New York Governor David Patterson has signed some of the most ... well, put it this way, if you like the government wasting time, then you're going to love the recently signed New York game bill. GamePolitics reports the legislation establishes an advisory council to conduct a study between games and real-world violence. It also requires -- here's the kicker -- new video game consoles to incorporate parental lockout features by 2010 and retail games to disclose ESRB ratings. News flash: All consoles already have parental lockout features built in and ESRB ratings are prominently displayed on each game's box and disc.
For its part, the Entertainment Software Association believes the law ignores "legal precedent, common sense and the wishes of many New Yorkers in enacting this unnecessary bill." It points out that the mandates required are already voluntarily in place and the bill unfairly singles out the video game industry. The ESA asks if New York would like to convene a government commission on books, theater and film as well. It's still up in the air if the ESA will sue New York, but the lobby group has gotten good at getting game laws overturned in several states and making its money back for doing so in the process.
Friends, we have a traitor in our midst. Our very own Law of the Game columnist, Mark Methenitis, has given the enemy a point-by-point plan on how to regulate games. He thought we wouldn't find it on his personal blog, and many Bothans died to bring us this information, but here is a small sample of his treachery.
"1. Forget the idea that you're only regulating games: If you want a regulation to stick, targeting one media without credible proof of the difference between that media and all of the other things kids are exposed to isn't going to fly. So, if you want to regulate games, the bill needs to also regulate movies, maybe music, and potentially even books. It needs to be a universal approach to put parents in control. ..."
"5. Forget the 'AO' rating for games: The argument is often made that some games should be rated 'AO.' Forget it. An 'AO' rating is basically banning the game from sale, or classifying it with the most hardcore pornography. Unless the game is some sort of sexual simulation, it shouldn't garner an 'AO' rating. In general, the sexual content in an 'M' game falls short of what is in many R rated movies or even what is on television. Arguing that a game like GTA IV should be AO is just an effort in futility."
"9. This should be a fine only offense, and only a fine against the store: It is the requirement of the store to perform their due diligence on each sale. Keeping that in mind, this isn't injecting heroin into the veins of children. The idea that it should be a criminal offense is just silly, and the idea that individual cashiers should be punished is equally inane. If a store has a problematic cashier, then the store should be held accountable and be allowed to deal with the cashier as they see fit."
There are six other points of treason! To reward Mr. Methenitis for his disloyalty we have dispatched our battle cats. May Cthulhu have mercy on his soul.
Each week Mark Methenitis contributes Law of the Game on Joystiq, a column on legal issues as they relate to video games:
This week has seen a striking revival of 'video game legislation' stories, from Massachusetts to Minnesota to England. Given the sudden resurgence of the issue, it seemed like an appropriate time to dissect the legal issue of 'video game regulation' on the Law of the Game operating table. The concept of government regulation is as much a legal construct as it is a political one, and to date, it has been the legal system's role to strikedown these regulations as a violation of free speech (although, it has recently been brought out that, at a minimum, Justice Scalia may not agree). The real issue at hand is where, if anywhere, a 'video game law' could fall in our legal system.
In broad terms, the US government gets to regulate many things, be that at the state or federal level. Just take a moment to think of all of the ways the government restricts your personal and professional life. If you want to drive a car without stealing it, you have to be at least 16 years old. If you want to buy certain 'products' from law-abiding establishments (the guy in the back alley doesn't count), the age restrictions are set at 18 or 21. If you want to sell a franchise concept, you have to make certain disclosures as required by the Federal Trade Commission and various state regulators. If you want to get philosophical, this is all part of the 'social contract,' and these restrictions are generally in place for the benefit of the public at large. But what about the games?
Health care? Taxes? Immigration? Why do presidential candidates insist on wasting our time talking about such trivial issues? When will they address the questions we really care about -- the ones about video games? Well, actually, right now.
Non-partisan, not-for-profit advocacy group Common Sense Media has quizzed some of the leading presidential candidates on a variety of media issues, video game violence legislation among them. Here's a quick summary of their views on proposed federal legislation limiting children's access to violent games:
Senator John Edwards (D - NC): The ESRB and retailers are doing a pretty good job, but the FTC found that 42 percent of children under 17 can still purchase M-rated games, and that's too high. Publishers need to tone down the marketing of violent games to kids. If the industry isn't careful, the government "will need to consider further steps" to keep these games away from children
Senator Barack Obama (D - IL): Video games should use technology to let parents restrict content [Note to Obama: theyalreadydo.] The rating system should be improved to make content information "easier to find and easier to understand. ... but if the industry fails to act, then my administration would." In any case, the government should spend money to study the problem.
Governor Bill Richardson (D - NM): "I would consider this legislation," but it's really up to the parents. I'll give federal employees paid time off to spend with their kids.
Fmr. Governor Mitt Romney (R - Mass.): I would enforce current obscenity laws to protect children from "a societal cesspool of filth, pornography, violence, sex, and perversion." I would "go after" retailers that sell violent games.
While the responses are interesting, the lack of participation from front-runners like Hillary Clinton, Rudy Guliani and Mike Huckabee makes the information a little less than complete just weeks away from the Iowa caucuses. Still, the full questionnaire has illuminated the candidates' thoughts on other game-related issues such as childhood obesity, screen time, media literacy and the media's impact on the candidates' own kids. Be an informed voter and give it a read.
California Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger made good on his promise today to file an appeal over a judge's ruling that a recently-proposed violent video games law was unconstitutional. In apparent retaliation, the Entertainment Software Association has filed a motion for California to recoup $324,840 in legal fees for its previous, successful challenge against the law.
In a statement, the ESA said that if the motion is granted, the industry will have been awarded a total of $1.9 million in fee and expenses for "defending its First Amendment rights" in this case and eight others. The trade association has a pretty good batting average so far, but does it have the firepower to defeat a T-101exo skeleton?
[Update: Although we like the thought of a robotic insectoid turtle monster, we have to provide canonical accuracy. The T-101 skeleton was on the inside of the body. Fixed.]
Former one-term governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney is starting his campaign off on the great motivator of fear. Using the ocean as a metaphor based off something Columbine related, he speaks of how "deeply troubled" he is by the culture our children grow up in today. Romney says, "I'd like to see us clean up the water in which our kids are swimming. I'd like to keep pornography from coming up on their computers. I'd like to keep drugs off the street. I'd like to see less violence and sex on TV and in video games and in movies. If we get serious about this we can actually do a great deal to clean up the water in which our kids and grandkids are swimming." Senator Brownback of Kansas says Romney is just a little late to the culture wars.
Brownback, who's already busy with his own battle on video games, says that Romney is a hypocrite because while he was on the board of Marriott International (hotel chain) he was paid $100,000 a year by a company that makes millions of dollars a year from in-room pornography rental. Raise your hand if you like yummy gooey irony.
As we move into high gear on what will be the longest US presidential election campaign cycle ever, it'll be interesting to watch how many times video games come up as talking points when, well, it's pretty clear there are bigger issues going on. But darn it, video games make for much easier talking points.
Though two pieces of video game legislationpassed in New York -- one in the Senate and one in the Assembly -- a compromise was not reached in time for a vote before the current session ended yesterday, reports Game Politics. The compromise was reached, however, and a unified bill is expected to pass when the legislature reconvenes in July.
According to Lower Hudson Online, the agreement still makes it a felony to sell "violent and obscene video games to minors." The bill would also have manufacturers equip game consoles with parental control settings (already available in the newest consoles) and retailers would have to label violent and obscene games (already done with the ESRB, though this bill reportedly requires another sticker).
If the bill, which Vicarious Visions called troubling in an Albany Times-Union op-ed, passes in July, expect the Entertainment Software Association to go after the bill with the First Amendment. And so far they have a pretty good track record.
We've been saying it all along, but maybe if the New York Times says it, the politicians will finally listen. In an editorial the NYT says violent and sexually explicit games can be bad, "but banning them as [Governor] Spitzer and legislators want to do probably will not pass muster in the courts." They point out that Illinois spent $1.5 million defending their law which was eventually deemed unconstitutional. Guess who's next New York? The ESA is watching.
Unlike the silliness going on in England over Resistance and the Church, these New York bills aren't the actions of the naive. Gov. Spitzer et al. aren't unaware how severe their actions are, they know full well what they're doing. Despite this, they continue charging like a bull headfirst into a courtroom which will just take the cash out of New York taxpayers' pockets and hand it over to the ESA for their court bills (and don't forget having to pay the New York attorneys who'll have to defend the legislation). As one commenter on GamePolitics put it, "The reason they think the bills won't fail is because they have something that the other bills didn't have ... a REALLY good feeling about this."
The Albany Times-Union today ran an op-ed piece by the CEO and president of Vicarious Visions (Marvel Ultimate Alliance), a New York based development company, about the New York video game bill legislation going down. They discuss being "deeply troubled" by the legislation currently being fast-tracked making games different from other protected speech.
The disturbing nature of the bills apparently can't be stressed properly at this point. The key feature sending chills up many game advocates' spines is that selling a game considered "depraved" to a minor would be considered a felony, with a minimum sentence of one to four years according to the New York penal code.
Vicarious Visions' CEO, Kathik Bala, and president, Guha Bala, write, "Just like movies, books, photographs, music and other forms of art and entertainment, video games are fully protected speech under the U.S. Constitution. In fact, nine federal courts in the last six years have ruled that legislation in other states substantially similar to what is being proposed in New York violates free speech protections. States have wasted hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars to defend these statutes. Several states and municipalities have been ordered to pay more than $1.7 million to the video game industry for legal fees. Given New York's pressing economic needs, it can ill afford to spend money enacting and then having to defend this proposal."
And therein lies the rub. In the end, these bills fail in court. The states involved are forced to pay the ESA for the cost of defending the industry from unconstitutional legislation. How many times do they need to play out the same plot line over and over again? The outcome remains the same. But it looks like state after state will pop in another quarter and try again.
The latest bill proposed in New York would actually make selling or renting a game to a minor which has "depraved violence and indecent images" a class E felony. What is that exactly in prison time? According to New York penal law, "For a class E felony, the term shall be fixed by the court, and shall not exceed four years." However, it must be over one year imprisonment to be considered class E. But wait, it gets better. "Depraved" is defined by the bill as anything showing "rape, dismemberment, physical torture, mutilation or evisceration of a human being." So, many M rated games would fall under this category. Boiled all the way down, this new law would have a kid working at Gamestop, Best Buy, or the local Blockbuster potentially get sent to OZ for 1 - 4 years because he sold or rented a minor an M rated video game. With politicians like these, who needs Jack Thompson?
This bill, A08696 by Democrat Assemblyman Joseph Lentol will have to share the spotlight with a similar bill proposed by Sen. Andrew Lanza (R), which is backed by Senate Republicans. All of this is about Gov. Eliot Spitzer's promise to legislate video games. According to GamePolitics, the enforceable parts (the Class E felony) would go into effect 120 days after the bill passes. The State Assembly goes into recess on June 21, so this bill needs to be on the fast track to make it. New York is getting really creepy with this game legislation.
"The Court wonders why nobody objected to the enactment of this statute. In this court's view the taxpayers deserve more from their elected officials."
We've heard some harsh criticism of video game legislation before, but this holds just a bit more weight than the others. It's not just that it was handed down by U.S. District Court Judge James Brady (represented here by the lovable [yet honorable] Judge Harry Stone). No, this criticism is special thanks to the price tag of $92,000 attached to it that the state of Louisiana must pay to cover the Electronic Software Association's legal fees. It's the latest shockwave from House Bill 1381, which would've banned the sale of "violent" video games to minors. Surprising no one, the bill at the heart of the controversy was written by fear-mongering superstar, Jack Thompson, attorney-at-lawl. Also of no surprise: It was ruled unconstitutional.
But don't get excited just yet, as bill sponsor Rep. Roy Burrell (D) says he might try again with a similar bill. Well, why wouldn't he? When a bump in your approval rating among frightened parents (read: voters) is on the line, is $92,000 in taxpayer dollars really such a high price to pay?
The Indiana State Senate has elected to stall legislation that would have made the sale of M- and AO-rated games to minors unlawful and punishable by up a $1,000 fine. Despite being approved by a Senate committee earlier this week, the bill has been deemed unconstitutional in its current state and will be passed along to a study committee for further evaluation -- and, as co-sponsor Sen. David Ford (R) hopes, revised to pass under the First Amendment. "Eventually we're going to have to deal with it," warned Sen. Vi Simpson (D), the bill's other co-sponsor.
When the Inquirer erroneously claimed that New York was planning a "video game ban for under 30s," we just added another mark on our "wacky Inquirer story" tally sheet. When the error started spreading to sites like 1up, PlanetXbox360 and Yahoo! Tech, we figured some sort of clarification was in order.
So let's be perfectly clear. Neither of the twobills currently being proposed by the New York state legislature will stop adults 18 and over from buying any video games. The confusion seems to stem from a section appearing in both New York Bill A00547 and New York Bill A02024 which says that access to a mandated "adult" video game section of stores will require customers to show ID unless the customer "reasonably appears to be at least thirty years of age."
In other words, if you look like you're under 30, they'll ask to see some ID. If the ID says you're over 18, you'll still be allowed to enter the section and buy the games. As both bills say in their texts, stores that sell or rent games "shall store and display such [violent] video games ... in a location designated for persons over the age of eighteen, in a manner which restricts access to such games."
If this system sounds familiar, it's probably because it's similar to the ID check system set up in most states to regulate tobacco and alcohol sales. Whether or not video games should be similarly classified is definitely worthy of debate (personally, we think not), but let's make sure we're arguing about the right thing here.
The Financial Times reports that the German states of Bavaria and Lower Saxony have drafted legislation the would lead to fines and jail time for developers, distributors and even players of games that involve "cruel violence on humans or human-looking characters." The proposed laws, which would affect nearly 19 million Germans, come in response to a recent school shooting by a masked, 18-year-old German Counter-Strike fan that has turned public sentiment in the country against violent games.
Bavarian Interior Minister Gunther Beckstein is leading the effort to pass the legislation, arguing "it is absolutely beyond any doubt that such killer games desensitise [sic] unstable characters and can have a stimulating effect." Despite complaints by German gamers, 59 percent of Germans at large support such a ban, according to a poll cited by the Financial Times.
Germany has a long history of tough restrictions on violent games from Doom to Gears of War, and an outright ban would likely affect high-profile PS3 launch games like Resistance: Fall of Man and Call of Duty 3.
In a move predicted by more thana few comments at Joystiq, Rockstar's controversial title Bully has received a T for Teen rating from the ESRB. Questionable content includes Crude Humor, Language, Sexual Themes, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco, Violence. Go ahead, let that one sink in, we'll wait.
What does the T rating mean, exactly? Most retail outlets follow one simple rule of thumb: don't sell Mature-rated games to minors. According to the ESRB's official ratings guide, "Titles rated T (Teen) have content that may be suitable for ages 13 and older." Come October, little Billy won't need to ask him mom or bribe a homeless man into buying the game, he can do it himself.
Wal-mart, after pulling Bully pre-orders a few weeks back (for various, disputed reasons), is now taking pre-orders on its web site.
With the political season in full swing, we imagine more than a few politicians will cite this case as an example of the ESRB's negligence, or how the ratings system is "out of touch with" or "destroying" American values. Keep in mind the game has no guns or knives, disproving the theory that this title is a "Columbine simulator" (as purported by anti-game activist Jack Thompson).
Bully will be released October 16 for the PlayStation 2.
When the Inquirer erroneously claimed that New York was planning a "
