Document glitch sparks GTA IV ban scare Any gamers left panicking after reading that the Grand Theft Auto IV videogame has been refused a UK rating by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC) can rest easy. Register Hardware can confirm that a misinterpretation of classification documents falsely sparked the rumours - the game has actually been awarded an 18 …
if GTA IV had been refused a certificate there would have been riots, civil war and i personally would have burned their offices to the ground
not that violent video games engender violent behaviour or anything, but damnit it's hard enough to wait the next 27 days let along potentially having to wait longer!!!
...That certain items should be drop kicked into the ocean on arrival.
Once again, common sense, family values, and common decency suffer at the hands of rampant commercialism.
Hold up a moment.
Didn't WE teach them that trick when we went after the Black Ship in the late Middle Ages?
oops.
I'll get me coat ;)
>I guarantee that every single one of my sons 14 yr old school friends will have this game within 24hrs of release, they've been going on about it for weeks.<
well do a mail shot to all their parents, get a meeting going, and, if that doesn't work, inform the police on them - those 14 year olds almost got Manhunt banned for us adult...
Although, point in fact, I don't know any adults who are actually going to buy it - plenty of male teenagers tho' are drooling in anticipation, so it would appear Rockstar know their audience.
/joke
"I guarantee that every single one of my sons 14 yr old school friends will have this game within 24hrs of release, they've been going on about it for weeks."
While there is a slim chance that some of those parents have evaluated the game and decided that its ok for their kids to play, which i have no problem with, my money's on it just being shit parenting for the majority. ie. little johnny was whining about it so much they bought it just to shut him up!
Not neccesarily "Shit parenting". It could just as easily have been that the parents have seen this sort of thing before with video nasties, the furore over "Murder Simulators" after columbine/dunblane. And will have been watching/playing them all that time without any negative effect. So they just assume that it's safe for their kids.
Me? I've been playing first person shooters since Doom (aged... ooh.. 5 or so?) and I am not a violent person. In fact except for the glasses and the belt that's larger than I'd like, they've had no negative impacts on me.
Or the kids might just hide it from their parents- how many people reading this page used to have (or still do have) porn/slasher flicks/violent video games/etc that their parents/partner/etc don't know about?
What is the point in the BBFC classifying video games?
Most parents ignore the classifications anyway. I recall going into a high-street game centre & listening to a conversation between the sales assistant & a parent buying their kid (probably about 10) a game (Think it was GTA3 - Vice City) which was classified over their kids age. Parent wasn't bothered, an basically said it's just a game. As Sooty said - Shit Parenting.
Adam has a good point in saying that the majority of "underage" people will play this as the game it is & leave it at that. But with some of the little shits around, and the current issues with Happy-slapping, gun/knife culture & the glamorisation of violence in the entertainment industry (mainly hiphop music) combined with shit parenting, it won't be long till something happens.
"But with some of the little shits around, and the current issues with Happy-slapping, gun/knife culture & the glamorisation of violence in the entertainment industry (mainly hiphop music) combined with shit parenting, it won't be long till something happens."
So until violence was shown in the media, there wasn't any murder and every teenager was a nice person?
Violence has been around as long as life has been around, and blaming the media for pyscho's and idiots who kill, copycat a game/movie is the easy excuse rather then dealing with the issue at hand which is the person themselves.
Weren't there some politicians wittering a few weeks back about a need for controls on video games?
And here's the BBFC quietly getting on with doing the job.
The problem with the BBFC is that they have, at times, followed some odd policies, apparently derived from the personal bias of one or other people who have been in charge. They've shown that unsupervised power can be abused.
Trouble is, they have the government breathing down their neck, and that's the epitome of unsupervised power.
It's good to know that less than a week after the Byron report came out the same old arguments on classification are being trotted out.
a) Didn't do me any harm
Cigarette smoking saved my life. Given there was less than a 0.1% chance of the event occurring recommending smoking just in case is not a good idea.
b) 14 year olds will get it anyway.
How many 18 films did you get into/watch when you were 14 (I'm assuming pre-download days)? It always happens. The point in the real worlds that 12 year olds might get stopped (and 14 year old boys might brag more than the reality anyway).
If instead of rehashing the same old prejudice you even bothered to look at current recommendations, you'd know that
research shows that _some_ games can lead to more violent behavior (and the same is true of films, stuff on the net etc). Not all and not everyone but there's a risk (ignoring scaring kids ***less which may not be great anyway.
The point is to educate parents to realise that this stuff contains what it does. That's one of the key findings of the Byron report.
I don't have kids, but I still like the idea of kids having a childhood and understanding stuff when they are ready to.
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it would appear Rockstar know their audience.
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I like GTA and I'm in the over 30 bracket... granted I only really play Vice City - lovin' that cheesy 80s crap on the radio, big ol' grin on my face hooning around listening to "Blondie". Mind I do that in my real car as well, just without doing a ton in city streets, weilding guns, kerb crawling or running anyone down.
"Doo do doo Doooooo - Atomic"
"But with some of the little shits around, and the current issues with Happy-slapping, gun/knife culture & the glamorisation of violence in the entertainment industry (mainly hiphop music) combined with shit parenting, it won't be long till something happens."
And when it happens, it will be blamed on (GTA/Manhunt/insert devil game of choice), whether or not it has anything to do with it. Again. These type of kids aren't so stupid that they won't try to use a get-out clause if one's available. They'll behave exactly like they want, mug an old granny and then shout "TEH GAIM MAID ME DO IT!!!".
If we see this (or any others) banned, then I'm campaigning for the banning of all Beatles records because one of their songs (Helter Skelter) was cited as cause for murder (Manson Family). So there.
Judging by the BBFCs rather childish comments when they were told they finally had to allow Manhunt 2 a release I wouldn't be suprised if they released the document early to be difficult with Rockstar.
It's also amusing that they say that they decided to let the drug cocktail thing slide as if they're doing a favour. So it's doing a favour to let a completely made up recipe slide but it's okay for various recent horror films to show in full realistic graphic detail testicles being crushed to the point of bursting, eyeballs hanging out of their sockets and general dismemberment and gutting in various films.
The BBFC needs to be removed, it's a pointless and irrelevant organisation.
It's not the fault of Rockstar that games like this fall into the hands of 14 year old kids, it's the fault of poor parents for not knowing what their kids are up to and not taking an active part in raising them.
If parents were more accountable for their offspring then they would not be able to blame antisocial behaviour on third parties. In the US they have classes in school which are mandatory and teach kids about the level of responsibility it takes to be a parent while we just teach them about sex and let them know that there is a council flat and income available for anyone who gets pregnant.
"I guarantee that every single one of my sons 14 yr old school friends will have this game within 24hrs of release, they've been going on about it for weeks."
I am the guardian of my 13 year old brother and he is aware of GTA and will obviously petition me for a copy (or a go on my copy) but it's been classified as 18 and so that means that if I find that he has obtained it from *anywhere* other than from me then I will take the necessary actions against the person who supplied it to him illegally. I know what sites he visits and I know what games he plays because he gets adequate non invasive supervision (and he knows it so has realised that it's better to come clean than to try to hide things from me). If, after playing it, I deem it to be suitable for him then I may allow him to play it but he's not going to be allowed to lend it or even play in the presence of friends unless their parents have agreed that it is OK.
It's that simple.
I've always used a baseball bat to steal one off a 14 year old in order to provide them with a balanced view of the violence in the game.....
Point is if you permit your child to have the game you are endorsing it. What you had to hide from your parents you knew they thought was unacceptable. There are enough bad influences on children without endorsing them role playing at being a violent drug dealer.
Just remember that when they start sniffing lighter fluid.
I totally agree with you. But do you let your brother go to his friends houses? No matter what you think is unsuitable, unless you keep them under lock and key, they do get to play them elsewhere.
Personally I do the same as you, play the game, and if I think its suitable, I let my son play it. That said, I only apply it to 18 rated games, a year ago I would have applied it to 16 rated games but now my sons 14, having witnessed many many 16 rated games, they have the odd F word in them (far far less that they hear in the playground) and I know my son, I know how he thinks, I know he realises the difference between fantasy and real life, and so far, I haven't found a game rated at either 16 or 18 that my son wanted to play and I found unsuitable for him.
In fact I often see 15 rated films that seem a lot worse than 18 rated games.
this is the thing that takes the piss, the Government want a body to regulate games? do they not realise that the BBFC does or do they think the same thing we all do and that is the BBFC are shit.
i have 2 kids, both under 6. i would not let my son play them. i have heard of kids as young as 4 playing these games.
saying that, i watched robocop when i was about 5 or 6, i knew it wasn't real, my parents told me this and if i didn't wanna watch it i could just look away or turn it off. it's just like a cartoon, or power rangers. you have to watch it and then turn it off if it's not right.
sometimes simpsons is too much and that just shows you how things have changed
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