The same goes for film makers, musicians, and other people in the entertainment industry. Most of them do so because they really believe in the project. The teams that work on these games put in obsessively long hours. Video games are very much a labor of love. When do we let people police themselves? When do we let parents do their jobs and protect their children? When do we truly enforce laws that get retailers in trouble when they sell Mature rated games to minors? Regardless of whether or not you see games as art, we are banning something people have worked on for years. As of right now I don’t have any plans to start peddling smack or lobbing off my friends’ heads with a chainsaw. I am currently playing Scarface for the Wii, a game that is full of gun blasting, chainsaw swinging, and drug pushing. Sure, violent video games may immerse you in their world more so than a movie, but still I never acted on the images and content of these games. I’ve also played a lot of violent video games as well, including the first Manhunt. I never think about sadistically torturing someone in real life. Even with seeing all these brutally violent and gory films, I never once felt the urge to go out and hurt someone. I’ve also see some other slasher films that make those two franchises look like they should be rated as family friendly. They are filled with some truly graphic and violent scenes. On the most basic level, I’ve seen all the Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street movies. I know that I’ve personally seen a ton of these movies. We have seen a number of slasher films come and go over the years. Their objective was to create a game and an experience that they felt was best conveyed by a violent and disturbing storyline. Their goal wasn’t to turn the public into sadistic killers. The people at Rock* made Manhunt 2 the way they did for a reason. There’s no such thing as a title that is too kiddy or family friendly, so why should there be titles that are too violent? I am not trying to be an advocate for violence I am trying to stand up for expression. That’s why we have the ratings we do, there are ends to the spectrum for a reason. You are supposed to look at a project and give it a rating based on the content within. If you have a board that is in charge of appropriately rating films and games, what sense does it make to completely ban a title? It kind of defeats the purpose of a ratings board in the first place. The issue I have is when a piece of entertainment is banned. The severity with which they make their decisions may need to be reviewed, but overall things aren’t that bad. Hopefully everyone can agree on a very basic level that what they do is indeed needed. Not everyone is going to be happy with the decisions they make. Their views and opinions might seem a little strict from one person to the next, but that is bound to happen. They are trying to appropriately rate films and games to keep the public safe, or at least to protect people that aren’t old enough to see these kinds of materials. I have no complaints with what their final goals are. They are simply looking at works of entertainment and rating them accordingly. Why does Manhunt 2 have to be banned at all?įirst off, I do not think that the BBFC is a bad group in any way. The only question I am left with is a very simple one. I don’t doubt that we all thought Manhunt 2 would gain a lot more negative press before its release, but I am not too sure we saw something like this coming. The BBFC has described the game as offering “casual sadism”, not a very light term. Here we are just a few weeks away from release, and we find out that the game will not be sold in the UK. Now we are inching closer to the release of Manhunt 2. Once all issues were cleared up, the title returned to store shelves, but the negative stigma stayed with it. A number of retailers pulled the game from the shelves for the months where things were in question. Still though, it’s hard to ignore negativity like that. It was only months later that it was found out that the murderer never owned the original Manhunt it was the victim’s game. The original title went through a number of issues, including being linked to the murder of 14 year old Stefan Pakeerah. When the game was originally announced, we knew it was going to stir up some trouble. Wow, quite a morning for those in the UK looking forward to Manhunt 2. I’ll be back with more updates in a little bit! Better late then never…and a good topic came up to talk about! As you guys know, the regular work day has already started.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |