South Park Creator Says Video Games Face "Double Standard"

[weirdsoup]

I think the problem is actually the people doing the ratings seem to have certain thoughts hardwired into their heads

Thoughts such as things like comics, animation and video games are all exclusively for children and as such things are banned, blocked or otherwise censored on that basis.

 

[DarkhoIlow]

Can't they now release an "optional" patch that by-passes Australia's censorship laws?

'

I think that would be a bit illegal don't you think? Sure seems like it.

 

[Bindal]

Can't they now release an "optional" patch that by-passes Australia's censorship laws?

'
I think that would be a bit illegal don't you think? Sure seems like it.

Nope, not at all. A very recent (and very similar) example would be the anal probe weapon from Saints Row 4. It had to be removed from the games default weapons you can find due Australia. Their solution? Make it an optional DLC (right away with the Season Pass or very recently on it's own), also available in Australia.

 

[Lieju]

I do think the standards should be different for interactive things. Not that it should be the only thing that matters in what rating it gets, but making the player do something is different than making the player a passive observer in it.

Video-games do face harsher regulation, though, because they are still considered a 'children's thing'.

 

[viranimus]

Well, Not fond of censorship but is it really fair to look at it as a double standard and basing it essentially on cultural differences related to international countries?

I mean think about it. If it were in episode format, what difference would it make? While the base content would be broadcast here in the states, once repackaged, invariably those same international restrictions would come into play and when broadcast to those communities it would be done so with their intended levels of censorship.

Spoiler: Saddam's Advocate

I mean I do kinda see what he is trying to suggest. For example, In a show, having Cartman feed Scott Tenorman Tenorman Chilli was at the time pretty out there. It being chosen to be part of their broadcast was expressing a morality choice through the character. In a sense it "CAN" make it at least seem easier, when you can establish that "Being evil like this is just a part of the characters personality." Where as it does make it seem less clear when you assume the role of a character in a video game world and in effect are making these commands that result in morality actions. But essentially it is no different. You simply have to look at the "role" in which the player controls as a character itself and that further extends to how divergent of morality scripting you write and how many potential choices you grant the player to make.

Each "result" in turn becomes its own "character". So even with a wide berth of morality actions a player might possibly encounter, from a creative and development standpoint you really only need to effectively concern yourself with the most extreme ends and their polar opposite as respective characters.

It simply takes looking at a potentially complex situation broadly in order to first reduce it down to "like terms" in order to make it manageable.

Then it essentially becomes no different than doing something in the show, because you can then say X is the extreme end where we can and will allow it to potentially be taken, and that is comparable to what we have done in the past in Y instance or in close proximity.

So I think they might just be trying to look at it too hard by simply not looking hard enough. Its really not all that different and really I think that such a response comes more from a perspective of simply being in an unfamiliar and uncomfortable medium more than there being an actual double standard.

Captcha : Go Berzerk.

LOL Amen.. Thats what I say. Give em all the room in the world to express any and all unfiltered vulgar thoughts that might breeze through their minds. Sure some will be offended, I certainly wont. I say bring it on, cause I still to this day have found very very little that truly offends and upsets me.

 

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

I for one am not too miffed by all this, the New Zealand Steam version escaped being censored.

Suck it Aussies!

You just added insult to injury, kiwi. How dare you?! Go back to your sheep!

....

I is kidding. Still though, really salty over the fact that despite us getting an 18 rating, I believe last year just in time for The Last of Us, this can't be seen. Not only does my copy of GTA 5 on the couch have scenes where in I hire hookers for lovely car sex, but an entirely naked cult and lapdances for only 40 dollars!

And yet South Park, a show which has been shown for many years and uncensored - gets censored!? REALLY?! Fucking oldies running the Australian Game whateverthefuck.

I also love the fact that I actually once saw an actual IRL sex change on South Par, the show, which was shown by Mr Garrison getting his sex change and it flicking in and out of IRL view. As in, full view of the doctor cutting the testicles out. Not the nicest thing. But I'm fine with it, because I CHOSE to watch it. And then the South Park game who's abortion scene involves seeing nothing except for the player jabbing things with needles and a probe scene from the side gets banned? REALLY?!

You should see what happens in the scenes following that little mini-game.

Lets just say if Ubisoft wanted the game to have a lower rating then it would have been a better idea to remove the entire abortion clinic mission where you end up fighting

Spoiler

Aborted Nazi Zombie Fetuses (admittedly they were aborted before becoming Nazi Zombies)

I have to admit I didn't know whether to laugh at the entire thing, feel ashamed for laughing, or stop playing.

 

[SonOfVoorhees]

The probes look like penises and having them sticking in a kids arse etc was deemed ban worthy. But in a game rated 18 and with graphics simplistic and cartoony i just dont see the point in censoring it. If it was photo realistic then fair enough, you could understand even if you dont agree. But with South Park, those things like probes etc are expected.

 

[StHubi]

As an outsider and not from Germany I can understand the laws about Nazi symbology, the courts want a water tight way of banning the use of it with as few loopholes as possible. Is it right?

That's the way it is meant to be. The only exceptions are art and educational purposes. In all cases glorification of Nazi stuff will always be banned regardless if it is art or educational material. Video games do not fit into those two categories in Germany at the moment.

To make video games count as art in Germany a company would have to go into court and has to prove that their game is really art. But that did not happen yet as this company would not be allowed to sell the game (in a version with Nazi symbols) until the court has decided on the case. Lost sales would surely be the result and so far no company has tried this. Even in the best case this would probably only be a success for a single game and it would have to be repeated for every new game...

 

[J Tyran]

As an outsider and not from Germany I can understand the laws about Nazi symbology, the courts want a water tight way of banning the use of it with as few loopholes as possible. Is it right?

That's the way it is meant to be. The only exceptions are art and educational purposes. In all cases glorification of Nazi stuff will always be banned regardless if it is art or educational material. Video games do not fit into those two categories in Germany at the moment.

To make video games count as art in Germany a company would have to go into court and has to prove that their game is really art. But that did not happen yet as this company would not be allowed to sell the game (in a version with Nazi symbols) until the court has decided on the case. Lost sales would surely be the result and so far no company has tried this. Even in the best case this would probably only be a success for a single game and it would have to be repeated for every new game...

Games are in a funny position, some are just pure entertainment, others are art and some are educational. Some games mix the elements and be entertaining yet contain art and another might be educational art.

Personally I am not on board with the games are art thing, not all games at least. Many games can contain art and some might be making an artistic point but in general? No they are not art, is generic shooter #54895849 art? Sorry no, is a game like Journey art? Maybe, its certainly very artistic.

Games have to be judged on a case by case basis, any game wanting to use that horrible image would have to prove it was used artistically. How many judges would actually be able to make that call I don't know.

 

[AgentLampshade]

I now have the mental picture of several 40+ year old people sitting in a room playing[footnote]or watching someone play. I'm not sure how these things go down.[/footnote] the South Park game. And I can see the look of disgust on their faces. And it is fantastic.

I'm glad there's a joke about the censors there as-well as the lazy (but still funny) text descriptions.

 

[JazzJack2]

Games are in a funny position, some are just pure entertainment, others are art and some are educational. Some games mix the elements and be entertaining yet contain art and another might be educational art.

Personally I am not on board with the games are art thing, not all games at least. Many games can contain art and some might be making an artistic point but in general? No they are not art, is generic shooter #54895849 art? Sorry no, is a game like Journey art? Maybe, its certainly very artistic.

Whether something is art or not is not based on it's quality, you can have shit art and generic shooter #54895849 is (shit) art.

 

[Lunar Templar]

I've no sympathy for him. At all.

Just because you can get away with it in America doesn't mean you can get away with it every where else, yes, shocking as it might be to some America isn't the gold standard for the rest of the world.

 

[Seneschal]

Just a heads-up for those that didn't get the memo and are raging against "fascist" censors: Nobody censored them. It was Ubisoft who cut the scenes from the game, and then played victim. As fine as the game is, this is pretty obvious and despicable attention-trolling, something concocted in the putrid pits of the Ubisoft Marketing dungeon. I particularly like how it paints Europeans as prudes when most of Europe wouldn't bat an eyelid at it. PEGI certainly didn't.

 

[Veylon]

Matt Stone you are talking out of your arse. The game wasn't censored like you guys would have us believe, you cut the cunting content out for Europe! There was an statement from the ESRB literally 2 days ago saying that they approved the uncensored version. Stop trying to pretend you were forced to cut content out for Europe, you weren't. I don't get it, are they trying to engineer an issue about this or something?

The ESRB is a voluntary rating system sponsored by the entertainment industry. It speaks for no government.

While America has no rating system - though a lot of people seem to think the ESRB is part of the government - other countries do and that is why the content was removed. Nobody's obligated to listen to the ESRB if they don't want to.

 

[Fdzzaigl]

I feel absolutely disgusted that the game has been censored in Europe. Even if it's only 40 seconds or whatever, it is completely unacceptable.
Sadly, I will also not buy the game here as I will not buy a censored game, not ever.

It completely baffles me how I live in a nation where things like abortion and euthanasia are accepted, where big efforts are made to get people from all sorts of ethnicities to be equal, where controversial content is not commonly censored in any other media, but that we have started to see video games being censored. It really is a double standard.

Even though I believe most of these restrictions are caused by the policies of bigger nations in Europe, I also see quite a few narrow minded fools making appearances in media to demonize video games in Belgium.

It seems that they've forgotten that this here holds true for video games as well:

 

[Therumancer]

Matt Stone you are talking out of your arse. The game wasn't censored like you guys would have us believe, you cut the cunting content out for Europe! There was an statement from the ESRB literally 2 days ago saying that they approved the uncensored version. Stop trying to pretend you were forced to cut content out for Europe, you weren't. I don't get it, are they trying to engineer an issue about this or something?

The ESRB is a voluntary rating system sponsored by the entertainment industry. It speaks for no government.

While America has no rating system - though a lot of people seem to think the ESRB is part of the government - other countries do and that is why the content was removed. Nobody's obligated to listen to the ESRB if they don't want to.

Yes and no. Groups like the ESRB exist in a rather weird place in the US where private industry is being used as a front by the government to force things that it can't do directly. The whole "hey, the government isn't taking way your free speech rights, it's private industry doing it and they have the right to control their own platform" issue that plagues so many informed discussions on the subject, albeit on a different front.

The way something like the ESRB works is that it coordinates with the government and licensing, while not a government agency their stamp of approval is something the government listens to when making it's decisions on a large number of issues. If a product decides to seriously buck the ESRB, they will rapidly find that few if any businesses will carry their product, as businesses that tend to do so will suddenly find other businesses unwilling to sell to them in fear of their own licenses and so on.

The government also holds a sort of mallet above the whole thing, with the constant threat that if the ESRB isn't abided by, then the government itself will continue to push to actually gain this authority itself. We already had one major battle over this where the government wanted the right to actually enforce age ratings criminally. For every victory one it's important to note the government can always find another way to push to do the same basic thing through some backdoor method, and all it takes is one ruling to win, and thus this also contributes to a lot of the pressure to force acknowledgement of the ESRB and why businesses that don't play the game and have nearly everything rated can run into problems from companies that do abide by the ESRB.

I don't articulate this very well, but basically it's like the mafia running a protection racket. Sure you don't HAVE to pay Vito and Luigi for security every month, but as soon as you stop paying someone vandalizes your store and beats you half to death with a baseball bat in the middle of the sidewalk in front of your store... not their fault, it's just a tough neighborhood. The Mayor, he's their uncle, the chief of police he's another uncle, the beat cops, they all speak Italian in this neighborhood and carry stocking masks folded up in their pocket purely by coincidence, the baseball bat in the trunk of the cruiser, that's for when the cops help teach little league in their spare time of course... point any of this out and the ACLU which received donations from various "uncles" talks about nasty stereotypes and the defamation of Italian Americans even if your not talking about Italians in general....

Not a perfect analogy, but the point is that the ESRB effectively wields enough power, and has enough support from the government, that you can't truly consider it entirely voluntary, and that is why a lot of people tend to mistake it for a government body, because if it's crossed it can bring a ton of crap (including legal) on the heads of the people involved.

This is why so many people point fingers to private organizations and their relationship with the government nowadays, the government does favors and helps run support, and private industry in turn helps force the kind of "voluntary" regulation of anything from free speech, to organized representation of labor or business owners, allowing the government to indirectly do things it can't do directly. It's been talked about for a long time.

This is in part why I think more of these businesses need to fight back against censorship and groups like the ESRB. Especially when you look at the amount of money they have to throw at the problem and play the same kind of games right back instead of always just backing down. In short it sounds nasty, but big video game companies and the like need to start directly buying their own politicians, and that includes those in other countries. By doing this they can actually create a situation where things like the ESRB and PEGI effectively wind up working for the with them controlling the favors and "soft power" support, as opposed to following the agenda of people who want "offensive" things like crude sexual humor censored from video games.

That's just my opinion, I know many will disagree with me on all of this, including how all this practically works (especially seeing as I'm not great at explaining it). In short my basic argument is that everything is corrupt and for the right thing to be done, the guys who are right effectively have to become more corrupt than the other guys. It's a messed up world we live in sadly.

 

[RoonMian]

As an outsider and not from Germany I can understand the laws about Nazi symbology, the courts want a water tight way of banning the use of it with as few loopholes as possible. Is it right?

That's the way it is meant to be. The only exceptions are art and educational purposes. In all cases glorification of Nazi stuff will always be banned regardless if it is art or educational material. Video games do not fit into those two categories in Germany at the moment.

To make video games count as art in Germany a company would have to go into court and has to prove that their game is really art. But that did not happen yet as this company would not be allowed to sell the game (in a version with Nazi symbols) until the court has decided on the case. Lost sales would surely be the result and so far no company has tried this. Even in the best case this would probably only be a success for a single game and it would have to be repeated for every new game...

Games are in a funny position, some are just pure entertainment, others are art and some are educational. Some games mix the elements and be entertaining yet contain art and another might be educational art.

Personally I am not on board with the games are art thing, not all games at least. Many games can contain art and some might be making an artistic point but in general? No they are not art, is generic shooter #54895849 art? Sorry no, is a game like Journey art? Maybe, its certainly very artistic.

Games have to be judged on a case by case basis, any game wanting to use that horrible image would have to prove it was used artistically. How many judges would actually be able to make that call I don't know.

Right now 25 games have been actually banned in Germany since 1989. Most of those are games that had a different cut version specially for the German market while the uncut version was banned to avoid confusion and avoid a loophole with the second hardest hammer with that the BPjM (the government body rating games in Germany) can hit a game. The rest have been gems like the "Concentration Camp Manager" or the "Anti-Negro-Test" and stuff like that which violate German laws against inciting racial hatred. The UK and some Scandinavian countries have laws like that, too.

The thing though that sometimes causes the German special rules for this kind of thing to fuck over the rest of Europe is the "Index" (the second hardest thing I mentioned above). If a game is put on the "Index" it is not banned in Germany. You can still buy it legally without problem. The catch though is that due to youth protection that game cannot be advertised anywhere where minors could see the advertising. To avoid this publishers cut their own content so they can still roll the marketing machine.

My point is that this is not exactly censorship. Games aren't censored in Germany. The publishers do the censoring themselves if they expect higher sales that way.

Since 2003 though only very few games have actually been put on the index because that was when a legally binding 18+-rating was introduced (with a huge, ugly as hell red sticker on the game). Only very extreme games still get put on the index. Games where you would imagine even the advertising to be not fit for minors (one example was MadWorld for the Wii).

 

[J Tyran]

As an outsider and not from Germany I can understand the laws about Nazi symbology, the courts want a water tight way of banning the use of it with as few loopholes as possible. Is it right?

That's the way it is meant to be. The only exceptions are art and educational purposes. In all cases glorification of Nazi stuff will always be banned regardless if it is art or educational material. Video games do not fit into those two categories in Germany at the moment.

To make video games count as art in Germany a company would have to go into court and has to prove that their game is really art. But that did not happen yet as this company would not be allowed to sell the game (in a version with Nazi symbols) until the court has decided on the case. Lost sales would surely be the result and so far no company has tried this. Even in the best case this would probably only be a success for a single game and it would have to be repeated for every new game...

Games are in a funny position, some are just pure entertainment, others are art and some are educational. Some games mix the elements and be entertaining yet contain art and another might be educational art.

Personally I am not on board with the games are art thing, not all games at least. Many games can contain art and some might be making an artistic point but in general? No they are not art, is generic shooter #54895849 art? Sorry no, is a game like Journey art? Maybe, its certainly very artistic.

Games have to be judged on a case by case basis, any game wanting to use that horrible image would have to prove it was used artistically. How many judges would actually be able to make that call I don't know.

Right now 25 games have been actually banned in Germany since 1989. Most of those are games that had a different cut version specially for the German market while the uncut version was banned to avoid confusion and avoid a loophole with the second hardest hammer with that the BPjM (the government body rating games in Germany) can hit a game. The rest have been gems like the "Concentration Camp Manager" or the "Anti-Negro-Test" and stuff like that which violate German laws against inciting racial hatred. The UK and some Scandinavian countries have laws like that, too.

The thing though that sometimes causes the German special rules for this kind of thing to fuck over the rest of Europe is the "Index" (the second hardest thing I mentioned above). If a game is put on the "Index" it is not banned in Germany. You can still buy it legally without problem. The catch though is that due to youth protection that game cannot be advertised anywhere where minors could see the advertising. To avoid this publishers cut their own content so they can still roll the marketing machine.

My point is that this is not exactly censorship. Games aren't censored in Germany. The publishers do the censoring themselves if they expect higher sales that way.

Since 2003 though only very few games have actually been put on the index because that was when a legally binding 18+-rating was introduced (with a huge, ugly as hell red sticker on the game). Only very extreme games still get put on the index. Games where you would imagine even the advertising to be not fit for minors (one example was MadWorld for the Wii).

Self censorship is annoying but you can see where the developers ans publishers are coming from with it, its easier to edit the "objectionable" parts out rather than go through the palaver we see when games like Saints Row 4 are repeatedly refused classification in some countries and publishers have to go back and forth until it passes the censors. It is far easier to edit it before putting it up for classification.

Personally I hate the new system for game classification in the UK, games used to classified by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) who rated movies. The system was simple and fair, games with some violence and a bit of gore and/or revealing outfits that show some T&A got slapped with a 15 rating. Really violent games like Mortal Combat and/or games with sex and actual nudity where rated 18, it was easy to understand and as it was legally enforced (supplying under age kids with them was prosecutable) it pulled the teeth of the usual "games are evil" crowd because the defence was "kids shouldn't have them". Only 3-4 games where refused classification and where told they had to edit them before they could be sold. Only one game was ever actually banned but it was overturned in an appeal.

The law changed and now we use the PEGI system, its a stupid mess of symbols and has far less visual impact than the 15 and 18 system just about everyone understands because its been used for movies for decades. Now games are at the mercy of European censorship, if PEGI or another EU nation objects and demands censorship or a publisher self censors to pass classification Britain is affected when in the past it wouldn't have been with the old BBFC system.

Because of that I can certainly sympathise and understand your position.

 

[RoonMian]

Self censorship is annoying but you can see where the developers ans publishers are coming from with it, its easier to edit the "objectionable" parts out rather than go through the palaver we see when games like Saints Row 4 are repeatedly refused classification in some countries and publishers have to go back and forth until it passes the censors. It is far easier to edit it before putting it up for classification.

Personally I hate the new system for game classification in the UK, games used to classified by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) who rated movies. The system was simple and fair, games with some violence and a bit of gore and/or revealing outfits that show some T&A got slapped with a 15 rating. Really violent games like Mortal Combat and/or games with sex and actual nudity where rated 18, it was easy to understand and as it was legally enforced (supplying under age kids with them was prosecutable) it pulled the teeth of the usual "games are evil" crowd because the defence was "kids shouldn't have them". Only 3-4 games where refused classification and where told they had to edit them before they could be sold. Only one game was ever actually banned but it was overturned in an appeal.

The law changed and now we use the PEGI system, its a stupid mess of symbols and has far less visual impact than the 15 and 18 system just about everyone understands because its been used for movies for decades. Now games are at the mercy of European censorship, if PEGI or another EU nation objects and demands censorship or a publisher self censors to pass classification Britain is affected when in the past it wouldn't have been with the old BBFC system.

Because of that I can certainly sympathise and understand your position.

Well... That's odd... Because I'm the complete opposite of you...

In my opinion the PEGI system is actually pretty fair and most Germans wished Germany would ditch its special national way and just join PEGI.