Duck and Cover

www.clanbase.com wrote:Violent games turning illegal?
by: TheDevilOnLine
Last Tuesday the Secretaries of Justice of all EU countries met to discuss violent games. One of the current ideas being considered for the pipe line is, to ban all games with violence from the EU. Just like Germany has already done with extremely violent games. Will this be the end for our beloved games like CounterStrike, Battlefield, GTS:SA, Half Life 2, and Halo 2?

If it's up to the Dutch Secretary of Justice, Ernst Hirsch Ballin, all computer games that contain violence will be illegal soon in The Netherlands.

The secretary thinks that the current system used to rate games isn't good enough, since most stores don't enforce the age limit when people buy games. In The Netherlands it used to be the responsibility of the parents and the branches themselves.
"We have to keep looking if the current methods are still effective enough"

said the Secretary last Tuesday in the EU meeting.

"The outcome of the upcoming investigation can possibly be that we will make all violent games illegal"

Other countries from the EU, like Germany, already have a law to forbid these games. Hirsch Ballin thinks that all member countries of the EU should use the same policy.

During the EU-meeting, the German Secretary of Justice showed a video of an extremely violent game that has been forbidden in Germany, but is still allowed in the surrounding countries. The EU-meeting was because of a letter from the European Commissioner, (Justice) Franco Frattini. Frattini had seen the game 'The Rule of Rose' and was shocked by the mental and physical violence against a young girl inside the game. Frattini thinks that this sort of violent games encourages violence.

Frattini said last Tuesday that he wants a European rating. To get this done he already planned a lot of conversations with several game companies.
�Within the European free market we can't allow different approaches to fight violent games and video's

Frattini said. An earlier investigation already showed that one out of three children within the EU is unwillingly exposed to extreme violence or porn.

The game companies in The Netherlands and fifteen EU countries created their own rating system for games 1½ years ago. The Pan European Game Indicator (PEGI). An easy to understand picture system. A symbol with a fist in it means that the game contains violence, while a spider means that a game is scary.

In the meantime we are waiting for the result of the investigation, and hopefully it won't become as bad as the Secretary indicated. In my opinion it should always be possible to play a game like Unreal Tournament, or Battlefield. Ok, maybe some games go too far with the violence in it, but it all remains just a game, doesn't it? And if violent games are banned, they will find a new product that offers 'violence'. For now however, all games, violent or not, are still legal in most European countries, except Germany. And until it is illegal: Game On!

More on the German law against violent games, and four other weird laws about gaming can be read here

Superhaze wrote:(summer of 44 anyone?)

Adults being thirty years or older.

PsychoSniper wrote:They need to ban teh nips.

J-RPGs ruin teh RPG market.