Los Angeles TV station Fox LA 11 recently did a segment on California's law on violent video games featuring a debate between Gerry Block (IGN and G4TV contributor) and Michele MacNeal, Director of the California Chapter of the Parents Television Council.
While the debate is fairly tame and both participants are clearly nervous about being on TV, the "video game guy" does a good job of being articulate. Check out the video and judge for yourselves.
Source: Fox LA
Kajex: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/05/20/neverwinter-money-making-exploit-sees-cryptic-turn-back-time/ My understanding is that none of this was illegal, either.05/20/2013 - 11:42am
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PHX Corp: http://www.gamezone.com/news/2013/05/20/violent-video-games-are-bad-for-your-body Most rediclous Study about violent video games ever05/20/2013 - 10:13am
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Cecil475: @PHX Corp - The dude's a moron who wouldn't know crap if it came up and kicked him.05/19/2013 - 6:36am
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PHX Corp: http://kotaku.com/ea-sports-developer-calls-wii-u-crap-and-nintendo-wa-508481261 EA Sports Canada Moron calls Wii U 'Crap' and Nintendo 'Walking Dead'05/18/2013 - 11:42am
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E. Zachary Knight: If the videos are of sufficient quality that people subscribe and watch regularly, then those let's players are providing a service that people want. That is the heart of capitalism. That is not something that should be shamed.05/17/2013 - 8:06am
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E. Zachary Knight: I have no idea who either of those people are. However, I still don't see why making a business out of creating let's play videos is somehow evil or wrong.05/17/2013 - 8:04am
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MaskedPixelante: It sure is if you're just doing it for the money. See Tobuscus and/or Pewdiepie for what happens when people get into it just for the money.05/17/2013 - 7:30am
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E. Zachary Knight: Why is it wrong to make money doing LPs? Why should that be something that should be shamed?05/17/2013 - 6:20am
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MaskedPixelante: https://twitter.com/PsychedelicSA/status/335183893214924801 Now here's an interesting, glass half full thought about the Nintendo LP thing. It outs the people who are just doing LPs to make money.05/17/2013 - 5:56am
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E. Zachary Knight: I responded in writing to all this "let's play" stuff Nintendo Started. No need for my permission, I won't give it. It's not mine to give. http://divineknightgaming.com/?p=29205/16/2013 - 2:21pm
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E. Zachary Knight: Lars Doucet of Levelup Labs has a Reddit going on game companies that allow monetization of Let's Play videos. http://www.reddit.com/r/Games/comments/1egayn/lets_build_a_list_of_game_studios_that_allow/05/16/2013 - 1:04pm
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Sleaker: @Imautobot - yah I wouldn't use an emulator as a good first run test of how stable the console is, haha.05/16/2013 - 11:47am
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E. Zachary Knight: The 50th person to jump off a bridge is just as dumb if not dumber than the 1st.05/16/2013 - 10:03am
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MaskedPixelante: Yeah, let's all jump on Nintendo for doing this, even though they're hardly the first company to do this...05/16/2013 - 9:47am
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E. Zachary Knight: Wow Nintendo, this is wrong. http://kotaku.com/nintendo-forcing-ads-on-some-youtube-lets-play-video-50709238305/16/2013 - 8:44am
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Imautobot: @Sleaker, further gameplay has revealed that the controller button do stick under the faceplate. Also, The NES emulator (Emuya)keeps crashing on me, though I think a bad ROM is causing it.05/16/2013 - 7:10am
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Papa Midnight: AE: I wonder if any other publishers will follow suit.05/15/2013 - 8:12pm
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Andrew Eisen: EA is ditching Online Pass. http://venturebeat.com/2013/05/15/ea-kills-its-controversial-online-pass-program/05/15/2013 - 7:20pm
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Avalongod: @Zach and quicnkold...I've read the bill and the intent of it is to fear-monger. It's not a balanced message. I don't recall the ESRB being mentioned at all. It's more "keeps your kids away from these movies/games or they'll become violent"05/15/2013 - 4:35pm
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E. Zachary Knight: quiknkold, The big problem with that legislation is the amount of misinformation out there. Who is going to ensure that the information in the pamphlet is accurate?05/15/2013 - 3:25pm
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Comments
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Wow... she actually pulled the 'first ammendment? but we voted for this!' argument.
Still, this guy has to be one of the best spoken and articulate pro-game interviewies I have seen in a while.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
What happened? A FOX affiliate allowed an actual debate? They're not supposed to do that! The proper form of "debate", per FOX rules, is to set up a strawman for a one-sided rant about violent pornographic games like Mass Effect!
Won't somebody think of the ratings.. er, children?!
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
I'm not that surprised, actually. In debates shown on my local Fox affiliate (Fox 5 Atlanta), the news anchors aren't afraid to play hardball to either side.
All in all, I think the problem lies less with the local affiliates and much, much more with Fox News Channel and the higher-ups at News Corporation.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Let's not shake a fist angrily at them when they are doing right. This isn't the first time FOX has actually reported on something and done a decent job in regards to video games. When a lady was complaining about the Taliban being in the new MoH game, the FOX reporter basically grilled her over it with 'Why is this different than other war games?", "This is literally nothing different but a coat of paint, so why the outrage?", and other such questions.
Just saying, when they do something right, they should be encouraged to do so more frequently.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
And for those 6% of transactions saw the employee getting fired on the spot when the government released that report. Gamestop takes that whole thing very very seriously. So I'm told, they pay for their own secret shoppers to check on their employees.
Also, that 36% that Michele mentioned was the overall average across all retailers. Stores like Gamestop and best buy have the lowest rates of success for underage shoppers and the harshest penalties for the employees that get caught.
TL;DR: The Industry alread does a good job of regulating itself. Fix the sections that are falling behind and spend government time on more pertinent issues.
Treasure bin: Cult Hits, chea pass gaming options, and rants about gaming in general
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
"The law aimed at cracking down on games like Halo and Cop Killer..."
Um, did we just make up a game there?
"But the voters voted for this law!"
Yeah, the voters voted to pass Prop 8 too. What's your point?
EDIT: BearDogg-X's comment below brings forth a bigger problem with the PTC lady's statement. This law was never put before California voters.
Andrew Eisen
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate(The VG guy won)
=="But the voters voted for this law!"
Yeah, the voters voted to pass Prop 8 too. What's your point?==
The PTC motard really said that? Well, she's lying, but that's typical of the Parent Trash Cult. The voters never voted for Yee's piece of shit "law". The motards California calls their Assemblymen and Senators voted for that "law"(after Yee got an illegal substitution of Assemblymen to get his pride and joy out of committee in the first place). There's a huge difference there, lady.
Geaux Saints, Geaux Tigers, Geaux Hornets, Jack Thompson can geaux chase a chupacabra. Hell will stay frozen over for quite a while since the Saints won the Super Bowl.
Geaux Saints, Geaux Tigers, Geaux Hornets. Solidarity for the Saints = No retreat, no surrender. Even through the darkest days, this fire burns always.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate(The VG guy won)
Heh, good catch. That didn't even cross my mind and I live in California. Oops.
Andrew Eisen
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Yeah, I have no idea where Cop Killer came from. That is the first I have heard of it.
E. Zachary Knight
Oklahoma City Chapter of the ECA
http://www.theeca.com/chapters_oklahoma
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Ice-T.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Articulate or not, the "video game guy" could do with a hairstyle makeover if he's interested in being taken seriously.
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
Very true. From a "concerned citizen" standpoint, his hairdo is a bit off putting. But if anyone is willing to listen to his points they will be quite surprised.
What I found interesting about this debate is the percentages they both presented. The game guy brought up the FTC study that showed a 20% failure rate, while the PTC person brought up their own internal study that showed 30 something percent failure rate of enforcement. While the numbers aren't that far from eachother, she made it out to be the end of the world.
Yet, I still can't get over the fact that the PTC lady admitted that it is the parents job to monitor their kids media and that is why the government should step in and make it illegal to sell violent games to minors.
E. Zachary Knight
Oklahoma City Chapter of the ECA
http://www.theeca.com/chapters_oklahoma
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
OK Game Devs
Random Tower
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
I'd still love to know how old these mystery shoppers are. If they're 15 and 16, I'm not impressed with her numbers.
Also, giving a kid money and a ride to a game store with specific instructions to pick up a particular title is not a very accurate reflection of the realities of M rated game purchases by minors.
Andrew Eisen
Re: A California Video Game Law TV Debate
If I recall correctly, the main flaw in their methodology is they usually had an adult standing only a foot or two away from the child paying attention to them, so employies (correctly) assumed the adult was with the kid and concenting to the purchace.
So essentially they used flawed methods to get a result closer to what they were hoping for.