Should we have some kind of "moral standards" orginization in video games?

[BarryMcCociner]

Before this turns into a shitfest I just want to say that there are both merits and disadvantages both sides of this argument, and I see them on both sides and the way we're supposed to find solutions to these problems is be weighing both sides of the argument.

Now, currently the only "moral standards organization" in video games is the ESRB, which is essentially the MPAA of video games, they slap their little warnings on covers and decide what audience the title is suitable for, but other than that these organizations have little power. Honestly? I think they have a right to exist.

I mean, picture some old Grandmother looking to pick up a game for her grandkids sixth birthday, would you rather those warnings not be there? Would you rather the six year old gets Grand Theft Auto V or would you rather they get Mario Kart 8?

Personally, I'd want the warnings on the covers to show the uninformed consumer what is and isn't going to be acceptable by their standards. We all have different levels of what we deem acceptable, and these warnings help us understand what we will and wont be able to tolerate. So I'm all for the ESRB warnings on game cases.

But that's just not the issue here, you see in Films there's organizations (I forget their names) which say things like "You can't show animal cruelty, You can't show an erect penis, You can't show a shaved vagina." and things like that, now to some these rules might seem understandable, but to others these rules are puritanical and extremely trivial.

For instance, the nudity rules. If you're going to allow film makers to show the naked body of an actor, why put regulations on how the actor has to look when they're shown? Can't show animal cruelty? Fine, but what about historical films, when you have cavalry riding in and none of the soldiers attack the cavalry?

I think the only time I've ever seen a horse die in a film is when the Fell Beast flies over head and drops its talons into the charging army in Lord of the Rings, plus there was The Neverending Story but they got to skirt around that rule because it wasn't a death technically caused by people.

It always grates my nerves a little to see in a historical film nobody attacks the horse, only the rider when attacking the horse would kill every advantage cavalry has over infantry.

And some of the rules placed on film were completely unarguably ridiculous, for instance "No three-second kissing", though Hitchcock did find a simplistic, yet clever way around that, and it's still used in some films today (having the actors "break off" every two seconds).

And don't even get me started on the Comics Code Authority, that was even more silly than the rules they place on film. "Don't portray crime or criminals in a sympathetic light", "No homosexuality" (i should add that the ban on homosexuality in comics was lifted in the 1980's) Jesus, how restrictive can you get?

Thing about this is, video games have never really had a "moral standards" authority. There's a 'Wild West' aspect to creativity in video games. Realistically, nobody can step in and tell developers "Hey, you're breaking our list of rules you never agreed to and we're gonna have to get you to stop that. M'kay?" Granted Nintendo did do something like this a long long time ago, forcing developers to only make a certain number of games yearly, but that never really about the content of the games it was more about the quality. But this did still on some level interfere with creative processes.


But the thing is, there are some things that quite simply nobody fucking wants in games. For instance, child porn and bestiality and having rules against that in place would change nothing and everybody would agree upon it. (With the exception of two or three basement creeps.)

And having these rules in place would be a wonderful PR move for the video game industry, "Oh look, video game developers are denouncing kiddie porn." Nobody's gonna be morally outraged at that.

But I can't help but feeling there'd be some silly rules that'd crop up in this hypothetical "moral standards organization" like the "Don't portray crime sympathetically" in the CCA or "no three second kissing" in films.

 

[Therumancer]

My basic attitude is that there shouldn't be any kind of moral regulation on the media at all. Rating systems so people know what they are buying is okay, but as far as telling people what they can and cannot do? I believe that's a serious problem and needs to be prevented.

The bottom line is that at the end of the day what's moral and acceptable to one person is not to another, and indeed half the point of many stories is to create an unlikely series of events where things that are considered "wrong" are the right thing to do, or flow so naturally from the course of events that you find yourself agreeing until you stop and think "oh hey, that's really messed up". Piers Anthony is sort of a master of this and made this kind of the recurring point of his classic "Bio Of A Space Tyrant" series, where the hero is Hope Hubris, The Tyrant, pretty much a dude who does it all, and actually winds up making guys like Hitler seem nice in comparison. To put it bluntly the series starts with the guy collecting the bio talking about how Hope Hubris is an incestuous cannibal (and he is), but it needs to be put into context..... (in this case he was a Space Refugee in a ship abandoned by it's crew and left to die, the surviving children wind up eating the dead adults to live, while dealing with crippling depression and on heavy drugs his little sister seduces him.. or so he thinks, giving him the willpower to continue.. oh and he pretty much gives away his other sister to a group of space pirates as a sex slave in exchange for sparing everyone else... these formative childhood experiences helping to shape the man the Mad Tyrant Of Mars would become...). Simply put with moral regulation one of the all time classic science fiction stories probably wouldn't exist, or it's point that the guy was still arguably a hero despite over the series him doing pretty much every messed up and wrong thing you can think of at one time or another.... always out of necessity or for the greater good, and leaving humanity stronger for his existence even after his end (where he defeats himself by basically creating and running the revolution against his own regime as he also lead the regime if I remember).

At the end of the day I am against any kind of moral censorship, even of things I find repugnant. When it comes to the really nasty stuff people bring up like "Child Molestation" in defense of censorship, my point is that they need to stop the act itself, not people simply talking about it or it's existence. I feel we've already entered too much of a slipper slope as it is, and if anything we need to dial back regulation of communications, not just in terms of the government, but in terms of private citizens being able to control platforms and effectively censor or suppress other private citizens (which is a ridiculous amount of power given that it's being used by people who were neither elected nor appointed by an elected official... but that's a whole different discussion).

As far as there being a "Wild West" of creativity in video games, that's not really the case to be honest. At one time there was some truth to that but the moral censorship of countries like Australia have lead to the realities of the market making games adapt to those standards when they are set down. For example they had to remove scenes of your character injecting himself with stims in "Fallout 3" due to Australia's laws, not to mention the censorship of the "South Park" RPG albeit in that case they simply added in a very weak regional lock.

What's more the whole "Hot Coffee" thing and how the industry reacted (backing down instead of fighting) was probably the point where any kind of real "anything goes" attitude died.

What's more I'll also say that when it comes to fantasy in particular I become somewhat wary of the whole "Kiddie Porn" thing because as much as I think it's exploited as a loophole, there is a valid point that real laws weren't created to deal with fantastic situations. Is a being that looks childlike but has none of the emotional vulnerability or problems of a real child something we should argue is off limits? Pixies, Faeries, and other mythological creatures can go here pretty quickly especially when you consider a lot of them were supposed to romance mortals (with mixed results), this is to say nothing of aliens, demons, etc... Of course for every argument you can make here you wind up with abuses, such as the whole "Pretty Sammy" Anime character which some people argue is a multi-thousand year old Jurai princess that simply looks like a child, which is a great argument until you consider she seems to have the emotional maturity of a 9 year old as well in most versions which is where it becomes disturbing when people sexualize it to the extent I've seen. Of course on the flip side I've seen some interesting analysis done with exactly that point, DC for example had a short lived JSA sub-plot where Captain Marvel who is the adult alter-ego of the child Billy Batson had a thing for another super heroine his own age, but given that Cap looks like an Adult and she obviously isn't an adult, this caused some problems until Captain Marvel's alter ego was revealed (a kid crushing on another kid basically). Of course then again there is also the point that if a kid has "The Wisdom Of Solomon" is he really a kid anymore anyway? That brief thing was an eloquent way of raising some of the basic issues with this kind of thing, and perception as opposed to reality when dealing with concepts to which there are no real world analogies.

My basic attitude is that if you go too far and creep too many people out karma balances, the vast majority of people (including prison inmates) really dislike pedophiles. You push things too far and you wind up seeing your work pushed entirely to the fringes, or the consumers becoming pariahs. Not to mention the kind of trail this kind of thing leaves works against someone if they are ever investigated.

With Nintendo I can see why they set company policies about what they will develop, but that kind of thing (internal standards) isn't the same as censorship. What's more Nintendo doesn't seem to be all that draconian about it at the end of the day or there would likely have been some backlash. Look at Disney for example, the internal policies of which could be politely described as what would happen if Hitler was running the moral majority, with so much enforced sweetness that apparently the employees can't take it. Over the decades you've pretty much seen Disney animators undermine the company by putting all kinds of sexual and satanic crap into the movies in subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) ways. Unlike some people who point to some kind of conspiracy, I tend to mostly think it's an ongoing phrank subculture due to how assertive Disney has been with it's moral guardianship over the years. There are videos alleging conspiracies and collecting things hidden in Disney material all over the place, a few of which have shown up on The Escapist. Given the fanatical fan base I'd imagine if Nintendo was being viewed as a problem internally we'd probably see a lot of similar things, and while there have been reports of a few creepy bits here and there, to my knowledge we haven't gotten anything like Mario popping a hard on near peach, or giant penises in the background, or satanic images and hand signs.

One of the more interesting (if totally paranoid) videos on the subject is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGvIkc0tdpI

But there are loads of them nowadays.

That's just an opinion as to the logic behind that, and as I said, I figure if Nintendo was being that bad internally we'd see more of the same kind of thing from their employees.

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

I dunno. I mean, there isn't really a "moral standards" organization in movies either, outside the MPAA. Yes, there is stuff like the Humane Society's "no animals were harmed in the making of this movie" sort of thing, but their "power" comes from it's political power in general, rather than some formal responsibility. I mean, you can make a movie where animals are killed on screen, but between the reluctance of actors and staff on set, political pressure, public pressure (there's a reason dogs tend to live), and the relative danger of a panicked animal, most Hollywood unions won't have anything to do with it. Heck, there's not even anything saying you have to follow the MPAA's rules if you don't want. Just, y'know, good luck getting a theater release or getting sold at Hastings.

The CCA, likewise, was just comics version of the MPAA or ESRB. Had more actual policing power than the latter at the time given it was a concession to the US congress, but theoretically, no comic had to follow it, and "underground" comics didn't. It's just that retailers wouldn't or couldn't carry the comic if they didn't, similar to the AO rating. And I use "was" intentionally. The organization has been dead for some time now, giving their title, stamp, and intellectual property rights over to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.

 

[Riotguards]

what exsactly is your "point"?, the ESBR is made specifically so that it can stop minors or underage children from buying something that is deemed too senative / violent for their age and it specifically says that it has blood, drugs, etc, etc

this "warning" on whats tolerate / untolerate idea is just a horrible idea, i mean how many games do you have that you play that has something you don't tolerate, i don't tolerate murder but i still i do it a ton in games, nor do i tolerate slavery but i will do everything i can to free a slave


"But that's just not the issue here, you see in Films there's organizations (I forget their names) which say things like "You can't show animal cruelty, You can't show an erect penis, You can't show a shaved vagina." and things like that, now to some these rules might seem understandable, but to others these rules are puritanical and extremely trivial."

firstly there's a lot of games which do not show any of these, its not because they feel morally obligated to not show this stuff, its so that they can keep the age rating as low as possible, a game like GTA would shoot straight up to adult if it showed hot coffee mode again and by doing some clever tricks (ratchet and clank using a bunch of robots / no blood) to make it so they can reach all age demographics

animal cruelty is another thing entirely, nobody wants to hurt an animal, we put way too much emotions into them, way more than that of a human (possibly because we know their "innocence"), i mean i often find that films that exploit a dog's death is incredible cheap and leaves a bad taste in my mouth

summary: grandma shouldn't be buying her kids games, let her give the parents the money and if they are educated enough research why the ESRB is important then they won't buy GTA for their kids

 

[inmunitas]

I don't see any valid reason why you would need to enforce any "moral standards" in video games, if you don't want your kid to play certain games that's your responsibility. However I would agree that platform holders/maintains should try make it as easy as possible for parents to put restrictions on what their child may play, the notion that playing certain games is going to have any real negative impact on human behaviour is just ludicrously moronic.

 

[Emanuele Ciriachi]

No we don't need, the left would hijack it and turn it into yet another propaganda machine.

 

[EXos]

No because the question will be, "whose moral standards?"
There are too many groups that get offended by even the slightest hint of satire or just not doing it the way they want.

PEGI and ESBR do enough. If you need a committee to tell you that an 18+ game with the warning Labels for Sex, Drug abuse and violence might not be a good present for little Timmy on his fifth birthday then there is something wrong with YOU not the system.

Enforcing moral standards depends on who is in-charge of them. In this present climate would you really want people like this guy in charge of what can go into video games ?


Word of advice do not try to watch a whole load of his stuff he's the Male Anita Sarkeesian oh and he doesn't have lenses in his glasses......... no really it's literally just a style choice

I tried to watch... I cringed at the one eyed guy that didn't think VR would work for him. (A No shit sherlock moment) But I had to stop at the woman that couldn't use her arms and legs that felt like games left her behind.

 

[BarryMcCociner]

No because the question will be, "whose moral standards?"
There are too many groups that get offended by even the slightest hint of satire or just not doing it the way they want.

PEGI and ESBR do enough. If you need a committee to tell you that an 18+ game with the warning Labels for Sex, Drug abuse and violence might not be a good present for little Timmy on his fifth birthday then there is something wrong with YOU not the system.

Enforcing moral standards depends on who is in-charge of them. In this present climate would you really want people like this guy in charge of what can go into video games ?


Word of advice do not try to watch a whole load of his stuff he's the Male Anita Sarkeesian oh and he doesn't have lenses in his glasses......... no really it's literally just a style choice

I tried to watch... I cringed at the one eyed guy that didn't think VR would work for him. (A No shit sherlock moment) But I had to stop at the woman that couldn't use her arms and legs that felt like games left her behind.

Yeah, it's like complaining that a deaf person can't appreciate songs. Yeah, it's incredibly unfortunate but until you can figure out a cure for the disability it's going to be an omnipresent obstacle.

 

[Silvanus]

I don't think so.

I'm happy with the existence of an age ratings agency, and also happy for games to carry icons or messages indicating ethical procedure or production values (such as altnameJag's example of the Humane Society message).

 

[Glaice]

The existing ESRB is enough, we don't need another similar agency doing the same exact thing.

 

[loa]

Thing about this is, video games have never really had a "moral standards" authority. There's a 'Wild West' aspect to creativity in video games. Realistically, nobody can step in and tell developers "Hey, you're breaking our list of rules you never agreed to and we're gonna have to get you to stop that. M'kay?" Granted Nintendo did do something like this a long long time ago, forcing developers to only make a certain number of games yearly, but that never really about the content of the games it was more about the quality. But this did still on some level interfere with creative processes.

Not really.
An 18+ rating is basically the death sentence for a game that wants to make a profit.
There will never be a "AAA" game with an over the top violent universe that doesn't shy away from getting rapey and disturbing.
You know, like that berserk comic. Which is a cult classic.

 

[Thorn14]

The words "Moral Standards Organization" makes my skin crawl. And it reeks of the "Comics Code Authority." which brought about the near death of comics.

So no thanks.

 

[DoPo]

There will never be a "AAA" game with an over the top violent universe that doesn't shy away from getting rapey and disturbing.
You know, like that berserk comic. Which is a cult classic.

Or the F.A.T.A.L. RPG. Which is the exact opposite - the people who've heard about it mostly despise it.

What was your point again?

 

[CrazyCapnMorgan]

Can we get a "moral standards" in real life before we set about trying to enforce anything in the fantasy one?

Kay, thanks.

 

[inmunitas]

Not really.
An 18+ rating is basically the death sentence for a game that wants to make a profit.
There will never be a "AAA" game with an over the top violent universe that doesn't shy away from getting rapey and disturbing.

Spoiler

Halo

Spoiler

Grand Theft Auto

 

[Sniper Team 4]

No. I don't need someone else telling me what is acceptable for me in my games. And I'm sure not going to tell other people what is acceptable for them to enjoy in their games. If that were the case, a lot of games probably wouldn't even be on the market, because I don't find them fun or entertaining. But that doesn't mean I'm going to slap my friend and go, "NO! You can't play that game because I object to it!"

I can make an informed decision on my own. As for parents, they need to learn the rating system if they haven't already. Video games have been around for decades now. It's gotten to the point where saying you don't know the rating system for them is like saying you don't know the rating system for movies.