Combat games disrespect war laws, report claims
Videogames should respect the real-world rules governing wars, a report has concluded, following research into how many videogames break them. A study of 20 titles, including many from the Call of Duty and Tom Clancy series, carried out by Pro Juvenile – an organisation which aims to protect kids from unlimited videogame …
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Don't let them get hold of Grand Theft Auto...
Don't these people have anything better to do?
So I guess if instead of nazis or whoever we have zombies, they wouldn't care? Is it only 'realistic' games that must be within the 'virtual' law?
Or perhaps next they'll be saying how pacman is cruel because eating ghosts is against their non-human rights.
Strewth.
Dear Pro Juvenile and Trial...
IT'S NOT REAL. IT'S FAKE.
FANTASY.
A STORY.
FICTION.
FALSE.
ARTIFICIAL.
If these games were at all meant to imitate reality to any reasonable standard, there would be only one play-through, and if you died the game would delete itself and prevent re-installation, to accurately represent real life death in that situation.
who gives a shit?
i buy a war/shoot em up game to do exactly that... wage unconditional war and shoot shit up!
fuck off beurocracy and let me play my games in peace.
Reality?
I thought the whole point of video games was that you have the freedom to explore and do things that you can't in the real world?
Where do we draw the line? GTA4? One man taking on an entire armed police dept. Not moral, banned. Jedi Knight series? Lightsabers? Hacking people up with a freakin' laser beam? Banned. CSS? Killing cops is not legal, terrorist team disbanded. "Counter terrorists win"
I'll get my coat, and go buy CoD MW2 just to take out my frustration about this on innocents.
*long pause*
Failure of common sense, on an epic scale.
How is it that the millions gamers the world over can understand the distinction between video games and reality, but those that seek to "protect" us from video game violence cant manage it?
Of course games give "the illusion of impunity"...
If you want the reality of impunity you need a real war.
Reverse the report...
Politicians should follow the Juvenile's rules. Total war.
remove civilians
You could just remove all civilians... then they can't be accidentally hurt.
What next, the RSPCA getting involved because we're killing mutants in STALKER?
Churches getting involved due to Assassin's Creed?
All FPSs being banned because 'respawning' is not-realistic?
How about introducing the guantanamo bay addon, when you get captured by the americans, you go there for waterboarding, instead of respawning?
here we go AGAIN
having failed in the usual "oh no this game has blood" approach, now we have "this game violates paragraph 3 subsection (b) of the geneva convention".
I'd like to point out how amazingly boring all games would be with all characters (playable or npc) being 100% legal and honorable.
not that story writing for games is particularly amazing, but it would ruin alot of games I have played if the main character was not allowed to "go badass" when his wife and child are killed, for instance.
to answer the point about military training, the military make their own games for that! America's Army, Operation Flashpoint, Project IGI - all games spawned from military efforts to produce training platforms for their troops.
you can't break any rules in america's army or they send you to the stockade. I ended many a game there, wishing the twat with the harmonica in the next cell along was actually infront of me so i could kill him.
i think i just made another point why you should be allowed to kill civies in war games. sometimes - they get in your way so you are stuck, or they do something annoying and persist in it, and to make the game bearable / playable you shoot them.
anyone who has played oblivion / elder scrolls will know what i'm talking about.
There is nothing better.......
After a hard days graft trying to get dumb people to use a system is to go online and shoot some spotty american teenager playing americas army.
Nothing like an RPG backblast BBQ and a spot of teabagging along with some insulting chat to relieve the daily grind.
Does it make me want to go out and kill real people, hell no, thats dangerous!
Paris - brighter than the researchers and more interesting as well.
Virtual terrorists unite!
It's only a game. I know full well that it's only a game and wouldn't dream of doing things that I do in games such as Modern Warfare 2 or GTA in real life.
@AC 24/11 09:11 - Lemmings?
Why, what do Lemmings REALLY do that justifies your inclusion in your comment?
Do you mean the time Disney chucked a load of a cliff, because they wouldn't conform to a silly myth?
So...
Adult games are bad for kids...
So don't allow the kids to buy them. Let Adults buy them instead..
This report is shocking!!
Piss orf..!
"Suck on this!"
Pro Juvenile?
Somebody should tell them that these are 18 rated games and are not meant for children, in fact are illegal for children to buy, or to be bought for, in civilised countries.
They'd be better off spending their time educating parents that modern computer games aren't actually designed for children.
war laws
hahahahahahahahahahahahaha
War laws
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Get a grip.
You can try to sanitise a war as much as you like, you can try to put in rules of engagement and trials and all that mock bullshit afterwards to make it seem all nice and legal but in the end it's about one group of people trying to gut the other group as quickly as possible, normally because there is something they want.
Sure you can dress it up as a police action. Sure you can complain that the other side tortured your people, sure you can tell your troops to only fire if fired upon but that's all bullshit. If you're at war then you have to torture and you have to kill and you have to maim because that's what it takes to get that war won. Do you really think that in WW2 (the last war that actually needed to happen) they were concerned about international law? Sure there were off the record gentlemanly agreements (you don't bomb Cambridge and we'll not flatten Heidelberg yet) and sure there were conventions for POW which the Allies and the Crouts subscribed to but when the Japs decided to torture the hell out of the allied POWs there was nothing the allies could do apart from up the stakes and win that thing.
Proportionate response in war is something uniquely western. Having bombed the crap out of large portions of the middle east do you really think that johnny terrorist is looking for a proportionate response? Fuck no, he's looking to do as much damage as possible. Do you really think that any US soldier caught in a sandy shithole is going to get medical care like the guys in gitmo get? Fuck no. I say ditch the idea of proportionate response and say "you touch one of our guys and we'll flatten half your country, you touch two of our guys and we raze it to the ground and turn it into glass". That would put a pretty quick end to people fucking with anyone who has military might (and what point is there to having military might if you are too pussy to use it).
No but seriously, war laws, you crack me up.
War?
If the purpose of games was to depict an ideal world, would it not be better to produce games where there was no warfare at all, lawful or otherwise? Something like Bunch of Flowers 4: Modern Floral Arrangements?
Simple solution
From hereon, let it be known that all persons opposing the player in any armed videogame conflict are to be classified as 'enemy combatants' As such, they are not fighting under the flag of any national entity recognised by the UN and therefore not protected under the Geneva Conventions or any other articles of war.
It's a cop-out that works for the Brits and Americans in real life, why can't it work in games too?
Missed the point as usual.
And of course the laws are always followed in real life aren't they? Just because a law exists, doesn't mean it gets followed. Abu Graib? Guantanamo? That's why cretins like this irritate me. Typical hand-wringing liberal attitude. It's the individuals involved that choose whether to follow the law or not, and govern their actions accordingly.
However, it might actually be interesting to build a war game where these laws do have an effect. Plenty of RPGs have a moral mechanism built in which affects gameplay. I think it's actually got potential. Fight clean and be lauded as a hero, or go rogue, get the job done and then escape into the jungles of Cambodia to run as soldier-for-hire? Games with a moral choice and ambiguity I find very interesting.
Ah crap
Damn it!
When survival is assured and the natural order denied, those that would, should, have been food suddenly find they have no purpose.
@Alpha Tony
"...And lets not waste the opportunity to teach kids about dangerous fungus by ensuring that whenever Mario eats a brightly coloured mushroom he throws up everywhere and spends 14 hours screaming that the snake people are trying to eat his shoes."
Actually, thats sounds like a pretty good game to me :)
Seriously...
research...
---------------------------------
carried out by Pro Juvenile – an organisation which aims to protect kids from unlimited videogame violence
---------------------------------
... and how many wargames (CoD4:MW2 for instance) are 18 certificates? Or indeed games that aren't wargames such as Grand Theft Auto.
Kids are already protected from violence in videogames by the BBFC/PEGI rating certificate - so what they're essentially saying is that "children playing unsuitable games may be exposed to things that are unsuitable for children" - no shit, really?
It's quite simple...
but then again so are most of the comments here.
As a society, we function not only based on the laws that exist, but the laws that we choose to enable. These tend to be as a direct response to some sort of moral or ethical standpoint.
Those, in turn, are entirely based on the lawmakers views and experiences themselves. The same is entirely true of foreign policy, or military orders.
So, you let people play war games which are becoming almost photorealistic, and the line between "game" and "real life" falters. Seems harmless.
Why does this matter? Because, as the article is trying to point out, games are a perfect way of modifying social behaviour.
In the same way an entire generation of young people do not consider spelling or punctuation to be important, thanks to the wonders of SMS and facebook, a generation are going to lose any ability to show compassion when they encounter a real life event which is similar to a computer game.
You and I may be able to tell the difference; but we are not one of the disenfranchised youth who are being molded by the violent games they play.
Still don't see the relevance of how your experiences as a child might cause problems as an adult?
When Dubya was a young man, his father was head of the CIA. Now, consider for a moment what an interesting view of the world and American foreign policy junior was exposed to. Roll it forward a couple of decades, and he is president.
Now do you see how your childhood experiences, not matter how harmless at the time might be somewhat detrimental to society?
@kissingthecarpet
OK, I'll assume you're stupid and not just trolling.
Lemmings was a hugely popular game that first appeared on the Amiga and spawned many imitations and sequels.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemmings_(video_game)
It involved the little critters getting killed in many interesting ways. Hence the reference.
RE:And in return...
"Should Priests be allowed spend talent points in Shadow?" No! I mean, you roll a healing class and then spec non healing. Shadow is for offspec and leveling.
Anyway, you do kind of have a point. This is something that has been discussed in the RP (pen and paper, not PC) community for a long time. Is it moraly right to assume that all Orcs are bad? Should heros attack first, just because they see something as "evil". Fortunatly most of the RP comunity are well educated adults so able to discuss this without making sweeping statments and slinging mud.
Yet another report missing the obvious...
How many times do we have to see these stupid reports about violent games causes people to become violent? Especially seeing as its been proven to be a false claim so many times...
OK so now there looking at War crimes... It's just ridiculous reasoning behind the whole premise that being able to commit a war crime in a game is likely to make a person go out and commit a war crime. Well here's an idea why dont we go ask some people currently serving time for War crimes if they ever played computer games? And whether they thought that was the reason for it... I bet they'd say yes - anything to pass the buck on to someone else... But how many congolese, sudanese, serb, *insert conflict zone here* soldiers had/have access to computer games? Do they really think thats the resaon why these things continue to happen today is that they possibly had access to these games? And what about the war crimes that happened before computer games were ever invented? Mankind has been coming up with ways to be despicable to each other for millenia - computer games will not add or take away from that one bit...
The only people stupid enough to play a game where you get to commit a war crime and who actually believe you could do that in real life (or would even want to!) are the sorts of people who 30 years ago would have been in a mental institute. And i would strongly hope that our military (and military's world wide) have ways of idenitfying these people and preventing them from joining up...
...although perhaps i am being too optimistic.
A Stark Simple Head Choice with One All Win Win Option and One All Losers Lose Everything Guarantee.
It is naive of the masses and most helpful to those able to Play their Virtual Games for Real, that you do not Realise that Particular and Peculiar Ability, and the Facility that actually renders to them the Powers to do as they Will, for they so easily Can.
And what do you think they would target to Non Lethally Destroy a Corrupt Present World Order whilst also Indicating that which is Needed to be Changed in Order to Guarantee their Future Survival? And that is the Flip Sunny Side of the Coin.
The Flop Dark Side is, for such Enabled Power Players, Equally as Easily Virtually Played for Real and in it, are there No Corrupt Present World Order Survivors to Blight IT and the Future.
Such seemingly Polar Opposite choices would normally be automatically well decided correctly, but one can never overmisunderestimate the Idiotic Evil that Possesses the Manic Fool who thought themselves Failsafe and FoolProof rather than Destined for Hells Fires dangling on the End of a Long Swift Journey on a Shortened Sharp Rope .......
So this end game of this presumably means...
That I would no longer be able fly into Buckingham palace at 500Kts while piloting a Lancaster bomber in MS Flight Simulator.
Pointless, self interested numpties these groups.
@Ed Blackshaw
"arganisations"
If that's supposed to mean "groups of trolls that exist purely to provoke daft arguments" then 70-some odd comments, mostly of a warmish nature, would indicate they're on the money here.
If it's just a typo, then I'm very disappointed. Hell, I'm going to start using it anyway.
(untitled
"Intentionally directing attacks against civilians"
There's no such thing as a civilian, just conscripts who ain't been called up yet.
They're all as guitly as sin. Nuke 'em.
Geneva does not apply
As far as I can tell the rules or war apply only to warfare among humans...
Have games screwed me up?
Nope. Having started on "adventure", "rogue" and "hack" in the 70s , I can safely say that I am still a normal adult. Ok, so I might be a bit old to be still playing games, but boy! are they fun!
And that's the point; games need to evolve to key the early adopters engaged. I'm looking forward to total immersion games in which every bullet, every sword, every plasma ray hits home with a vengeance.
I suggest the next game should have the working title:
"COD: War on Censors"
what a bunch of delusional lawmakers
It just shows how that people in power are such dysfunctional, delusional, living on fantasy land where games not being seen as fantasy they must be seen as reality...
Who in UK cares about MPs stealing money from the tax man only 4 handed to police? what about all others?
Who in UK cares about the real game wars on Iraq and Afghanistan? And our soldiers dying just to serve political agendas.
Who in UK still care about an invasion of Iraq which was unlawful in the eyes of international law? Weapons of mass "distraction" which the tune conveniently changed to "oust the evil Sadam".
Who in UK cares about the unemployment figures going up?
Who in UK still cares about how much the fantasy governing members offered to banks and when it will be returned?
But yeah lets create a law to defend the game character rights to live.
After all, parents are unable to coupe with responsibilities to raise children in this country...so the government has to step it replace them with idiotic laws
But firstly lets call the NHS mental department, to pay visit all those patient's that have a seat at the commons - because they all seem unable to distinguish fantasy from reality...
*arf*
"Whaddya mean, "Teabagging is outlawed by the Geneva Convention"?"
just remember
everyone talking about torture and bombing civillians, lets not forget shooting enemy soldiers with hollowpoint bullets is also classed as a warcrime.
we obviously couldn't have anyone exposed to such horrors like that, it's not like it happens on a daily basis on American streets.
Thats why it is called - GAME!!
Are they not have proper functioning brains?
@Tom Oliver:
Which part of the number 18 do you not understand?
ALL the games mentioned in the report are RATED 18, for f*ck's sake. They're NOT intended for children and are therefore designed as such.
"You and I may be able to tell the difference; but we are not one of the disenfranchised youth who are being molded by the violent games they play."
Have you been living on Mars for the last thirty years? Commercially-produced computer games have been around since the early '70s. Granted, the graphics have improved in leaps and bounds, but the input devices haven't changed all that much. Most games still rely on a minor evolution of the control systems of *cranes* as their primary user interface.
As long as we retain that 2D display (no matter how "enhanced" it is with coloured films and faux-3D effects) and that physical, abstracted interface, we aren't going to be in any real danger of confusing the game's simulated models with reality itself.
"In the same way an entire generation of young people do not consider spelling or punctuation to be important, thanks to the wonders of SMS and facebook, a generation are going to lose any ability to show compassion when they encounter a real life event which is similar to a computer game."
Oh do shut up you sad, deluded person. Any kid who can use abbreviations like "4nic8" must have a pretty decent vocabulary. Most kids use SMS abbreviations because they're *used* to them, not because they don't know how to spell. And no, they're NOT all roaming our streets trying to kill us. Most of them are no better or worse than we were at their age.
If spelling were the only metric for intelligence, half the Ph.Ds of this country would fail your test. The lax spelling skills of many adults today can be traced back to the rise of word processors and spell-checkers. Failing grammar skills can be similarly traced to people relying increasingly on their computers to do it for them.
It's the quality and range of your vocabulary which defines the clarity, depth and subtlety of your thought processes, not how good you are at spelling.
It doesn't stop there!
Also, if you get shot all you need to do is crouch behind something for 30 seconds and you heal... oh, and if you shoot your teammate in the head don't worry too much because they'll come back to life and you can apologise (or they'll just shoot you right back).
You know, it's almost like computer games aren't reality...
Implementation problem
I can understand wanting to not encourage certain activities. However, it's not easy to do that in a reasonable way. For example, Fallout 3 keeps players from killing children by making them immortal, so you can hit them with knives, shotguns, grenades, and whatever else as many times as you like; is that really an improvement? (The European versions of Fallout 1 & 2 removed the child sprites, preventing them from being targeted in the first place.) Should players be unable to fire a weapon when they might hit a civilian or other 'unapproved target'? Avoiding simulated war crimes is a nice idea, but there's no easy way to do that without putting blatantly artificial restraints on gameplay.
We don't need the violence.
You're being exploited by video game publishing houses who sell grotesque violence, like that seen in Modern Warfare 2 and then take gains from the publicity it must solicit.
We don't need that sort of violence, understandably some creature or enemy must be defeated in games but that enemy should not be a child or a plane packed with civillians. It hasn't always been in games, the best game 'FUED' was about turning villagers into zombies to take out an family member with whom you were sharing a fued.
Now imaging that when I say taking him out I mean on a date, fun, fun, fun.
LOL
I'm with another poster on here; Total War. Anyone who opposes me in any way, indeed anyone who doesn't unconditionally support me, is clearly my enemy and thus an ‘enemy combatant’ who's not covered by the Geneva Convention; ergo I can do what I like to them.
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