Just think about the world in the next twenty years when the old gezers are dead and the "innocent children" are running things. These rules most likely wont exist, and the old people who are still clinging to life with lifesupport wont be able to do a damn thing about it.
On the Left 4 Dead Ban
- Thread starter Yahtzee Croshaw
- Start date
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Well it is complete bull-ovaltine-chocolate-drink, but good ol' yahtzee can get it with his good friends from GAME TRADERS ROBINA.
I'm simply saying nearly every kid is gonna want to play this and they probably will anyway and it will probably have absolutely no negative effect and that the large majority of adults wouldn't care for the game anyway. It's just SILLY banning it.Knight Templar said:
there's a little catch with that. If you import a steam game, then you can't install it. If you buy a game in the US and then install it on an Australian PC, then it says "invalid regional code" and refuses to accept your CD-key. I speak out of experience here.ssgt splatter said:
Not a chance, We get bundled as Australia. If Its Banned in Aussie, it will probably be rare here too.L4Y Duke said:
I think it's funny that the fuckers at the ACB get to sit there and obviously play the game for ages before deciding that no-one else should.
I can imagine the conversation when they're "rating" the game..
"Whoa! Did you see that? I blew his legs RIGHT off!"
"Awesome!"
"Yeah! Fuck me, willya lookit all the zombies! Blow them up!"
*boooom*
"HAHA that was *sweeeeeet* - look, that ones arm is on that windowledge hahahah"
"You know - this is awesome. Wouldn't it be amazing if we were the only people in the country to play this?"
"Hmmm - yeah - you have a point. This is WAY to good for anyone else"
"Shall we do the old no-rating routine?"
"Fuck yeah, then I can make a fortune selling copies of the game DVD's on the black market"
"Awesome! Fancy a pint?"
"Sweeeet"
*not really an imaginary conversation - that really happened.
I can imagine the conversation when they're "rating" the game..
"Whoa! Did you see that? I blew his legs RIGHT off!"
"Awesome!"
"Yeah! Fuck me, willya lookit all the zombies! Blow them up!"
*boooom*
"HAHA that was *sweeeeeet* - look, that ones arm is on that windowledge hahahah"
"You know - this is awesome. Wouldn't it be amazing if we were the only people in the country to play this?"
"Hmmm - yeah - you have a point. This is WAY to good for anyone else"
"Shall we do the old no-rating routine?"
"Fuck yeah, then I can make a fortune selling copies of the game DVD's on the black market"
"Awesome! Fancy a pint?"
"Sweeeet"
*not really an imaginary conversation - that really happened.
Well a few things to say here, firstly this is more of an issue with one guy, as has been said before.
Then ironically, in refusing to create an R-18+ rating the people in charge of these things are actually exposing more violent games to children at a younger age than those in the US and such places.
See aside from the odd refused classification (Which I might add seems to be completely arbitrary and has little to do with actual content) most of the games get through unchanged with an MA-15+ or an M-15+ rating where in america they would have gotten an R-18+ (Or do you guys call it T-18? I forget). So the average australian 15 year old actually has access to more violent content in games than the average american one.
As a whole honestly australia seems to be more laid back when it comes to these things than america, it's just that we have some odd bureaucratic choke points that we can't seem to get rid of.
Another example is the ratings bored continued banning of the odd (again arbitrary) film that contains depictions of nudity despite having absolutely no problem with hardcore X-rated porn movies which in any case have content far more gratuitous than any non-porn movie.
Granted this isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I can assure you that if they were as lacking in gameplay as you seem to think they are they wouldn't have spawned such successful competitive scenes where so many other games have failed to.
Then ironically, in refusing to create an R-18+ rating the people in charge of these things are actually exposing more violent games to children at a younger age than those in the US and such places.
See aside from the odd refused classification (Which I might add seems to be completely arbitrary and has little to do with actual content) most of the games get through unchanged with an MA-15+ or an M-15+ rating where in america they would have gotten an R-18+ (Or do you guys call it T-18? I forget). So the average australian 15 year old actually has access to more violent content in games than the average american one.
As a whole honestly australia seems to be more laid back when it comes to these things than america, it's just that we have some odd bureaucratic choke points that we can't seem to get rid of.
Another example is the ratings bored continued banning of the odd (again arbitrary) film that contains depictions of nudity despite having absolutely no problem with hardcore X-rated porn movies which in any case have content far more gratuitous than any non-porn movie.
I enjoy the odd bit of gore because it's simple mindless fun, that's it. Nothing more is needed sometimes. I also resent you citing left 4 dead as a game barren of interesting gameplay. Left 4 dead and others like it (Like gears of war) have quite advanced competitive multiplayer in them and are simply topped with a bit of gratuitous fun that happens to come in the form of buckets o' blood.Odjin said:
Granted this isn't everyone's cup of tea, but I can assure you that if they were as lacking in gameplay as you seem to think they are they wouldn't have spawned such successful competitive scenes where so many other games have failed to.
Dear Australia,
you are so damn right! Piles of corpses are totally not suitable for children. I've seen Die Hard when I was seventeen and now look at me. LOOK AT ME! Yeah, the truth hurts. While I totally agree that violence and video games are not cool, I really don't understand why you don't see the other potential origins of danger for society. Isn't it true that children are much more endangered by stupidity and mediocrity nowadays than by violence?
Please, Australia, protect your kids from genociding player substitutes, but while you're at it you should also shut down every single radio and TV station and ban Hollywood films. Oh, and kill all the smokers, not only would you protect the children from the effects of passive smoking, the smokers themselves would be thankful too (if they were still alive, that is) since they won't get lung cancer when they're dead.
One last suggestion: Why don't you build a Hatcheries and Conditioning Centre to make absolutely sure that your kids are safe from bad influences. Ford, would I love to see that!
Well, gotta run now.
Greetings from Germany,
lostbuthappy
PS: Sex is good => don't ban genitals. Thank you.
you are so damn right! Piles of corpses are totally not suitable for children. I've seen Die Hard when I was seventeen and now look at me. LOOK AT ME! Yeah, the truth hurts. While I totally agree that violence and video games are not cool, I really don't understand why you don't see the other potential origins of danger for society. Isn't it true that children are much more endangered by stupidity and mediocrity nowadays than by violence?
Please, Australia, protect your kids from genociding player substitutes, but while you're at it you should also shut down every single radio and TV station and ban Hollywood films. Oh, and kill all the smokers, not only would you protect the children from the effects of passive smoking, the smokers themselves would be thankful too (if they were still alive, that is) since they won't get lung cancer when they're dead.
One last suggestion: Why don't you build a Hatcheries and Conditioning Centre to make absolutely sure that your kids are safe from bad influences. Ford, would I love to see that!
Well, gotta run now.
Greetings from Germany,
lostbuthappy
PS: Sex is good => don't ban genitals. Thank you.
While old I'll finally get around to commenting. I pretty much said my piece in another "article" about the same thing.
In general this isn't really about moral guardianship, it's about power. Free Speech is one of those things that goverments hate. One of the reasons why it was guaranteed in the US Constitution along with things like Freedom Of The Press, and the right to bear arms (in case someone in power tries to remove the other rights). Even in Australia the goverment can't suddenly decide "yes, let's have an Orwellian police state that we will rule" they need to get the support of the people to open those doors, and moral guardianship is a way of drumming up support. Once you have the precedent ball rolling it takes less and less approval from the general populance to extend the law into other things, and even totally unrelated areas. Bureaucracy is the biggest monster created by humanity, and this is why it can do more damage to society than the cumulative effect of a Gojira marathon to the octagon type enviroment that Tokyo provides in those movies.
The thing is though that Valve for example is group of wusses. All video game companies are. "OMG, if we oppose this we might lose money, get in trouble, or actually go to jail waaaah!" which is why they back down. Heck, I haven't even seen a company try perfectly serious political/legal rallying, or organize a non-violent "Rise Of The Nerds" against the goverments that do this kind of thing (Australia being a key example).
Oh sure, us nerds might sit down and make pretensions of caring with internet petitions, but honestly it means nothing, and we know it. It takes leadership and resources to actually DO something, and sadly the only ones who have that abillity are the game companies themselves who are too busy bent over giving rim jobs to the establishment, and trying to find ways to get their consumers to give up the rights they currently have in favor of digital downloads, to really care.
Valve has said their very "sad" about Australia's ruling. Well, rather than worshipping these guys as great designers and such, I think a bunch of nerd rage should be being thrown in their direction for simply grabbing a tissue and then running off to cry someplace.
Not that Valve doesn't sort of deserve this mind you, see I'm not a big shooter fan, I do not play Left 4 Dead, but they DID make some promises to their fan base that seem to be being broken by the release of Left 4 Dead 2. Like many people with an eye on the industry I would love for this product to get a big huge mouthful of fail. However there are bigger issues at stake here now. I think by fighting Valve could regain some of the respect they seem to have lost with this sequel to begin with.
Oh and Yahtzee, you seem to get messages around quite well in the gaming community. It occurs to me that if you believe in all of this, you could probably be doing more down there in Australia. Not like Valve or anything, but I'd imagine if you decided to throw "Yahtzeepalooza" in the middle of some area inconveinent to the goverment, and bad mouth the censorship policies, you could get plenty of aussie game nerds to come down with signs at the very least.
Then again I'm insane. See if I had a bunch of money to spend, I'd probably be trying to develop some of my ideas for games (natch), probably unsuccessfully. However I remember seeing this Tasmanian mercenary on TV they interviewed once that cut both his ears off and claimed he could outbox Mike Tyson or something like that. I'd probably keep a petty cash drawer around to periodically hire him (or others of his ilk) to expand a collection of body parts collected from censors.
We all have our crazy ideas (like mine) but the point is that there ARE still perfectly sane and rational ways people can start addressing this kind of issue. The kinds of things your supposed to exhaust before anyone does anything crazy, but right now I don't think I've ever seen one pro-video game rally.
In general this isn't really about moral guardianship, it's about power. Free Speech is one of those things that goverments hate. One of the reasons why it was guaranteed in the US Constitution along with things like Freedom Of The Press, and the right to bear arms (in case someone in power tries to remove the other rights). Even in Australia the goverment can't suddenly decide "yes, let's have an Orwellian police state that we will rule" they need to get the support of the people to open those doors, and moral guardianship is a way of drumming up support. Once you have the precedent ball rolling it takes less and less approval from the general populance to extend the law into other things, and even totally unrelated areas. Bureaucracy is the biggest monster created by humanity, and this is why it can do more damage to society than the cumulative effect of a Gojira marathon to the octagon type enviroment that Tokyo provides in those movies.
The thing is though that Valve for example is group of wusses. All video game companies are. "OMG, if we oppose this we might lose money, get in trouble, or actually go to jail waaaah!" which is why they back down. Heck, I haven't even seen a company try perfectly serious political/legal rallying, or organize a non-violent "Rise Of The Nerds" against the goverments that do this kind of thing (Australia being a key example).
Oh sure, us nerds might sit down and make pretensions of caring with internet petitions, but honestly it means nothing, and we know it. It takes leadership and resources to actually DO something, and sadly the only ones who have that abillity are the game companies themselves who are too busy bent over giving rim jobs to the establishment, and trying to find ways to get their consumers to give up the rights they currently have in favor of digital downloads, to really care.
Valve has said their very "sad" about Australia's ruling. Well, rather than worshipping these guys as great designers and such, I think a bunch of nerd rage should be being thrown in their direction for simply grabbing a tissue and then running off to cry someplace.
Not that Valve doesn't sort of deserve this mind you, see I'm not a big shooter fan, I do not play Left 4 Dead, but they DID make some promises to their fan base that seem to be being broken by the release of Left 4 Dead 2. Like many people with an eye on the industry I would love for this product to get a big huge mouthful of fail. However there are bigger issues at stake here now. I think by fighting Valve could regain some of the respect they seem to have lost with this sequel to begin with.
Oh and Yahtzee, you seem to get messages around quite well in the gaming community. It occurs to me that if you believe in all of this, you could probably be doing more down there in Australia. Not like Valve or anything, but I'd imagine if you decided to throw "Yahtzeepalooza" in the middle of some area inconveinent to the goverment, and bad mouth the censorship policies, you could get plenty of aussie game nerds to come down with signs at the very least.
Then again I'm insane. See if I had a bunch of money to spend, I'd probably be trying to develop some of my ideas for games (natch), probably unsuccessfully. However I remember seeing this Tasmanian mercenary on TV they interviewed once that cut both his ears off and claimed he could outbox Mike Tyson or something like that. I'd probably keep a petty cash drawer around to periodically hire him (or others of his ilk) to expand a collection of body parts collected from censors.
We all have our crazy ideas (like mine) but the point is that there ARE still perfectly sane and rational ways people can start addressing this kind of issue. The kinds of things your supposed to exhaust before anyone does anything crazy, but right now I don't think I've ever seen one pro-video game rally.
Every word is true. Was actually wondering if Yahtzee even cared about this game being banned as he didn't mention a word of it in ZP this week. Guess this answers that anyway. Gutted for anyone else living in Austrailia like. Would like Valve to change the content to a way found suitable for the ACB but equally I don't want to miss out on anything!
Indeed Yahtzee, you said it quite well.
The sad fact is, this obvious denial of liberty gets completely ignored by the american media. If this was in Canada, or China, or our country it would be all over the news, and yet I've yet to see a single article on it.
All I can say is use your power as a citizen. As gay and ineffective as it can be, it's the only viable tool against oppression and authoritarian rule.
Well, excluding a revolution. *cough cough*
The sad fact is, this obvious denial of liberty gets completely ignored by the american media. If this was in Canada, or China, or our country it would be all over the news, and yet I've yet to see a single article on it.
All I can say is use your power as a citizen. As gay and ineffective as it can be, it's the only viable tool against oppression and authoritarian rule.
Well, excluding a revolution. *cough cough*
it's how the government controls us, by keeping us poor.