http://pc.ign.com/news/28704.html) to cover Delphi's bare bosom and change the red blood to green goo, Co-Founder and Vice-President of Planet Moon, Bob Stevenson, sent along the word as to why the choice was made to alter the game slightly at the last minute:

"We agree! Covering Delphi and changing the blood does suck! And indeed these changes were part of a last-minute bid for Giants to get a 'Teen' rating from the ESRB. It was only recently that the pressure has been mounting for us to cover her up or face crippling our potential distribution. That would obviously be completely crap for us as we've labored over this game for three years. And it is our finest game to date.

"Although we are now stuck with a 'Mature' rating, we may still have a chance at getting wider distribution if retailers step back and realize our game is not a 'danger' for the minds of America.

"Importantly, these changes were only for the US versions of the game. Elsewhere in the world, Giants will be seen as we originally meant it to be. As to whether we can revert these changes -- 'no comment' at this point. Just know that our aim is true.

"Planet Moon's battle is to continue making games that are unique, fresh and truly entertaining. We are really proud of this game and we obviously want as many people to play it as possible."

Bob Stevenson
Co-founder
Planet Moon Studios

While there is already a patch that turns the green blood back to its original red, no "official" word has been given yet as to the disrobing of Delphi in the US.

Oddly enough, one of the biggest reasons Planet Moon and Interplay were aiming for a "Teen" rating is because many large retailers, especially the "Marts" (Wal and K), won't carry "Mature" rated games...although they will carry "R-rated" movies and guns. Makes you think, don't it...

-- IGN[/quote]

I was really looking forward to Giants: Citizen Kabuto, until I read this. I hope they find a way to patch it so those of us who aren't mindless robots can enjoy it the way it was meant to be.

-Keiichi

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[This message was edited by Keiichi on Dec 09, 2000 at 00:50.]

[Mason]

This country of 'ours' never ceases to amaze me. The lengths we are willing to go to be hypocrites are astonishing. You can watch the news and see sex and violence. You can watch prime time television and see sex and violence..and if you have any kind of normal cable at all, well, forget it..corruption city with all the sex and violence. Video games, however, are clearly responsible for all of our ills. The sex and violence exhibited in them is far too much for our feeble children to handle..the real stuff? ..well they can handle that just fine, it's the fake stuff that will ultimately push them over the edge. Columbine, anyone? It was the video game industry that was CLEARLY responsible for that tragedy!

I am the Walrus, koo koo kachoo.
Why do people insist on putting their 'two cents' in when they don't have a penny to spare?

[Mojo.the.Red]

All I can do, really, is sigh. Everybody knows its nipples and the word "f'uck" and seeing blood come out of something (because obviously falling off your bike, you NEVER bleed) makes children instantly pick up a gun and shoot their nearest friend.

Good lord God what is this world coming to? Quick, no more history class! Its to violent! Sex ed shows breasts and penises to teens! Its pornographic! Shakespeare was racist! Christ almighty Christ spare this foolish, foolish world from its own designs.

*sigh* Had Columbine happened ten or twenty years ago, it would have been Metallica instead of Manson and Dungeons and Dragons instead of Doom. Remember when it first happened, everybody immediately blamed the Matrix because they did it while wearing black trench coats? Jesus. Idiot media. Idiot people. I wanna crush them all.

http://badmojojacket.homestead.com/files/bmj.gif

[Ballistophobia]

We all make our on choices so f.uck all these *******s who keep sending mixed messages to people making it seem like we are gonna be influenced no matter what. If I decide to go and kill someone tomorrow,it's not cuz of all the time I played UT or any video game or any slasher flick or and rap cd that even talks about kidnapping your girlfriend and cutting her throat,it would be cuz I am a sick *******. Plain and simple.
I wonder what rap cds Hitler listened to or what video game it was that Charles Manson played. :rolleyes: There will always be bad people and just cuz the fact that 2 picked on,and seriously f.ucked in the head,highschool students shot up their school played Doom means absolutely nothing. I mean think of how many people played that f.uckin game. Are these people idiots?
I mean damn,it's like if someone kills a bunch of people in their school and then blames in on sports,you wouldn't be seeing football or hockey shows being toned down. I know that's sort of an unfair analogy but **** it,I'm high. :p
What I mean essentially is that just cuz something is obviously one way doesn't mean it will convey that specifically. Games being violent will not affect me or anyone else anymore than a violent movie. That all might change in the future however. Games like RE and Silent Hill have already demonstrated how much more real and fun games can be compared to a movie in certain aspects.

Honestly,if anything,I think violence in games has keep me more sane somehow. I let out all my anger on games and music I guess. Oh yeah,all the weed I smoke keeps me even more of a nice guy,another subject when the man is ****in me in the ass with making it illegal. :mad:

/me goes and smokes :D

[jaeg]

Why is this such a big deal? A business is trying to increse sales by complying with the wishes of a few major reatilers. So? Who gives a flying rats ass?

I know, I know...its the "principle". That us Americans, as a whole, think video games are influential to youth. We rate movies, restrict the sale of pornography, cigarettes, guns and sometimes even music(some stores do). What is wrong with a rating system for a type of entertainment that is fairly mainstream?

FreeBSD: The Power to
Serve - <A HREF="http://www.freebsd.org" TARGET="_blank">www.freebsd.org</A>

[jaunty]

ahh, it truly is a sad sad day for personal freedom.

i got carded buying dues ex today :( what the f*ck is that sh!t!?

so now, for the sake of "saving america's youth" you can't see some tit, you'll be missing the word "f'uck" and blood is gonna be green goop.

i think all need to stand up for ourselves, well i dont, because australia is a little less constipated than the USA, but not by much, as mentioned above.

but let me tell you right now, if that happened here, now, the streets of sydney wouldn't be very safe for any socce rmums driving their SUV's around. It'd be protests from every gamer in the city, and as happened in melbourne at the world ecenomic forum, the cops would join in, thats right, the people here to defend public safety and freedom, did their job, and defended free speech hahahaha, fukking yuppies. i hate them all, and they will pay for crippling the world i've been forced to share with them.

<img src=http://www.geocities.com/bischlong/jaunty2.jpg>

[Mason]

I have no problem with rating the games, in fact i think they should be rated, but if Walmart or K-Mart sells "In know what you did last summer" to kids..and as far as I know, they don't card you for buying a movie..then they damn well should be selling games rated "M". Choosing to NOT sell "M" rated games is just a cop out to cover up for the fact that they don't enforce the existing policies regarding the sale of those games. Hmm..do movie theaters stop showing "R" rated movies just because underage teens are getting in due to the theaters lack of ID checks? Hell no, that's a lot of money..and, ladies and gentlemen, I think that is the real bottom line. Either enforce existing policies or shut up, for cryin' out loud. I don't even want to get STARTED on the fact that Walmart sells "edited" music CD's..explicit lyrics are replaced with 'blank spots'. sort of like "I want to (blaaaaaank) her brains out!" Why do they just not pull those CDs' off the shelf..hmm..could it have anything to do with the fact that there is, literally, a TON of money to be lost there? Ok, I've rambled enough....

I am the Walrus, koo koo kachoo.
Why do people insist on putting their 'two cents' in when they don't have a penny to spare?

[I_ABuGa]

hmmm... i wonder whut computer games Hitler played with... Or maybe that guy who holed himself up at Waco... or that Unabomber guy... or maybe even bin Laden.

[Mojo.the.Red]

What's wrong with rating a game? Everything. What if I don't think the stuff listed in the rating is so extreme and ammoral? Instead, it should have a list of stuff that people may find objectionable such as sex/violence/religious/language, and no age rating. Who's to say a 25 year old is more "mature" than a 15 year old? "Noted principals and child psychologists that make up the ESRB"? F'uck that.

Face it, there's no real media paranoia about violent movies (that passed after Taxi Driver/Ronald Reagan, though some people still cling onto it desperately) so Walmart sells them freely, but since people OVER the age of 20 are Walmart's primary demographic, they enforce the media hype to reassure parents, and the "mature" people who shop there don't even notice the change. Its all money, boys. See why I'm a commie? This wouldn't happen in a society with no economy.

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[MiscMan]

Rating games is okay, i suppose. Especially for parents with young kids(say, under 8). But carding people? That's ridiculous. If you look at statistics, those people who can't buy games with nudity, can just go **** their damned girlfriend. Hell, they could buy a prostitute.

To go even farther, it's been proven that doing things such as that do NOTHING to reduce crimes in any way. They probably do more bad then good. All those gullible schmucks for parents who bitch to people just to feel self important are really really irritating me now. I don't go to blockbuster cause i can't rent R movies??? What gives? This old whore at the movie theater wouldn't let me see this R movie cause "I'm not supervised". Well if parents don't want to supervise their kids, let them. You can't help people in any way by doing such things. People who send their kids to catholic school, go to church every week, and have after school **** going on won't do JACK **** to reduce that kids chances of becoming a crack head. Hell it could make it worse. I would get tired of going to a place who's original intentions are so muddled in egotism and arrogance that people who go to it feel bad about it. I don't get it at all. It's surprising how many stupid people there are, but i'm not going to just sit around while some jackass********er screws me over because they want to shelter everybody. Whatever i guess...

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-MiscMan

Titanium Wars (http://www.planetunreal.com/titaniumwars/mainindex.html)

[Zundfolge]

We have to make a distinction though, if the government comes in and tells you what you can say or what content in your game can or cannot be then that's wrong, but if a game maker is responding to market forces then that's fine. I always get annoyed at people who get mad at the big chain stores when they refuse to sell something they find objectionable. Do you think the government should force people to sell things they find objectionable because of some sort of twisted view of fairness.
If that's the case then we should force Jewish bookstore owners to sell Mien Kampf and books on how the holocaust is a hoax, African American book stores should have to sell pro KKK books and oi CDs, Christian book stores should be forced to sell Hustler magazine.
If a video game company believes that it will significantly cut their sales if they don't make some changes to a game then they would be fools to buck the market, these guys are in it for the money.
If you are that interested in the unedited version of the game, there is no law saying it can't be sold here so go to your retailer and see if you can order it through them. If that doesn't work go to the manufacturer, most of them will have some way to order it. You can also check with online software retailers from other countries. Or get a bunch of people to write the company and bitch and moan, maybe if enough people will do that they will release an unedited version in the states (become a market force).

As for a rating system, as long as it's not being forced onto the industry by the government, I have no problem with it. It's just more information for the consumer (remember that the movie rating system is NOT LAW, it's a voluntary system set up by the motion picture association).

I wish people would realize that the free market is as much a natural force as gravity or the laws of thermodynamics.

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[MiscMan]

I understand that. The free world is exactly that, free. We are free to think whatever we want to, say what we want to, buy what we want to, and manipulate what we want to. It's far from perfect, and when big, giant, huge annoying chains start making people feel guilty for not sheltering their kids, it will get some people a bit upset. I'm not going to use this to start a dumb debate of "i can say anything, blah la dida", but in all seriousness stuff like this is so retarded and uneducated. It's too, political. Though i myself would like to get into politics not for the reason of it being just that, but i would like to be on the inside for a change. I can't really say anything conclusive as to why, when, how, or who do such things. All i can say is that though people are moderate, those vocal radical people are not. Very rarely do you hear, "the radicalists are going midway on this one". That's because the average person doesn't really care enough about an issue to have an extreme stance on it. It's just that many people think that the voice of those few are the voice of the people.

Now, the only problem with this is that we can't really give in to the people, or "the mob". In general, people are followers. How many people do you think didn't vote for Nader knowing that he couldn't win. Too many, for some god awful reason people "want to be on the winning team". Even when they don't even make the cut.

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-MiscMan

Titanium Wars (http://www.planetunreal.com/titaniumwars/mainindex.html)

[Keiichi]

If fifty "concerned mothers" picket outside of a electronics store so that the store is forced to remove "inappropriate" products from their shelves or lose signifigant buisiness, I'd hardly say that it was the stores choice. They were pressured by the "soccer moms" to remove that material and, in turn, the developer was pressured to remove the objectionable material from their software or face very little market saturation. In effect, the minority rule. The majority of people who play computer/video games have no problem with a little violence, but, for some reason, their opinion is disregarded.

Even if you rule out the above, it still doesn't excuse the hypocrisy of these stores. They refuse to sell "mature" games, but see nothing wrong with selling R-rated movies and guns. It's mainly because most people (at least those in positions of power) still see games as an industry for children. Hell, my parents still say that I'm "playing on the Nintendo", even though it's a friggin' Dreamcast, for Christ's sake. The idea that people who are 20, 30, or even 50 years old still play video games is not only laughable to them, but down right absurd. Because games are still considered to be products for young children, parents are shocked that there's so much violent content included in them. They fail to realize that games are just as much the realm of mature adults as they are of "little Jonny".

-Keiichi

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[Mason]

Again, nice on Keiichi! That was my point precisely. As long as Video games are percieved as chldish by the general public, you are going to have this problem. As for MiscMan, wait 'till you have kids and see how you feel about your statements. I just have two NEICES and I get protective of them with regards to movies and games..granted, they are only 5 and 4 years old. I think ratings and information on the packaging(like blockbuster does) is fine. I also think enforcing it by carding individuals is fine also. I DO think that the age limit for renting "M" games should be lower though, like 15 or 16. Let's face it(all you over the age of 25 or so), kids today are further ahead in many areas than we were at the same age. They are physically maturing at earlier ages and are intellectually maturing at a slightly earlier age(current teenagers don't count..I'm talking 12 and under here).

I do, however, think that parents need to be involved more in their chldrens' lives. They need to be aware of what they are doing, both under their roof and when the child is out with friends. Not enough parents pay attention to what thier kids are doing and I think they are using various industries as a means to "keep an eye on them". It's an excuse for laziness in my opinion. South Park movie, anyone? Personally, I hold the apparent 'death' of the 'one parent working, the other at home with the kids' responsible for this. The need for both parents to work has resulted in too much independance and freedom for kids at too early an age. It's unfortunate but hey, it's PROGRESS(wink, wink).

I am the Walrus, koo koo kachoo.
Why do people insist on putting their 'two cents' in when they don't have a penny to spare?