Racism in gaming.

This is a fairly sensitive subject, so I’ll try and say what i need to say without upsetting anyone.

Racism in games is a common problem in games, as some countries are predominately white, so most characters are therefore white, which doesn't go unnoticed. Most games, if this, problem arises, just patch a few characters with a different colour skin, but even this sometimes encounters problems - I don't know why, I just read this from somewhere on the internet, and I’m not sure its completely true.

There have been some serious problems though, as some older games have had serious racist inclinations. One such game is "Muslim Massacre: The Game of Modern Religious Genocide" which is an obviously racist game, of which I would prefer not to go too far into. The most I’ll say is that it included negative religious views, violence, and high amounts of racism. It turned out that the game itself was a joke, intended to annoy and induce uproar, and it was soon taken of the internet and banned.

Another way of seeing racism in games is stereotypes: a video game called "Freaky flyers" has these stereo types, as said by this website:

http://www.ugo.com/games/the-11-most-racist-video-games

"Often times, racism can come in under the guise of cartoonish good times. Such was the case with inept multiplatform air racing game Freaky Flyers, released in 2003 by doomed Midway. Players could take control of a motley crew of horrible stereotypes, including Sheik Abdul, a Middle Eastern Ay-rab with a turban and a talking camel; Sammy Wasabi, a horrible Tojo caricature with buck teeth and broken English; Pauli Atchi, a completely legitimate Italian businessman; and Cactus Rose, a "fiery bandita" from Mexico."

Some could say that this is simply comical, and I think so, but if it appears on that website, then someone somewhere thinks its racist.

Another more resent example would be "Resident evil 5", a first person shooter where you kill zombies. Unfortunately, the trailer showed the protagonist mowing down an infected African village, and all the zombies were African. They fixed this so that the enemies were more racially diverse, but there were some complications in the game, which some critics still claimed as racism. The head of the British board of film classification stated that they deemed it not to be too racist, and felt sorry that some people were still unhappy with it.

Another game, one of which I have already mentioned on this blog, is "Grand theft auto", of which contains and in some cases encourages racist behaviour, as one of the missions is to investigate a Cuban/Haitian gang war, and the characters show hate towards some of the gang members, and after some lawsuits the company that made the game, "Rockstar", removed some of the discriminate language from the game.

A Certain report that I came across has a view that blaming video games for violence is racist, as it appears to only happen in predominantly white areas.

Christopher Ferguson, a Psychologist, says that when a shooting at school, college, or the attacker is young, happens in an area of a minority, video games are not blamed. Yet, when an attack happens in a predominantly white area, video games are often blamed. He may have a point, but his conclusion cannot be too sound as it is not always true, video games are not always blamed.

The arguments surrounding racism are delicate ones, as if people get too personal or philosophical it can derail the argument, and you could end up just going in a circle, with no end to the debate. Video game companies, or for that matter any form of Media Company must consider their portrayals of race carefully, or be thrust into controversy which they really don’t want.

Video game ratings

A fair few video game regulations have been created; one of the most obvious ones is the age restriction regulation which splits the video game into age ratings: 3+, which is for young children, 7+, for older children, 12+, for young teenagers, 16+, for older teenagers, 18+, for adults.

The age regulations stated are set by Pan European game information (PEGI), which is the most prominent age regulatory system, but there is another system called the British board of film classification (BBFC), which is similar except U (underage) and  PG (parental guidance) is used instead of 3+ and 7+, 16+ is cut to 15.

These regulations were set after a few particular games were released: “Mortal kombat”, which contained graphic violence, “Night trap”, which contained sexual references and “Doom”, because of the prolific use of guns and demons.

But, the above regulations don’t always work. For one thing, some parents may flout the law and buy a game of rating 16+ for their 12 year old son/daughter. And it’s hard to stop them. Also some restrictions in America have had to content with the Freedom of speech amendment, which also covers freedom of expression.  Some game companies use the former to sell controversial games that otherwise would be banded, but if so these often have to abide by the regulatory systems anyway.

The Grand theft auto logo.

Grand theft auto has come under attack for many reasons. It’s an adult game, in my opinion, as it contains not only guns and violence but racism, some sexual references, and views of some of the more seedy aspects of the criminal underworld as we know it. It has also been connected to some young offenders, murder in one case, and is in the Guineas world book of records as one of the most controversial games in history. Who’s to say that this could not get into the hands of young children, and what would be the effect? This is the main aim of the regulatory system that games like this stay only in the hands of those old enough to understand and not be corrupted by it.

A current survey has shown that only 2% of games have an 18+ rating, and that they must introduce “cigarette style labels” to games with violence (this possibly means on games of 16+) in order to make parents aware of what they may be giving their child, as some kids know what is in the game but don’t want their parents to know, or just think it’s cool and want it because it popular, mature content or not. This could reduce the risk of exposure to harmful media to young children.

This is a link to the site I found this information on: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3628894.ece

This webpage also covers the internet, and educating parents in these things to make them aware. This could work, as trying to stop children from accessing games is hard, but parents are the only barrier to them, reinforcing it would help greatly.

The age ratings aren’t all good, though, in some cases they can restrict access even to those who are allowed according to the ratings. In a German retailer called Kaufhof all games of 18+ rating are banned completely, they won’t sell them at all, which some would argue isn’t fair.

In any case, it will be a long time before game regulations are secure and reasonable. Education and reinforcing it are steps to a safer and more morally sound games industry.

Video game violence

It's well known that alot of video games, old and new, contain violence, and in some cases it can be quite extreme and gruesome. Some violent games will often depict other adult themes, and are usually restricted by an age limit, which most children will try and surpass if they really want the game so much.

A certain game called "Doom" was one of the first games to cause controversy beyond the fact that the game was simply violent( The first ever game depicting violence "Death race", was the first to cause an outcry, if only a small one by comparison,) due to the fact that;

"Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who committed the Columbine High School massacre in 1999, were avid players of the game."

- a Wikipedia quote from this address: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom_(video_game).

This caused mass a outcry about violent imagery, "Doom" especially, and for a while most of america was to be quite honest very paranoid, as one child got suspended from school for playing the childhood game "cop's n robbers", and another person got suspended for simply dyeing their hair blue.
 
This graphic shows some of the gore found in "Doom".

Another point about "Doom" is the satanic imagery in the game. It does not encourage satanism, as the main character is basically killing the demons, but the player could take heed of the gruesome and gothic style, or for some reason research it.

Violence in video games has continued unabated, and so far, nothing to serious has come of it. Other's say that its not just the serious aspects of this violence but how it affect the child whilst he or she is growing up,
and some researchers found that behavioral problems such as bullying, fighting, and minor crimes rose with more violent video games, and after games like "Grand theft auto" racism rose dramatically as well.

This may just be a select few impressionable children, but it could either be that they are simply acting out their rebellion, and the game persuades them to do so, or they could be social hermits, or their family might not give them as much attention as they need .

Some video games show things you might not want a child to know about, and yet are not violent. In "Super paper mario", the true villain of the game (who will remain nameless) is obviously psychotic and a merciless assassin, despite appearances. And yet this game is being sold for a much younger audience. Some may say that the young children might not understand and therefore disregard this, but it can influence them.
Also in most games the enemies disappear when they die, would a young influential child believe that something or someone would disappear if they knocked them on conscious? This I guess depends on how sensitive someone is to what they see, and how level headed they are, but it is still hard to tell if a video game is affecting someone.

It's hard for most people to tell what the source of the violence that some children, as many other things other than games can cause these things. I could reference as many incidences as I could, and yet this still would be up for debate, so shall leave it here.

W.o.w, gaming has some legal issues...

The first issue which I will bring up is a legal issue with the well-known MMORPG World of warcraft, about an add on created for the game.

The company MDY industries made a game application called “WoW glider”, a basic program that controls the characters in the game during the players absence, causing them to maximize the characters money, items and other statistics, and when the player would come back the character was more powerful and at an advantage.

This is quite an obvious cheat, but the main problem is that MDY has a fairly solid case for their product that held up in court when Blizzard, the company that made WoW, tried to sue them. This case is that the product “does not modify or copy the game, just simply interacts with the game.”

Blizzard finally won with a technicality: a copy of the game is always temporarily copied into the computers RAM memory, which is completely legal when there is a person playing the game, but illegal if there is a computer playing it, as the WoW glider program gains the copy when it plays it, violating Blizzard’s terms of use.

This argument between MDY and Blizzard seems trivial, but this type of argument happens all the time. I know, and have used, a program called Instant Replay, which modifies games. Gameshark must have won their argument somehow because their software is being distributed legally in renowned gaming shops, and some of the modifications are more extensive than MDY industries WoW glider.

The gaming industry has fought back by using complex, and sometimes unhackable games, with firewalls and programming that doesn’t react well to hacking. Obviously the modification applications still work, as some online programs are filled with hacked characters (on a side note, in some games that can be incredibly annoying) so this is an on-going battle between the official game companies and the modification companies.

The main problem is copyright issues, as some people modify and sell bootleg versions or games with changed game play.  In the case of MDY vs.  Blizzard, WoW glider changed the game play so that other players had an unfair advantage, which in my own opinion shouldn’t be allowed, as the point of the game is to gain experience with the game in order to get better. Others may argue, that someone with little experience with computers may need this help, because otherwise they would be stuck and never proceed in the game, such as in some games you can run out of important items and never or struggle to get them back again.


Some cheats are legal, hidden Easter eggs hidden in the game, but these Easter eggs can be hacked to do some damage to the game system, as if some Easter eggs are inaccessible graphics the players may do drastic measures for more interactivity.

This constant battle between companies for reasons both ethical and legal, but what it really effects if the way we all play games. Do we use codes and hacking to blast through games, or do we build or skills and win fairly?


That's something we'll have to wait for.

Incoming updates.

In this blog I will research and show ethical, legal, and regulatory issues in the gaming industry. At the moment I am doing research, and I will post up something soon.