Video games are vulgarity, but Jackass 3D isn't.

Gearbox is seeing troubles with Duke Nukem Forever's explicit content - if they don't tone it down, they may face an Adults Only rating, which forces the games off shelves (because just the mere SIGHT of Duke Nukem's box art will cause our children to sprout hair follicles on their eyes) and prevents them from being sold in a public place outside of an over-the-counter transaction.

On top of all this, the Supreme Court is having a hearing soon debating whether or not video games are vulgarity instead of art.

Jackass 3D is a plotless, pointless hour and a half of man-children vomiting, being sprayed with animal shit, pissing on each other (with a camera lined up alongside the urinator's penis), tethering a remote-control helicopter to a penis (also on-screen), batting ping-pong balls with a penis, I'm sure you've read the word penis far too many times at this point so I'll stop. This movie was "restricted", which is, AFAIK, the most restricted rating a publicly-distributed movie can get - which just means you have to show your ID before you get into the movie. The movie can still be advertised.

Now, I had fun with Jackass 3D and I don't think I would want to see it censored or hidden or have its artistic rights removed (even though I wouldn't consider it a work of art). But it frustrates me that Jackass can get off the hook just for being a movie, while depicting sex in a video game is putting it on a fast track to being barred from public advertisement - and therefore dooming it to failure.

Also, hello, On-Topic Conversation. Is this a well enough constructed post, or should I have just posted this in IJBM?

edited 16th Oct '10 9:15:26 AM by Barcode711

Worshipper of Ahura Mazda, as proclaimed by Zoroadster http://twitter.com/bpglobalpr

This seems more like a JBM, but it does have real merit to it.

This is a horrific double standard that needs to be done away with. If there are any websites out there that organizer gamers into one unified voice, we need to post as many links to those sites as humanly possible to get them as much publicity as possible, if for no other reason than to tell all gamers that yes, you DO have a voice in politics, and yes, you CAN make things happen.

I believe that things like this are just wrong. I think that that court ruling violates the First Amendment, and should be seen as unconstitutional. It MUST fail.

Please, don't let those "Tea Party" psychos ruin our entertainment...

I am a proud member of the Western Federation's Anti-Japan Media Task Force. My work is very important.

^Didn't Yahtzee try something like that? Though I doubt it will help you guys out in the states.

Why on Earth would it be the Supreme Court's prerogative to decide what is and isn't art?

They don't, but they decide what counts are protected speech.

Currently taking a break from the site. See my user page for more information.

Since when do movies get off the hook on this stuff?

That's Feo . . . He's a disgusting, mysoginistic, paedophilic asshat who moonlights as a shitty writer—Something Awful

I do find it somewhat distressing how easily age restrictions are thrown around for video games. Persona 4 was given a Mature (must be 17 or older to buy) rating just for having a bunch of fifteen and sixteen year old characters who act more or less their age.

...eventually, we will reach a maximum entropy state where nobody has their own socks or underwear, or knows who to ask to get them back.

We're long past Double Standard, probably going into at least Quintuple Standard or anything like that.

My own take is that I'm opposed to ratings until we have a singular standard for ALL media. And yes, by all I mean all. Books, newscasts, radio, religion, etc. And I don't think they should ever be enforced, they should be merely a suggestion to empower the consumer.

Democracy is the process in which we determine the government that we deserve

A lot of people who make the rules believe that video games are still played exclusively by 10 year olds who don't know better. It won't change until people who have been gaming all their life get the power.

Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?

^ That won't be for the next 20 years unfortunately.

Eating a Vanilluxe will give you frostbite.

If the people in charge believed the games were only played by ten year olds, they'd insist that games be made to target them, not that games with fairly innocuous content be reserved for older audiences.

The ratings standards simply don't make sense if viewed as resulting from a misconception of the age demographics of players.

edited 16th Oct '10 11:39:12 PM by Desertopa

...eventually, we will reach a maximum entropy state where nobody has their own socks or underwear, or knows who to ask to get them back.

Hmm... this seems unfair.

How come movies get off the hook with this kind of stuff, JUST for being movies and video-games don't? In my opinion, this 'Jackass 3D' should be given an adult/18 rating.

If something that's comparatively 'okay' is being given a rating meaning it has to stay behind the counter and something a fair bit worse is allowed on to be advatised (sp?)... -shudder-

And just in case you hadn't figured it out, both Duke Nukem and Jackass 3D annoy me.

My new account at: Eventua

Hard to do. If a book has nudity, do you give it a PG-13? What constitutes nudity? Is "she got naked" nudity? Is "She took a shower" nudity?

^ No, and No, respectively.

Those scenes on NBC would be 1) shot of bare legs with bra/panties hitting the floor, 2) shot of the head with shower stream on her.

Neither would be an FCC violation, neither would be looked at "wrong" and both would get the same messages across.

Now, if the book started describing things further than "she got naked" the rating would need to get reexamined.

Actually, "NC-17" would have been more restrictive. That this got only an "R" really surprised me, and I *like* "Jackass."

And the MPAA's reasons for the R are "male nudity, extremely crude and dangerous stunts throughout, and for language." They usually just say "nudity." (Different) Double standard, anyone?

edited 17th Oct '10 5:35:24 PM by PBMaxwell

I don't think a universal rating system, or at least a rating system that judges things like movies and video games that have a lot of similarities would be too difficult.

I just think it would be more difficult than the system there is now, and with barely anyone who cares about the subject on the same level they do other issues in power, that's more than enough to keep the old rating systems around.

A lot of the hot coffee fiasco was the result of people freaking out at the idea of sex in gaming because "ZOMG ZE CHILDREN!" and other silly notions.

Seems to me it's a matter of venue. Which is to say, it's easier to keep kids out of a movie theatre than a store selling videogames.

But it's well known that kids and teens will buy tickets for one movie and then sneak into another. It's not difficult at most theaters. Whereas at a video game store, you have to check out your actual purchases at the counter.

Of course, you can also order either movies or video games online given access to a debit or credit card.

...eventually, we will reach a maximum entropy state where nobody has their own socks or underwear, or knows who to ask to get them back.

I still find it funny that if you register your age as 7 on xbox live you can still play M rated games online.

It's a horrible double standard. OMG! you kill hookers and take their money! 18 only! but a movie where a dead girl kills people who watch a movie? PG 13!

Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?

When the Moral Guardians start their 'Think of the children! Won't someone PLEASE think of the children!', all gamers are children whose innocence those evil violent Wii-Station 360 games (like that "Mortal Call of The Assassin's Gears: Vice Andreas") are trying to corrupt (and a large amount of people agree with that), yet, a popular depiction of the average gamer is a fat, lazy, virgin Manchild who lives in his mommy's basement, which they also seem to think is true.

And, while everyone is making it seem as if running down a person in GTA is the worst thing ever to happen EVER, they seem to forget stuff like Jackass is a hell of a lot easier to get a hold of. You need to show an ID to buy an M-rated game (which the Moral Guardians bitch about later), yet they don't seem to notice Comedy Central showing the uncensored version of Jackass every other Saturday night (granted, it's on pretty late, but it's odd that they ignore it when it's free and requires no proof of age).

I need to prove I'm an adult to buy the new Call of Duty game, but my 16 year old brother is easily able to sneak into R-rated movies by buying a ticket for a PG or PG-13 movie.

Most stores won't sell M-rated games to anyone under 17, but I've been able to watch movies with full-on nudity since I was 14 (check IFC late at night, half the movies on at 11:00 or later have at least a good shot of bare boobs).

(Hold on, I have one more example in me)

The news was making a huge deal over "Hot Coffee", making it seem as if it was a required part of the game. It was horrible, kids had (supposedly) easy access to sexual content in a video game  ^*

!?! OMG! There's nowhere else they could possibly see such things. Especially not by searching for just about anything on Google Image (Type ANYTHING in and look what comes up, even with Safesearch set on Strict)!

Ok, I'm done.

edited 22nd Oct '10 9:35:29 PM by Malph

Laconic Version: Moral Guardians are morons who like to latch onto one target and ignore bigger "threats" (as they would put it).

One short answer - most people still think that video games are for children. The opposite cannot, no matter what, be proved to the close-minded and dogmatical Moral Guardians, so I guess that we'll have to stick with it for 15 years or so.

The sin of silence when they should protest makes cowards of men.

In cases like this, I think there is some sense to it. After all, video games are an interactive medium. In one, you merely watch a being of supernatural evil kill people, in another, you make your avatar in the game world kill people.

A game like, say, Parasite Eve though (which my father bought and I owned for years before realizing it was rated M) gets a much higher rating than it would as a movie, without having any violence against humans perpetrated by the player.

edited 22nd Oct '10 2:38:47 PM by Desertopa

...eventually, we will reach a maximum entropy state where nobody has their own socks or underwear, or knows who to ask to get them back.

... would that qualify as an implicit porn link? @ Malph