Rockstar Games really fucked things up.
Granted, the games they make are a real treat, and a quality experience because of their open-ended nature. Andreas owns Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories for his PSP, and has hardly completed any missions. He simply drives around on his motorcycle all day, taking it off some sweet jumps and crashing into a pile of steel, flesh and tacky Italian fatigues from the 90’s. But I’ve explored the allure of GTA games in previous articles.
What I cannot fathom - at this point in the game - is why the National Institute for Media and the Family is turning to the Electronic Software Ratings Board - hellfire burning in their pupils - and constantly trying to demolish and rebuild the rating system as they see fit. Over the past eleven years of its existence, they have done an insanely good job in providing fair ratings to all games presented to them.
Then, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas comes along and threatens to collapse the entire infrastructure of gaming and bring it crumbling down onto the heads of other developers, publishers, and geeks worldwide. The controversial Hot Coffee modification has upset quite a few powerful people. Senators Hilary Clinton and Joe Lieberman have become quite outspoken about video game rating systems.
However, even the two senators gave the ESRB the credit they deserved when they re-assessed the rating, and influenced Take-Two Entertainment to refurbish Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas so that the Hot Coffee sex mini-game was absent. Now, consumers who are interested can still purchase Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas in its re-released form, devoid of strange pixelated deviance.
So, why doesn’t the NIMF cut the ESRB a break? Anyone who has been following the issue has seen in every related article that the NIMF claims that the ESRB rating system suffers a staggering flaw. The reviewers at the ESRB do not actually play through the entirety of a game to review it. Essentially, the review system works as follows:
A game developer has reached a point in development where their end product is presentable, but not polished. However, elements like the story, content, graphics, etc have already been hammered out. The only remaining tasks before the games final release are bug checking, beta testing, and other related touch-ups. It is at this point that it is submitted to the ESRB for review.
The developers take footage of the most violent, disturbing, sexual and controversial parts of their products gameplay - if any, as is the case for E titles - and submit it to the ESRB. Footage of regular gameplay is included as well, to confirm that the four aforementionned qualities are not evident throughout.
Then, reviewers with no affiliation with the industry (i.e., they do not actually work full-time for the ESRB, ESA or any affiliated companies) are brought in and assist in the reviewing process by guaging the severity of the game based on the “worst parts”. These reviewers are sensitive to the effects of dangerously violent material, as the ESRB insists that reviewers have some previous experience with children (parents, teachers, counsellors, etc). The reviewers assess the content of the game - independantly of eachother, I might add - and submit a final judgement to the ESRB. The final rating, including all rating descriptors, are submitted back to the developer so that the game publisher can add them to the packaging before they are produced and shipped.
In the case of Hot Coffee, the controversial code in question was not part of the actual gameplay. That is to say, there was no way to access this code unless some sort of modification tool was used. Hot Coffee - without the aid of Action Replays and online mod communities - would have never been witnessed by consumers. In this sense, neither Rockstar nor the ESRB did anything wrong by their regulations at the time. Rockstar submitted all in-game footage, and the ESRB fairly and accurately reviewed it. Done deal.
A mistake was made. However, it was quickly fixed. The ESRB now insists that even code which is not accessible in regular gameplay must be reviewed to decide the rating of a game, which is likely to make developers hesitate from even contemplating blatantly graphic or sexual games of any type in the future. As any developer knows, serious sexual content in a game leads to an automatic “Adults Only” rating, which results in many retailers across the continent NOT carrying your product. If your product does not end up on store shelves, it does not sell. Therefore, an “Adults Only” rating = death of game.
In a recent article on 1-UP.com surrounding the issue - which actually inspired me to write this blog post in the first place - the NIMF are quoted in saying that the rating system for the ESRB is constantly sliding. Blois Olson claims that “a Mature rated game in 2005 is more violent and contains more explicit content than an M-rated game from 2003”. And that can be true. But M is all encompassing of violent material, whether it be several missions involving gunplay or blowing up an entire city block with explosives, violence is violence and it falls under Mature. The ESRB cannot be creating infinite strata for every discernable degree of violence. In that rating system, would M to the power of 3 really mean a damn thing to anyone?
Video games are not given ratings in relation to eachother. They are rated independantly. The 2005 title may be extremely violent, and the 2003 title mildly violent, but they are still violent, and thus, are Mature. Specifically, they would be given different descriptors to accompany that rating. Perhaps the 2005 title would feature the descriptors: “Intense Violence, Mature Humor and Nudity” while the 2003 title would feature the descriptors: “Mild Violence, Animated Blood”.
The problem is retailers and child advocacy groups intensely stress the importance of the rating, but hardly focus on the value of the descriptors. If people knew what the descriptor “Animated Blood” meant in relation to “Blood and Gore”, they would be able to better guage whether a game is suitable or not for their child.
And, in essence, that is what it boils down to: parenting. All of this controversy about violent content in video games is just another example of my favourite anomaly in the world: hands-off parenting. So many couples seem to want their kids to be raised for them by other people. Whether it be leaving the kids with a babysitter, grandparent, daycare or playgroup - parents are spending less and less time with their kids and more and more time at their jobs, or just being apathetic to the child raising experience. As a result, parents are developing this “hands-off” approach to parenting. If they knew what they were purchasing their kids, or actually took an interest in the types of media their child was regularly consuming, everyone would be better off.
So many times, a parent and child have come into Zellers looking for video games. The child greedily tugs at their parents coat and says, “I want that one”. The parent groans and says, “Are you sure that is the one you want?” The kid nods enthusiastically, and the parent hands over the cash without even looking at the back of the box. Honestly, a child could easily walk out of our store with a copy of Killer 7 or Grand Theft Auto if Zellers did not have rules in place to not sell M-rated games to anyone under 18. If a parent goes to purchase one, we have to explain to them the violent nature of the game and how it may not be suitable for people of that age. Usually, the parent just cuts me off and waits for their receipt.
Yet, when something goes wrong, apparently the video game industry is the one dropping the ball. The ESRB can only take on step further to protect the children of the US and Canada: give me a taser to zap all the idiot parents out there who do not give a damn.
Coming Up Later…
Why Aren’t Developers Doing Anything With The PSP?
Hands-Off Parenting: This Entry Will Make Me Sound Like A Chauvanist