Oklahoma senator proposes tax incentives for devs of non-Mature games

by Griffin McElroy on Jan 25th 2009 2:00PM

Oklahoma offers a surprisingly accommodating atmosphere for media producers -- the state offers tax incentives for many creators of TV shows, films and commercials, provided they do said production in-state. Now, Sen. Anthony Sykes (R) is attempting to offer the same sweet deal to creators of video games, but with one small caveat -- the incentives would only apply to developers of games that garner a Teen rating or lower from the ESRB.

It's a policy that's not exactly equal to somewhat similar restrictions placed on the other types incentive-earning media -- for instance, to be eligible, films and TV shows cannot contain child pornography or obscenity, meaning an R rated film or TV-MA show could ostensibly earn the incentive, while a video game adaptation of said film/show likely would not. It's not clear whether the bill will pick up enough momentum to get passed, though a similar bill was successfully adopted in neighboring state Texas.

Source

Tags: bill, mature, oklahoma, politics, tax-incentive

Reader Comments (83)

As if there aren't enough shitty games on the market already.

As if there aren't enough violence games on the market already.

I meant shitty! shitty violence games!

What are you saying? If a game isn't rated M it's automatically shitty?

If that's the case, you can get right the fuck out.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune says "hi".

The Drake's Fortune comment is lost on me. Either you have a boner for Drake, or don't realize your comment is rather out of context; meaningless.

I think the logical deduction of that comment would be that Uncharted is not rated M and is TOTALLY AWESOME!

Oh really? My bad. I thought for sure it was M, since there are guns and violence and whatnot in it, right?

Super Paper Mario is weeping...

LOOK WHAT YOU'VE DONE!

GTFO

That's. Fucking. Retarded.

Also, I don't understand the "child pornography" comment. Pretty sure this country has higher restrictions on child pornography than not getting a tax break for filming in Oklahoma. Including that as one of the exceptions is a tad redundant.

Haha exactly

I'm trying to imagine what kind of child pornographer would phone up the state government and ask for a tax break.

yea whats the point of that???

last check that was ILLEGAL.......

Why are your comments so sloppy? This once again proves that you are a retard

@game

Are you referring to my comments? Regardless of who you're talking to you're a creepo. Go away.

Nah he's talking to Aggie.

The guy puts ... in his comments a bit and everyone acts as if he's denying the holocaust or something.

...?

@Haggard what's this holocaust you're talking about?

Ellipsis (plural ellipses; from the Greek: ἔλλειψις, élleipsis, "omission") in printing and writing refers to a mark or series of marks that usually indicate an intentional omission of a word or a phrase from the original text. An ellipsis can also be used to indicate a pause in speech, an unfinished thought or, at the end of a sentence, a trailing off into silence (aposiopesis).

The most common form of an ellipsis is a row of three periods (...).

It's a lazy cut and paste job from a mis-type in the original article. My guess is that the author of the original article has intended to type "pornography", but he typed it just below where he typed "Early Childhood" and his brain has played tricks on him and he has typed "child pornography" instead. Joystiq have perpetuated the mistake by ripping off the text.

Texas did it? Oh, well, then it has to be fucked up.

-1 for you

+1 for you. If TX did it, it's fucked up.

For anyone that down voted me, this is Texas we're talking about. The same Texas where members of the House reach around and vote other members' votes.

I love how BigD got voted down, but Markez got voted up, even though they both said the exact same thing. XD

^

It's the tone in which it was said.

Maybe if ESRB wasn't so strict when rating games, 70% of them wouldn't be 'Mature'.

Look at Twilight Princess. Humanoid Character + Sword + Cartoon Violence = Teen rating. Compare it with PG-13 The Dark Knight and I'm pretty sure you'll notice a certain hypocrisy here.

The double standards annoy me to no end. Videogames are held to far stricter guidelines than any other type of media.

Material that could get away with a 12 rating in movies could be given a 15 (or even an 18) rating in a game.

Yeah, Halo could have been teen. "Maybe" the cussing drove it to a M rating, but I still think a 15 year old could of handled it.

The part that I find annoying is the lack of consistency. The first four Ratchet games had a T rating for mild violence, as does Uncharted which has gunfights with humans, blood, language, suggestive themes, etc. You can find worse things in Saturday morning cartoons than in the first four Ratchet games combined.

As a teenager, my cousin and I wanted to buy Halo for his Xbox but couldn't because the employees refused to sell an M-rated game to minors.

So instead we got Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter because it was rated T, being probably one of the only FPSes we were allowed to buy.

Just in case you didn't catch the point of the story: we don't allow teenagers to play sci-fi shooters with aliens, so we'd rather have them play realistic depictions of squad-based warfare.

What is this supposed to do?
Using tax dollars to fund kid-friendly games? Do they think that this will decrease kids' exposure to violent games?

There are already a variety of kid-friendly games for kids to choose from. Adding more isn't going to prevent them from getting the violent ones anyway.

The problem lies in parenting. Maybe they should make a tax incentive for parents who actually give a shit about what their kid is playing.

Tax incentives are not "money-giving". It's "money not taken" from the incentivated.

So, no, not your money.

"money not taken" is still money that the government won't have to govern, which is their job. The money still has to come from somewhere; tax incentives aren't free to the citizens.

They attract game development studios who wouldn't ordinarily exist in that particular state.

This game development studio earns money for the state economy, and is still taxed - thereby the citizens of that state aren't "paying" for anything.

I still think this will cost the citizens something. The law is designed to get current games manufacturers to make more kids' games. I highly doubt that an already established developer will move to Oklahoma just to get a tax break on kids' games.

It's all speculation from here, though. Perhaps a flood of developers will move to Oklahoma and the break will pay itself off in new tax dollars.

But I really doubt it.

Perhaps they won't move, but it might convince some Oklahoma residents to start one up. Although it's a good point that revenue from existing studios will drop.

But I get the feeling that the Oklahoma legislature would not have introduced this fund if it wasn't designed to increase revenue. This is a very circuitous route to attracting the "vidya games are corrupting the children" vote.

The qualifier that the game must be below a certain rating is probably to encourage the economic/revenue side of it whilst protecting against the chance that if the state gives a tax break to the production of a mindless, gory game; then the opposition or the media will question why the government is 'funding the destruction of our kids' or some other unproven BS.

"But I get the feeling that the Oklahoma legislature would not have introduced this fund if it wasn't designed to increase revenue."

I think we've all seen politicians do stupider things. =)

I don't know what the hell they're thinking. If their main goal was to stimulate the gaming industry, they would have left out the qualifier. If there aren't going to be many new publishers moving in, then the break would be to stimulate the production of kids' games from current developers.

If it is aimed at getting new companies started, then it's a weaker incentive because of the qualifier. But maybe they're trying to kill two birds with one stone? Who knows? Politicians are mysterious in their ways.

Well like I said, they might want to stimulate the games industry without getting crucified at the next election for giving a tax break to the next GTA.

Where is this Oklahoma, is it near French Polynesia?

Leave it to the French... and the Polynesian...

So only Wii games get the incentives?

That would explain why it's selling so well, then, if people under 17 can actually play them

Hah, Khan just pwned you. XD

My point exactly, they don't need more help.

There's nothing wrong with this, as the comments seem to suggest. Business (tax) incentives are VERY commonplace. That government is looking to be more receptive to developers is a good thing, Joystiq people, not a bad thing.

The fact that it only applies to "non-Mature" games should be common sense to anyone who lives in the United States. No representative wants Bloodfest 5 on the minds of their constituents.

They are arguing that the government is using a double standard in comparison to other forms of entertainment. If tax breaks to in-state movie and tv show productions were limited to non-mature products I doubt anyone would be upset about this development.

I respectfully disagree with you. Bloodfest 3 and 4 were LEGENDARY and any state would be proud to be home to the fifth and final (and GREATEST) episode of the Bloodfest trilogy!

It's not a trilogy if there's 4 games...

Besides, let's be realistic. No one makes games in Oklahoma anyway.

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Oklahoma senator proposes tax incentives for devs of non-Mature games

Reader Comments (83)

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