You know what? I want to see the US do what the UK has done since the early-mid 90's with games.
Have a legally enforced rating system.
Here in the UK (For the uninitiated, really) we have the BBFC, the British Board of Film Classification (As i'm sure most of you know anyway <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->), the BBFC, in short, review films and now games with "questionable content" (Your GTA's, Manhunts, God of War's, etc) and pastes a nice big label on the packaging showing the rating. Usual stuff like U, PG, 15, 18, and other more recent in-betweeners. Ontop of this we still have the likes of PEGI and so on giving recommendations, but they're just that, recommendations, the BBFC rating is a rock solid "It's illegal to sell this game / movie to anyone under this age" rating. And it is goooooood.
All films go through the ratings process, and get a rating, but when it comes to games, there's only the 15 or 18 certificates that are handed out if they are in any way offensive and such, and even still, some games avoid the rating if they only have bad language. Because the "f-word" never killed anyone.
I'm sure that it may be a tad drastic, as no doubt there are minors who are stable and mature enough to play games. But this just helps those parents that really don't have any clue about video games to know that a game is right or wrong for their child. Parents, let's face it, on the whole, don't know much about the games there are out there. Most of them, mine included, wouldn't be able to tell you that GTA:SA, Manhunt or God of War aren't suitable for children. But i can say one thing, here in the UK, if any parent was asked to buy any of these games, one look at the box would tell them exactly what kind of game it is. That nice red, round "18" certificate pasted on the front of the box will tell them that the game is not suitable for people under 18.
EDIT:
Also, getting a little bit more specific to the topic, the mod in question for GTA:SA, Hot Coffee, is embarassingly bad. I can see entirely why they took it out, probably not for risk of offending people and probably not through pressure to make the came less obscene, but because, in plain english, it's laughable. It works just like the Gym minigames, buttonmashing to raise "excitement" and such, but the poor models, animations and, frankly, non-existant production values apparent with it, merely suggest that it sucked too badly to be included and they just never bothered to remove it.
But personally, i really don't understand why game makers should be held responsible for what modders have done. Although the Hot Coffee mod is kind of a seperate case, as it merely unlocked the sex minigame, as opposed to the common conception of mods to be fan created content, but still, the minigame was not meant for the public to see, and as such, without some modding jiggery-pokery, it wasn't. It's like saying a kid's game has bad language because you went into the binaries and found the "f-word" in some comments in the code. It's not there for you to see and it's not a part of the final product that's available to the end user. Just because someone with too much time poked around and found it, does not mean the game itself or the developers are at fault.
EDIT 2: Hot Chocolate? Christ, i'm hung over, ok, Hot Coffee.
<!--QuoteBegin-esuna+Jul 15 2005, 10:12 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (esuna @ Jul 15 2005, 10:12 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> It's like saying a kid's game has bad language because you went into the binaries and found the "f-word" in some comments in the code. It's not there for you to see and it's not a part of the final product that's available to the end user. Just because someone with too much time poked around and found it, does not mean the game itself or the developers are at fault. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> Wasn't microsoft chastised by this by some europeans? some leaked/released (can't remember) source was seen to have the coders swearing in the comments. This was a while ago, so it's kind of fuzzy now.
<!--QuoteBegin-Roberto+Jul 15 2005, 11:41 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (Roberto @ Jul 15 2005, 11:41 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> <!--QuoteBegin-esuna+Jul 15 2005, 10:12 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (esuna @ Jul 15 2005, 10:12 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> It's like saying a kid's game has bad language because you went into the binaries and found the "f-word" in some comments in the code. It's not there for you to see and it's not a part of the final product that's available to the end user. Just because someone with too much time poked around and found it, does not mean the game itself or the developers are at fault. <!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--> Wasn't microsoft chastised by this by some europeans? some leaked/released (can't remember) source was seen to have the coders swearing in the comments. This was a while ago, so it's kind of fuzzy now. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd--> Actually, they did release a version by accident where the error messages were liberally sprinkled with the f, and other, 4 letter words. IE: "That doesn't work you f-tard!" was an actual error message that would pop up.
That got recalled VERY quickly.
As for the topic of the thread, no, I don't think that mods can become a liability to the game they are modding. Bad mods get forgotten regardless of their content. Most of the good mods are no more offensive then the original game and so are not an issue. The good mods with offensive content, the ones that push the envelope, are also important in that they let gamemakers know where the line is drawn and what they can include in that future game they are making.
And even if it's a mod that goes over the line and provokes controversy, well, I'm a believer in the "Any publicity is good publicity" theory, which is to the original game's advantage.
Comments
Have a legally enforced rating system.
Here in the UK (For the uninitiated, really) we have the BBFC, the British Board of Film Classification (As i'm sure most of you know anyway <!--emo&:p--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html/emoticons/tounge.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='tounge.gif' /><!--endemo-->), the BBFC, in short, review films and now games with "questionable content" (Your GTA's, Manhunts, God of War's, etc) and pastes a nice big label on the packaging showing the rating. Usual stuff like U, PG, 15, 18, and other more recent in-betweeners. Ontop of this we still have the likes of PEGI and so on giving recommendations, but they're just that, recommendations, the BBFC rating is a rock solid "It's illegal to sell this game / movie to anyone under this age" rating. And it is goooooood.
All films go through the ratings process, and get a rating, but when it comes to games, there's only the 15 or 18 certificates that are handed out if they are in any way offensive and such, and even still, some games avoid the rating if they only have bad language. Because the "f-word" never killed anyone.
I'm sure that it may be a tad drastic, as no doubt there are minors who are stable and mature enough to play games. But this just helps those parents that really don't have any clue about video games to know that a game is right or wrong for their child. Parents, let's face it, on the whole, don't know much about the games there are out there. Most of them, mine included, wouldn't be able to tell you that GTA:SA, Manhunt or God of War aren't suitable for children. But i can say one thing, here in the UK, if any parent was asked to buy any of these games, one look at the box would tell them exactly what kind of game it is. That nice red, round "18" certificate pasted on the front of the box will tell them that the game is not suitable for people under 18.
EDIT:
Also, getting a little bit more specific to the topic, the mod in question for GTA:SA, Hot Coffee, is embarassingly bad. I can see entirely why they took it out, probably not for risk of offending people and probably not through pressure to make the came less obscene, but because, in plain english, it's laughable. It works just like the Gym minigames, buttonmashing to raise "excitement" and such, but the poor models, animations and, frankly, non-existant production values apparent with it, merely suggest that it sucked too badly to be included and they just never bothered to remove it.
But personally, i really don't understand why game makers should be held responsible for what modders have done. Although the Hot Coffee mod is kind of a seperate case, as it merely unlocked the sex minigame, as opposed to the common conception of mods to be fan created content, but still, the minigame was not meant for the public to see, and as such, without some modding jiggery-pokery, it wasn't. It's like saying a kid's game has bad language because you went into the binaries and found the "f-word" in some comments in the code. It's not there for you to see and it's not a part of the final product that's available to the end user. Just because someone with too much time poked around and found it, does not mean the game itself or the developers are at fault.
EDIT 2: Hot Chocolate? Christ, i'm hung over, ok, Hot Coffee.
Wasn't microsoft chastised by this by some europeans? some leaked/released (can't remember) source was seen to have the coders swearing in the comments. This was a while ago, so it's kind of fuzzy now.
Wasn't microsoft chastised by this by some europeans? some leaked/released (can't remember) source was seen to have the coders swearing in the comments. This was a while ago, so it's kind of fuzzy now. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
Actually, they did release a version by accident where the error messages were liberally sprinkled with the f, and other, 4 letter words. IE: "That doesn't work you f-tard!" was an actual error message that would pop up.
That got recalled VERY quickly.
As for the topic of the thread, no, I don't think that mods can become a liability to the game they are modding. Bad mods get forgotten regardless of their content. Most of the good mods are no more offensive then the original game and so are not an issue. The good mods with offensive content, the ones that push the envelope, are also important in that they let gamemakers know where the line is drawn and what they can include in that future game they are making.
And even if it's a mod that goes over the line and provokes controversy, well, I'm a believer in the "Any publicity is good publicity" theory, which is to the original game's advantage.
Diazo