Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas tagged with Adults Only 18+ ESRB rating

[James]

Well said.

 

[Gandhi]

But it is only pixels. Are u commiting a sin playing cs.

 

[[toj.cc]phantom]

But it is only pixels. Are u commiting a sin playing cs.

I don't think they are talking about the violence, because if they are I smeel hipocracy. But if oyu had kids would you let them watch/look at this stuff in games/on the internet? (I'm talking about the pornographic content)

Yes you avhe to mod the code to remove the censor software flag they put in to lock the code out. The fact remains..the graphic code was originally in there. This game should have been AO'ed anyways with the violence and immorality this games has without the porographic code unlocked.

So what your saying is that just because the game is really violent and immoral it should be rated A. Well then according to you almost every M game rated M should be rated A. The ESRB says an A rated game is;

ADULTS ONLY
Titles rated AO (Adults Only) have content that should only be played by persons 18 years and older. Titles in this category may include prolonged scenes of intense violence and/or graphic sexual content and nudity.

Yes the game 'contains' the code for the nudity but how do you view it? A mod, there are many mods that add nudity to games and no one makes a deal about them. Even if the code is there it is your choice wether to download the mod and unlock the code. Another thing is the violence, it says the game has to have prolonged scenes of violence, that describes almost any shooting game or game rated M for violence.

P.S. I don't mean any disrespect or offense to anyone including the people I quoted and commented on.

 

[Gandhi]

Here's the thing if u're a parent and u buy your kid a game rated mature, its your responsibility to watch them. The game is rated 17+ now its rated 18+, thats one year difference. The parents who bought the game for their 12 or 13 year old shouldn't be complaining, because it is a mature game u made the choice to buy it for your kid. And if what I hear is right u can only get the mod from the net, and don't most games warn u that internet game play might not be suitable for all ages, cursing and what ever.
ANd porn is one of those things that u can try to shield your kids from but most kids have dled it or seen it. And what would u rather watch (I know most of u are going to say neither but I hope u get my point) simulated porn or real video of porn.
And how do u say killing is ok in a game because its only pixels but sex is wrong. Do u just try to justify what u like as ok. Thats like the guy who is addicted to porn or weed or alcohol and try to justify it as ok to make them feel better. And if u do, that is hipocritical.

 

[SirThom]

Keep in mind that it wasn't until recently that M games were required to be purchased by someone 17+...it didn't used to be that way.

 

[[toj.cc]phantom]

Keep in mind that it wasn't until recently that M games were required to be purchased by someone 17+...it didn't used to be that way.

They still are, but it isn't the game creators fault when the stores don't do there part.

 

[Odale]

But it is only pixels. Are u commiting a sin playing cs.

When i play CS, i dont want to go kill someone, let alone do it "more".

What's interesting is how Rockstar handled the situation in the first place. It looked like they tried to paint the "Hot Coffee mod" as content created by hackers initially...

Round of applause to Rockstar for blaming innocent modders for their own mistake. That will not get them positive publicity.

It'll be interesting to see what politicians attempt to do with this development.

What politicians will try to do will not stand for very long, simplay because of the first ammendment. Rockstar may argue (and probably will if it gets taken to court) that this is an encroachment on their freedom of expression.

Either way, whether its good or bad publicity, Rockstar lost alot of sales... Microsoft (xBox) and Sony will not allow AO rated games on their platforms. I dont think that they would have put this in for "Good Publicity".

 

[MeridianFlight]

I vehemently disagree that the killing featured in Halo 2 is somehow more acceptable then the killing featured in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I don't want to cause this thread to be bumped into the religious discussion forum however.

 

[[toj.cc]phantom]

Either way, whether its good or bad publicity, Rockstar lost alot of sales... Microsoft (xBox) and Sony will not allow AO rated games on their platforms. I dont think that they would have put this in for "Good Publicity".

That my misinformed friend is were you are wrong. After the game was pulled of the shelves Rockstar began taking the afor mentioned code out of the game and they are re-releasing it. So instead of bad publicity they get double, besides the fact they had already sold thousands of copies in the first place.
($6 million copies of GTA: SA have been sold already)

I vehemently disagree that the killing featured in Halo 2 is somehow more acceptable then the killing featured in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. I don't want to cause this thread to be bumped into the religious discussion forum however.

I think the killing in Halo 2 is fine. For a few reasons;

• The point of the game is to kill aliens, not humans.
• Your killing aliens that started the fight not the other way around.
• Your killing aliens.
• Your killing aliens that would destroy Earth if/when they find it
• Oh yeah, your destroying an insane alien army bent on the total and cpmlete destruction of mankind.

Just wanted to add this little tid bit. The 'sex scenes' that the developers put into the game featured the characters fully clothed. You had to download a free program to 'undress' the sex scenes. I could post a link with picturs but maybe I shouldn't.

P.S. The link doesn't contain any nudity just a few risque, FULLY CLOTHED, actions.

 

[SirThom]

I think the killing in Halo 2 is fine.

And alternatively, the killing in GTA:SA is not fine because you have the option to go up to some innocent guy sitting on a park bench, cut his head off, then kick it down the street.


Ya, there you go. Much different from Halo, wouldn't you say? At least the killing in Halo makes sense, like Phantom pointed out.


And -- no, I have not played GTA, but that's I gather from one of my non-believer cousins.

 

[kraniac]

Let me state first that I play Halo 2.

You can kill your human teammates in Halo 2. If you play multiplayer, you kill humans as well. You can impale them with swords. You can run them over repeatedly with buggies and watch their bodies twitch. You can stick grenades on them and watch them go flying as they explode. You can keep shooting or hitting a corpse and watch the blood smear the walls. If you shoot someone in the head with a sniper rifle, the bullet smoke trail implies that the bullet actually passes through the victim's helmet and skull. And just because they're aliens doesn't mean it's automatically OK to kill them. What makes it OK is that you are at war with them, just as we would be at war with another country.

Before you state that you don't have to perform any of these actions, I should mention that you don't have to do a lot of things in GTA either.

The acts of killing in GTA and in Halo 2 are the same. What makes it different is that GTA is much gorier, also contains a truckload of sex and profanity, and glorifies illegal activities.

In the press release Rockstar implied that the ESRB shouldn't rate a game based on the mods for it. I am inclined to agree with that, since people make downloadable nude player models for games like UT2004 (which, properly configured, would easily be less objectionable than Halo 2 or Counter Strike).

The difference that I see between the UT2004 nude player models and the GTA mod is that the GTA mod doesn't actually add any new content to the game, it just unlocks what was there originally. The UT2004 nude models are extra code and textures that have to be added to the game to be displayed; the developers never intended for the game to be used for such a purpose. With GTA, you can bet that at some point in the design process the features unlocked by the mod were intended for release.

Nevermind that God of War got an M rating instead of the AO I believe it deserved. (That's hearsay, because I've never actually played it, I've just had it described to me. If anyone cares to argue this point I have no ground on which to stand.)

And since somebody argued that "it's just pixels" (very common thing to do) let me state that the medium on which a communication is transferred cannot add or detract to the morality of the communication itself. If I call you up on the phone and curse at you and personally insult you for five solid minutes (assuming you stayed on the line that long), you probably wouldn't be inclined to dismiss it as just electromagnetic waves conducted through wire and then translated into corresponding motions of air particles. Let's say there is a serial killer and he stabs to death an entire family of innocent people for no reason other than that he wanted to videotape himself doing it, then when he plays that tape to relive his crime, is it just pixels too?

The only way the pixels argument can stand up to reason is if you are prepared to say that no communication can be morally wrong. I don't think that's something the large majority of people would agree with. Anyone who's ever seen a forum flame war can attest to the fact that sometimes communications are very wrong.

 

[SirThom]

You can kill your human teammates in Halo 2.

I might add that you can kill your teammates in many modern FPS games, we're not limited to Halo or GTA.

Anyway, these 'M' games are rated that way for a reason, but I'm still of the opinion that there should be a rating between 'T' and 'M', much the way that they did with 'E10'. I can't see Halo getting an 'M' rating if there were such a rating, and then all the extreme games like GTA and Postal (which is another matter entirely) would get an 'M' rating.

 

[Tek7 (Legacy)]

Hm. I'm leaving this thread in General Discussion now only to ensure that I don't inadvertantly hand off a stressful situation to Genesis (who leads the Religious Discussion Forum).

Tempers have been cool so far, but if anyone "flares up" then I'll lock the thread. I don't anticipate that happening, as everyone's been civil so far.

 

[Gandhi]

The acts of killing in GTA and in Halo 2 are the same. What makes it different is that GTA is much gorier, also contains a truckload of sex and profanity, and glorifies illegal activities.

Alot of games a gory, and in the future their going to become more realistic. Way back in the day people were complaining about wolfinstine. And without the mod there is no sex, u might see u and a girl get in the car and see the car shake but thats it. And if u can't handle that don't play mature games, or watch movies rated PG14. And y wouldn't u have profanity, and illegal activity in it, u're a gang member, would it seem real if they went around saying "please" and thank you", it goes with making the game more real. Would battlefield be a fun game to play if u ran to the german and said "please don't shoot, lets all be friends because killing is wrong".
U're still trying to justify something to make u feel better. U can't complain that u only kill aliens in Halo so thats ok, because there is alot of CS players in here. Are u going to start trying to justify it by saying u kill terrorists and their bad.

And alternatively, the killing in GTA:SA is not fine because you have the option to go up to some innocent guy sitting on a park bench, cut his head off, then kick it down the street.

U have the option in cs to knife a guy, u have the option in splinter cell to slit a guys throat. U can't justify certain violence to be ok to see and some violence to be wrong. Violence is violence and if u say well its not only pixels, don't play any violent games.

If u don't like the cursing and activities going on in the game thats fine thats your opinion, but remember it was a mature game. And a 17 year old would probobly see that in a movie rated PG.

 

[SirThom]

U have the option in cs to knife a guy, u have the option in splinter cell to slit a guys throat. U can't justify certain violence to be ok to see and some violence to be wrong.

Okay, but in CS, you're eliminating terrorists (or the other way around, depending on whose side you're on...), and it's the same way in Splinter Cell....you're doing it for good, for a good benefit (sp).

Violence is violence[...]

True...we see violence over in the Middle East on a daily basis, but like I said, it's for a good cause. But, that's for another topic

[...]and if u say well its not only pixels, don't play any violent games.

Nope, I'm not saying that.

And a 17 year old would probobly see that in a movie rated PG.

I'm not sure what the Canadian movie rating scheme is up there, but in the U.S., a PG-rated movie wouldn't contain such violence.

 

[Gandhi]

Okay, but in CS, you're eliminating terrorists (or the other way around, depending on whose side you're on...), and it's the same way in Splinter Cell....you're doing it for good, for a good benefit (sp).

So violence in games is ok if its against "bad" people. So if the next version of splinter cell or Cs allowed u to cut the guys head off and kick it, it would be ok because their "bad guys".
Your still trying to justify violence, u can't say violence in a certain game is ok because its for a good reason but not in the other.

And I'm not sure how it is in the states but I've seen PG14+ movies with topless girls, and cursing.

Read what PG13 allows in america
http://www.mpaa.org/movieratings/about/index.htm

A PG-13 film is one which, in the view of the Rating Board, leaps beyond the boundaries of the PG rating in theme, violence, nudity, sensuality, language, or other contents, but does not quite fit within the restricted R category. Any drug use content will initially require at least a PG-13 rating. In effect, the PG-13 cautions parents with more stringency than usual to give special attention to this film before they allow their 12-year olds and younger to attend.

And this is the canadian (British Colombia, where I'm from. Each province has their own rating but their pretty similar) rating system. Their pretty much the same.
http://www.pssg.gov.bc.ca/film_class/classcat.htm

 

[SirThom]

So if the next version of splinter cell or Cs allowed u to cut the guys head off and kick it, it would be ok because their "bad guys".

Well, if that was really how you played the game, I wouldn't have as much of a problem with it...not as much as I do if it's some bystander that ges knifed (sp) in a game that promotes illegal acts to begin with. As far as I know, spies and covert-op guys can do whatever they have to go get rid of who they're supposed to get rid of.

I've seen PG14+ movies with topless girls, and cursing.

You PG before, not PG14, so that's what I was basing my statement on.

 

[Gandhi]

Well, if that was really how you played the game, I wouldn't have as much of a problem with it...not as much as I do if it's some bystander that ges knifed (sp) in a game that promotes illegal acts to begin with. As far as I know, spies and covert-op guys can do whatever they have to go get rid of who they're supposed to get rid of.

Well in GTA your a gang member, stealing and killings of innocent bystanders happen in real life so ofcource it would be ok to do it in the game.
Also how many spies or covert opps guys do u know to say its ok for them. Your still rationilising killing in the game because thats what u think a spy would do.
So what do u think a street gang member would do?
How many innocent people have been killed in drive bys?
Y is it ok to kill people in a certain games, and not in others.
Would it be ok if I see a guy convicted of rape walking down the street and shoot him. Would u as the judge say the act of murder in this instance is ok because that was a bad guy. Or is murder still murder.

 

[SLNT_FIR]

religious discussion?

 

[Gandhi]

could I ask y?