July 12, 2007
ESRB President Patricia Vance (left) takes issue with some of the recommendations issued this week by the National Institute on Media and the Family and Iowa State University researchers.Vance was the lone video game industry participant in last October's National Summit on Video Games, Youth and Public Policy, but the views in the NIMF report, which appeared some eight months after the summit, are largely in conflict with the industry's position, especially in the area of legislation and universal game ratings.
In response to a request for comment by GamePolitics, Vance provided the following statement:
We're pleased that we were able to participate in last year's Summit, and encourage those who share our desire to help parents choose appropriate video games to continue to have an open dialogue with us about ways to make our rating system even more useful. We only hope that, in the future, NIMF and [Iowa State University] will consider including members of the academic and scientific communities whose opinions differ from their own in such discussions.
It should be noted that study after study, including those released recently by the Federal Trade Commission and the Kaiser Family Foundation, show that parents are overwhelmingly satisfied with the ESRB rating system. Even NIMF's own age ratings for video games agree with ESRB's the vast majority of the time. That being so, we hope that NIMF and other Summit participants will consider devoting more of their energies to encouraging parents to use the valuable tools already available to them, such as ratings, reviews and parental controls.
As always, ESRB is firmly committed to ensuring that the ratings are as effective and useful as possible. Enhancing the system and launching extensive initiatives to educate parents about how to be a better-informed consumer when it comes to games are a vital part of what we do. We will continue these efforts and stand ready to work with others who wish to help.
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Fine, what happens when the ESRB reforms and the big 3 and retailers refuse to stock/license the M18+ games of any type, sexual or Violent? Also, what if a game is both violent and sexual? Which ratings takes precedence?
Those who've educated me about how the ESRB works and how the game development process works have said that the ESRB DOES infact give the AO rating out a lot and that causes them to water down their product to get it rated M. You simply CAN NOT get an AO rating, its the kiss of death. OF course these people tend to like the ESRB and place the blame on the big three and retailers...
I'm not one to blindly follow what I am told. I do my own research and make my own mind up based on the information that has been given to me from those with experience. And I also do my own research so I can develop my own opinions. So sure they might not agree with what I say but I strongly believe that they would have had a much easier time if the ESRB rating system wasn't geared to benefit the Big Three and Retailer's efforts to boycott games with large amounts of violence and sexual content. Its a joint effort by all three parties and I will continue my stance against all three.
Nothing posted by GP readers has been new to me in terms of the ESRB, Big Three or Retailers. I've heard it all before and I've pondered those possibilities. However, I tend to think the opinions I've developed over the years tend to make more sense to me personally. And I've talked to quite a few others who have very similar opinions so I'm not some crazy guy. Others have put the pieces together in a very similar way I have. You can dismiss those who wish to place some blame on the ESRB all you want but we aren't dumb, we have done research and we understand the situation. It just seems like a few of you seem to think we are ignorant on the situation when we most definitely are not.
I hope you won't misunderstand mine: I have no objection to studying the workings of the human brain, in any context. I have great objection to using interpretations of such studies to create assumptions (or, God forbid, legislation) about what I (or any individual) should or should not think or feel in those contexts.
The latter is exactly what I see as being proposed by this latest NIMF missive.
Some enjoy the boost video games give our local, state, and national economies, yet they desire them dead. They watch movies and use technology that would have been impossible without the need for better and faster computers to run ever-more diverse and complicated software. I don't much care for these hypocrites. I understand those that don't see the value of games, but to blindly say games do no harm to some in some instances washes away their ability to say it does any good either. Education to me is never a bad thing. The consequences of having that knowledge however are open for dispute.
No, you seem to be misreading everything I've posted on this site. I think you a) don't read much media research/think it's worth anything, or b) are mistaken about what I am saying. There is no true way to show absolute causation of X upon Y, regardless of our attempts in laboratory settings. However, we usually learn a LOT about the topics and in the end it aids us as consumers. Qualitative and quantitative studies offer a lot of info if we understand their weaknesses and their strengths.
The research I am advocating would not judge how people appreciate the material or whether they consider it art. The idea is to see what effects the stimulus (video game, TV, other media, etc) have on a human under varying conditions. A lot of leg work and a lot of money, but in the process discovering a LOT more about the brain than we know now. If you don't believe video games can have ANY effect on a user you are sadly mistaken. The question is what can be learned from humans using video games. They're going to play them, so why should we not know more about them?
There are a LOT of things however that could be done with video games to make the battle over conflict make sense to more people. For example, video games are not given any weight or air of importance, just a game I'm playing. The player understands this and goes with it. He or she accepts the agreement of what the main message of the content is, that it's a game. It's not real and it's just for fun. However, there are those outside of the user base that are not accepting the cues and agreements not being gamers, so they ONLY see the content out of context. They don't understand the components of the medium nor do they look at the issue the same way.
A gamer could do the same if they chose. They could step out of the role as participant and digest the virtual world as a representation of various mores, taboos, and social messages relative to that virtual environment of the particular software title. A duality of sorts where they digest and question everything they see or analyze their own consumption as they go. A sociological gamer basically. One who looks upon the virtual environment to try and understand it through similar tools used in real society.
Kevin, video games are not designed to be broken down such as this initially, but this does happen. Art is broken down and dissected for messages ALL the time. That is what you do in an art appreciation course. Understanding or putting your own perception of the visually stimulating content (though it can be other forms as well) onto the scene is what has made art ART. If people want to do that with games, let them. I am not saying games ARE a drug. I am saying they are NOT a drug. They can evoke emotion and give people a stimulation that they will take to different places depending on the variables that run our mental facilities. If games did not do this, we would have stopped playing them long ago.
The ESRB does not suppress creative freedom. This is exactly why there is an AO rating in the first place.
As in your past posts on past topics, your alternatives suggest a system like the UK's BBFC, under which games with content that exceeds the standards of an M18+ rating cannot be rated or released at all. (Now that is what I'd call "suppressing creative freedom.")
Either that, or you are suggesting we should lump together all games determined to contain any "mature"-oriented content, assigning the same catch-all rating to Diablo and God of War that we assign to Thrill Kill and All Nude Nikki, as if there is no value whatsoever in distinguishing between the ways the mainstream public might interpret the appropriateness of the content in those different games. On the contrary, I believe there is value in such distinction, both personally and politically.
Every artist censors himself or herself. This is primary to the creative process. If you feel artists have degraded the quality of their work for the sake of wider exposure or higher sales, go ahead and blame them for selling out. Don’t blame the entire game industry for its mainstream obverse, and don't condemn the voluntary, non-legally binding rating system for being consistent with its clearly stated guidelines.
@DragonBomber:
Again, I am a little put off by your willingness to consider aesthetic appreciation like a medical procedure, and creative expression like a controlled substance. Art is subjective; trying to objectify it misses its best points.
@Ms. Vance:
Thank you. I hope you will continue your good work and know that many of us are rooting for you.
What responsibility? Why is it the ESRB's responsibility to adjust its system to avoid de facto censorship when they had nothing to do with the boycott? Again, without the Big Three's/retailer's boycott we're not even talking about this, so how can you say that me putting the blame on them is foolish?
BTW, I'm not trying to stop anything, I'm trying to understand where you're coming from. I just don't get why you think the ESRB is so much more deserving of blame than the actual AO censors.
What the Sam Hill are you talking about? Patricia Vance, sleazy? What action should she be taking? How is she supporting corporate censorship? And what actions, for that matter, CAN she take? She's the head of the ESRB, not the ECA.
Sorry for double posting...
Am I understanding you correctly in that the root of the problem is one of semantics? That simply changing AO to M18+ will have a significant impact? If so, I believe that to be something of an oversimplification.
First of all, before I get to that, the ESRB has always had conditions for assigning an AO rating, or any rating for that matter, and their job is to stick to them as honestly as possible. It's not their responsibility nor their concern whether or not the Big Three will license a game, or whether a retailer will sell it, and if you say it is you're saddling them with a burden they weren't designed to shoulder. That's like saying the MPAA should give a very sexually explicit movie a lower rating so that Century or United Artists will play it in their theaters.
As far as your solution goes, I somewhat agree that AO carries a more negative connotation (read: porn) than M18+ would. However, I believe that no matter what you decide to call it, the Big Three and the retailers will still boycott it because it's the WORST rating, and I think those decisions are made from a PR/political standpoint. Besides, even if you are correct, don't you think the AO damage has been done? Don't you think critics of the industry will scoff at the change as being merely superficial? Just trying to think like the enemy.
Anyway, I respect your opinion but I think your rage against the ESRB machine is wholly misguided and ultimately a waste of your energy. To me, the blame rests squarely on the Big Three and the retailers. If they grow a pair and license/sell AO games, the AO rating is a non-issue.
And never mind that most of the alternatives are worse in some fasion.
And wait... Didn't NIMF disown JT at some point? I guess even they have standards.
Don't tell me you are some sort of Gamarchist who wants absolutely no regulation. Censoring free speech is one thing. Censoring gratuidous violence to 6 year olds is a compleately different ball park.
Do you have anything to back up the "Sleazy" claim, or is that just a personal attack on someone who you disagree with but can't actually come up with any good reasons?
I don't believe that this entertainment medium is on the path of complete ruin. I mean, look at our critics. No sense of common sense, no sense of intelligence during debates, nothing that I would even think is any kind of threat. Downright pathetic if you ask me.
Well done Ms. Vance.
Maybe Mr. Moore should make a documentary on how a harmless entertainment medium is on the path to complete ruin.
For the 100th time on GP(and these arn't all my ideas)
Hmm lets see, reform the rating system. Either drop AO and make M 18+ or Make an M18+ and an AO18+.... or Make an 17+ and two 18+ ratings. This could lend itself to minimize censorship... actually I think dropping the AO and making M 18+ would greatly reduce the game industry censoring itself.
We don't need the government censoring games cause the industry is doing a really excellent job of suppressing creative freedom in terms of violence, sex and drugs. Not to mention the game play may change during online play warning might end up biting them in the ass as online gaming becomes more popular.
ESRB's main concern is to provide self regulation within the game industry... which translates to the game industry censoring itself. Its pathetic. I'd much rather the government be doing it so we could just protest, and fix it through court cases but as of right now game designers who wish to be creative in such ways that may be somewhat similar to Manhunt 2 are greatly restricted, gamers are also effected because they will not be able to play the games they want to play.
I agree they need some real intelligent people on their team
The ESRB isn't for the parents, it's for the industry. The Game Industry screws Gamers in the end.
What Craig Anderson has done has skipped from 'Maybe' to 'Definately' without taking his findings through other members of his own fraterntity. Remember the Cold Fusion guys who made an announcement without getting their work checked? Craig Anderson is the same.
"One example being their demand for public health officials and scientists to do extensive research on the alleged side affects of video games. Not to mention their ‘game ed’ course for elementary school."
Modified those are both valid directions we need to be going into as a society. Research into side effects, while in this use is deemed "negative" is not always bad. There are positive side effects with some medication for example, often used by the doctor/nurse practitioner to combat an unrelated condition. "Yeah, I want to lose massive weight doc!" "Oh really? Well, take this pill for depression which also causes weight loss and you'll be set!" Only some sort of investigation into video games and other media will set the record straight that is being shot cockeyed ever more by those who care about their crusade instead of children.
The school game ed idea is not a bad one, if it were framed as a media awareness course where a child learned early about the role of media in society. They could overlap the lessons with science, math, and technology courses to make the learning a bit more interactive. There are such courses in college, but not all children GO to college. To aid better informed media decisions by adults you have to make some dent on them as children to be able to catch them again later in life if you lose them from using their noodle with respect to intake. We live every day in a more media-rich environment and to keep children at the mercy of learning from their families or from the media itself is a bit irresponsible.
We all have our opinions obviously. I grew up in a very liberal California school district that had NO money. To make up for that my teachers found ways to catch the imaginations of the poor children stuck in that system. Video games and computer games were used more than once to illustrate lessons or to promote thought in class, usually as a reward to get good grades or try harder on difficult topics. Mr. Brinkerhoff used an Apple IIe and some Star Wars hangman game to spice up his awesome science demonstrations. Mrs. Rapp used her old Atari 2600 to give us a treat if we finished our work early and it was all right. Mr. DeCecco used episodes of the Simpsons to point out various things (though I was absent from that class due to my mother's insistence it would be a bad influence upon me, an idea she did a 180 on a couple years later).
Video games can be used to get across social messages and allow discussion just like reading a book, doing a report, then watching the movie. The power of games as a teaching aid is just dependent on people using them, including the necessary ratings system content descriptors and so forth. Video game magazines alone are treasure troves for primary document studies, by which the content inside can be used to investigate groups of people in some sector of society or society as a whole. People just don't always think enough about media so that those applications can be utilized, since they're just games, right? Anthropologists do the very same thing with the materials left behind of the Greeks, the Egyptians, and other cultures, so why does a living culture have to suffer late cognition of such useful information?
I do, however agree with NIMF on one ideal. That parents are the top defense in violent game distribution. But their demand for legislations seems a bit flip-flop from their Family ideals.
Write this organization and use this complaint against them:
http://www.d3dgames.com/bbb.html
I LOL'd at that.
HAHAHAHA, exactly. I like her education over legislation message. Let's hope NIMF will actually listen.