Hot Coffee, Rockstar & the ESRB.

[voodoolily]

The so-called S&M in this game was tame. The girl has a dungeon for a bedroom with chains hanging all over it, she wears a full bondage outfit, and all she and CJ do is a bit of light spanking. AO my ass.

True, tame and hilarious. It was just one of the many parts of the free content that I wouldn't want my kid to see. I agree with Sky that it's a parent's responsibility to monitor what their kids have access to. I feel a lot of sympathy for parents of kids today, 'cuz at least my parents didn't hafta worry about the internet. Just R-rated movies and other kidhood shenanigans like stealing and cussing. And they didn't know about the porn my bro and I dumpster-dived from the apartment complex we lived in (we hid it in our tree fort and invited all the neighbor kids to come take a look).

[Pococurante]

But if you put the bomb in the box with the grapefruit, you aren't guiltless just because sombody else lit the fuse.

Exactly.  The incident was created by them intentionally.  Anyone who's ever seen how this sort of stuff gets budgeted knows it was just some Lindy England-type working in their spare time.

Chum the waters, sharks come.  Hillary proved herself just that kind of shark during Watergate.

[MrHat]

Kind of brings us back to what someone was saying.  This is probably just the politicians saying, hey VG Industry, you best give us monies or we start making your life hell.

Re: AO being a punishment.  What Haem was saying is that games that might get that have limited their audience and hence their sales.  It's the same reason that movies that are typically or should be R rated push and push to get PG-13 for the summertime, they know that kids with disposable incomes will go watch it because of marketing, and parents with younger kids (<12) are more likely to let them go with to watch the movie if it's PG-13 and not R.  So by sticking an AO on a game, instead of M, you suddenly get all the stigma that comes with a game like that.

[Yegolev]

It's not just a stigma, Wal*Mart simply will not give shelf space to an AO title.  Similar to how they don't put porn tapes on those crappy wire shelves obstructing your path into the electronics section.

[MrHat]

It's not just a stigma, Wal*Mart simply will not give shelf space to an AO title.  Similar to how they don't put porn tapes on those crappy wire shelves obstructing your path into the electronics section.

Fuck Wal Mart.  Fuck them in their blue asses.

[Bunk]

A rating is not censorship or a ban.  A rating just means the right people can buy what they want they want it in the right place and with complete confidence they are NOT contributing to a crappy society.  Anyone bitching about a rating is a freaking child in an adult's body.

Bitch when something is banned.  Bitch when it's censored.  Bitch when the fuckers abuse the ratings systems to appeal to the mental twleve year olds.

Bitch like a grown up.

As Yegolov said, the problem is that currently, an AO rating is essentially a ban. Major retailers like Wal*Mart will not carry AO titles, period.

There are numerous problems with the current system, as it is:

R ratings just make a game more popular
Stores don't enforce the ratings = kids get the R games
Parents don't pay attention/care what the kids are getting = kids get R games
AO games have the stigma of being calssified as Porn
Many major retailers won't carry AO games as a result

As it stands right now, things get classified as R (or M, or whatever the system is using) for having violence, bloodshed, naughty language, etc.
Games get an AO rating for having boobies.

I like boobies, I should be able to buy a game that has boobies in it (violence or not) without having to skulk in to "Red Hot Videos Adult Superstore!!" to buy it. And the way things are headed, that's whats going to happen.

I'm not trying to suggest answers here - I don't have any good answers for tis. I'm mearly stating that what we have now isn't doing what it is supposed to do.

[Sogrinaugh]

Take-Two has halted production of GTA:SA and is redoing the content

I predict speculators are going to buy up as many copies of the current version as possible and put them up on eBay after the updated version is released so if you don't have the game yet and want the "modable" version you better run out and get one now before they sell out.

Damn i got to this thread to late.  That was my very first thought appon reading the OP's newspot, and wondering how much of a risk i should take (i.e. how many copies of the game i should purchase).

[Llava]

Rockstar, stop being lazy.

It's more than being lazy.

It's being just plain irresponsible.  I'm no conservative, and I don't feel like there ought to be a law about this, but I've said this before- it sure would be nice if companies could hold themselves to a slightly higher standard than putting in a dildo in a game as an easter egg.

I bet if you did enough research, you could find that Rockstar is actually controlled/funded by a few select politicians who keep pushing the company's game content over the boundaries in an attempt to stir up profitable controversy and votes.

[ahoythematey]

That's pretty unlikely, being that the GTA team was DMA Design and is, as far as I know, still Edinburgh-based.

[NowhereMan]

Frankly I still think that the worst thing Rockstar did was reacting with a lie claiming that the Hot Coffee bit was completely not them. There's almost no way you're not getting going to get found out on that one and it makes you and by extension the rest of the industry look like you're trying to sneak this stuff under people's radars. That is the reason that the industry could get severely fucked over in America in terms of what regulation they have to deal with. I'd love to sit back all happy and smug now and point out how I live in Europe and so this won't effect me much but as the US is such a massive market, I know that if the shit hits the fans and you bastards decide that mentioning the word sex in a game or having a female character wearing anything less than a full length dress is a no-no, then game companies over here are going to start getting ready to sell to those standards.

Perhaps I'm being too sceptical of Rockstar, perhaps the response was a miscommunication and the higher-ups were told it wasn't part of the game or something. In that case though the fact that they didn't go on a firing spree very soon is almost as bad as the lying scenario (which imho seems more likely). It just comes across as taking no responsibility and despite the fact that I think this really is a massive hullabaloo over nothing much, it is likely to damage the industry.

[Shockeye]

Serek Dmart on Hot Coffee.

[Samwise]

He at least gets points for looking at the thing in question before commenting on it publicly.

[WayAbvPar]

Serek Dmart on Hot Coffee.

Serek Dmart - To be honest, I'm in two minds about this.

That is at least 3 fewer than normal!

[Llava]

That's pretty unlikely, being that the GTA team was DMA Design and is, as far as I know, still Edinburgh-based.

We need a color that's not sarcastic, but implies that a sentence isn't to be taken seriously.

[ahoythematey]

Hmm, what would be a good color for facetious...

[Samwise]

Teal?

[Daydreamer]

Octarine

[Trippy]

Rainbow colored (yes I know one of the standard colors is missing...)

[ahoythematey]

I said facetious, not overtly gay.

[Murgos]

Running With Scissors and POSTAL have been the scapegoat of the game industry for a long time...

Heh.

[Yegolev]

Serek Dmart on Hot Coffee.

Too much Smart, not enough Hollenshead.  They should have asked Shigeru Myamoto what he thought.

[Sky]

I said facetious, not overtly gay.

I'm still upset the gays stole our rainbow. Where will we put the lucky charms and pots of gold, dammit?

[HaemishM]

Apparently up a gay man's anus.

[voodoolily]

I said facetious, not overtly gay.

I'm still upset the gays stole our rainbow. Where will we put the lucky charms and pots of gold, dammit?

I think there are a few gays who aren't thrilled about the rainbow thing, either. They didn't steal it, you can still use it. The pots of gold, you can just give to me.

[Pococurante]

As Yegolov said, the problem is that currently, an AO rating is essentially a ban. Major retailers like Wal*Mart will not carry AO titles, period.

(...)

I'm not trying to suggest answers here - I don't have any good answers for tis. I'm mearly stating that what we have now isn't doing what it is supposed to do.

I don't see an "Adults Only" section in Walmart that sells adult magazines, videos, or novelty items.  If I did I'm sure I'd see GTA there.  I'd go somewhere else when I want maximum strength adult content.

So no a rating is not a ban.  The problem is not the rating systems or the ratings they award.

The problem is content providers who want to sell to the wrong demographic through the wrong distribution channels.  A lot of you are saying you don't see a problem with that and want to blame the ratings system.

That's Orwellian to me.

[voodoolily]

I thought the problem with rating was jsut a matter of who could/would sell their product. Walmart is the biggest retailer of games, so elimination of that franchise by a rating change could be trouble.

Pink is the color of blatantly obvious.

Of course ratings do not equal a ban, but it's unfair to change a rating to one that renders the game unsellable by the biggest marketer, just because of hidden content that is really no worse than anything the game already had (that had warranted an M rating).

[Sky]

I don't see an "Adults Only" section in Walmart that sells adult magazines, videos, or novelty items.  If I did I'm sure I'd see GTA there.  I'd go somewhere else when I want maximum strength adult content.

If you lived in my town, you'd understand that walmart not carrying something is tantamount to a ban. It's the only software outlet in the area. Sure, I know how to order things online, but that doesn't cover the underprivileged folks without internet connectivity or even pcs.

"They don't gotta burn the books, they just remove 'em." - Zack de la Roche

[Pococurante]

But it no longer supports that light rating.  The lighter rating was the result of deception.  I see ESRB doing what a credible independent organization should do.

To turn it around while I personally might not be too perturbed to buy a copy of Time magazine that dropped out a Larry Flynt centerfold when Shaken Just Right what do you think is an appropriate reaction for people who buy and distribute Time magazine and not pr0n?

Content developers need to pitch their products to the right channels.

[Strazos]

Again, you could not play the "Hot Coffee" sections off the shelf, and that's what the ESRB rates. Since when do they have to account for 3rd-party mods?

[Triforcer]

Just out of curiosity, of the people here who hate the ESRB ratings and also think American society is fascist and puritanical for not letting everyone from toddlers on up have easy, free access to unlimited porn, how many of you actually have children?  As with so many other issues, its easy to extol the virtues of totally unrestrained hedonism as an angry collegian stoner but harder when you have your own kids. 

[Samwise]

Hot Coffee is a bit of a gray area between "easter egg" and "mod".  Unlike a proper easter egg, it's not accessible by any sort of end-user twiddling.  Unlike a proper mod, it doesn't import any new code or assets into the game, it just flips a protected variable to activate an unused code path (which in turn accesses previously-unseen art assets and so forth).

So on the one hand, Rockstar lied when they said that the minigame was an original invention - it was in fact part of the code they shipped.  On the other hand, it's quite a bit different from shaking a Time magazine and having a Hustler spread fall out... it's a bit more like getting a secret decoder ring that allows you to reveal a hidden Sports Illustrated swimsuit spread on page 36.  It's not going to "fall out" accidentally, and it's not even that scandalous to begin with.

[Strazos]

Sorry, I don't want someone's parenting problems to infringe on me. Parenting should be the responsibility of, you know, the Parents.

I'm not saying replace Saturday morning cartoons with pr0n, but people need to calm down about this nonsense.

Don't want you kids to be exposed to inappropriate content, such as what may be in a game? Then do your job.

[Shockeye]

and it's not even that scandalous to begin with.

And therein lies a bigger problem that's being glossed over by politicians and the like. The mini-game is less offensive than the rest of the game. Should the game have been AO from the start? Yes. Rockstar knows it pushes the boundaries with each game they produce.

[Triforcer]

Sorry, I don't want someone's parenting problems to infringe on me. Parenting should be the responsibility of, you know, the Parents.

I'm not saying replace Saturday morning cartoons with pr0n, but people need to calm down about this nonsense.

Don't want you kids to be exposed to inappropriate content, such as what may be in a game? Then do your job.

There is a fundamental problem of illogic with the two statements common to your side of this debate:

1.  "Leave parents to parenting.  If they don't want their child exposed to things they don't like they need to do a better job."

followed by

2.  "Since its the parents responsibility, we should have the right to a society with no moral rules or strictures whatsoever  because its not our fault if their kids see it."

This argument is like dropping a soldier in the middle of the warzone with no weapons or armor or clothing and telling him to fight.  It may be his immediate job to win the war on the ground, but when he loses you are still fucking to blame.  Telling parents to "parent better" is all well and good but when you strip them of most of the reasonable means to do so is YOUR FAULT.  You can't justify society being unlimitedly hedonistic because parents have a 100% magical ability to shut it all out, because you have systemtically deprived them of the tools they need to shut it out. 

[Samwise]

Triforcer, do you really think that toddlers are getting their hands on $50 games without any parental involvement?  As far as I can tell, most kids that are getting their hands on GTA are being aided and abetted by their clueless parents.  At some point, parents do have to take responsibility for what the hell they're doing. 

Giving your kid movies and games with "AGE 17+" on the cover or giving them $100 of allowance money and turning them loose in Best Buy without even reviewing their purchases is not responsible parenting.  If you sit your kid on top of a lit stove for a few minutes you're not allowed to sue the stove manufacturer when he gets burned.