Let's ban Taliban game

[Castout]

Originally Posted by Safe-Keeper

Project Reality has had both the Taliban and HAMAS as playable factions, complete with suicide bomber cars and trucks, for quite a while now. Nothing new under the sun.

Let me google that and see if they got Israelis too

Edit: yes they have among many others . . . too bad I don't have BF2. I'll wait for their ArmA 2 version which I understand is under development.

[Skybird]

Poor taste, but what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. When you add to a shooter a sense of reality by inclduing names and faces from reality, then you also transport parts of the content of the fighting side'S ideology as well as an invitation to identify with one of the sides. And then it is not just a shooter like Unreal anymore. If the side to identify yourself with is in explicit defence and use of terrorism, then at the latest I think the morals of such a release becomes absolutely questionable. Some say its free market, and anything goes. I say: No, not anything goes, and not anything must go. And "anything goes" should not be allowed or tolerated. There are limits to everything.

Could I have a "hostel movie" simulator where I am realistically torturing and killing bounded victims - maybe with optionally available digitally recorded enhanced screams sound package and a small plastic vial with guaranteed original human tears fluid as special gadget in the surprise special edition for the first 200 customers? Or a stoning-simulator? we could have realisistic physics for calculating the correct flightpath of the stones, depending of power used, throwing distance and size of ther stone. Advertising with a slogan of helping to battle adultry? the faces of the victi... I mean the cheating women, are covered in reality and so realism could be claimed for covering them in the sim as well. This would make it a non-troubling experience even for younger players.

Business is not neutral on morals. And it should never allowed to be.

[Flaxpants]

Originally Posted by Skybird

If the side to identify yourself with is in explicit defence and use of terrorism, then at the latest I think the morals of such a release becomes absolutely questionable.

But from a Taliban point of view, the Americans are terrorists, so to be fair, you would have to ban the game outright, or any wargame with 'real world' sides.

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Flaxpants

But from a Taliban point of view, the Americans are terrorists, so to be fair, you would have to ban the game outright, or any wargame with 'real world' sides.

The Taliban's point of view is and should be of no concern for us.

I indeed supoort the idea that shooters should not enable the player to identify himself with any faction shown in the game on odeological grounds, especially when the faction is trying to simulate a faction from reality. Psychologically it makes a difference whether you shoot at the "blue Alliance" or Red Bots, or at Nazi figures, Allied aces or UN blue helmets. In the first case, you game against bits and bytes and oixels. In the second you haven given it a face, making you shooting at something that is a bit more human than just bits and bytes and pixels.

Leave it to "Bluefor" and "OpFor". does not change the mission a bit, nor the gameplay, but psychologically it makes a difference. Ort did oyu think the game "America's Army" is named like that just by random coincidence...? Here, the identification effect is a wanted ingrendient, since the game was designed to acchieve right this effect - for recruiting purposes. I oppose such projects.

Let's leave it to tactical challenge and strategic problems. It's like with sports shooters. These guys for the most to not imagine to shoot at real people, and they do not prject mental images of people they hate onto the target poster. They are about the mental focussing, calobrating the instrument, and getting a good point score for the series they fired. If one of them starts to pin photos of faces onto his target posters, I would avoid him at all costs (and report him to the staff).

[Castout]

Originally Posted by Skybird

The Taliban's point of view is and should be of no concern for us.

I indeed supoort the idea that shooters should not enable the player to identify himself with any faction shown in the game, especially when the faction is trying to simulate a faction from reality. Psychologically it makes a difference whether you shoot at the "blue Alliance" or Red Bots, or at Nazi figures, Allied aces or UN blue helmets. In the first case, you game against bits and bytes and oixels. In the second you haven given it a face, making you shooting at something that is a bit more human than just bits and bytes and pixels.

Aren't you going too far on this. It's just a game. Using the same logic then the ban would also apply to street racing game, fighting game or any game that has any sort of simulated violence in it with semblance to real place and real people and which makes possible the breaking of law in it(and which state law would be used). Even some sports game like an olympic game should be banned to your defense because once you play a certain country in that sports game you take side and identify with that frakkin country and try to punish and humiliate any other country that you play against with in that game. No more FIFA World cup game for us too!


Next they're going to regulate which color to be banned and racial proportion and gender proportion in all game 3D models....and after that what to think and what not to think when gaming!

Where do you stop. . . once you begin politicizing a game?!




I can tell craps too such as these:

Do you think those who're playing Taliban in next MOH game would really kill British Forces or play them to practice killing them in real life?! That would be plain stupidity.

Or wouldn't British troops who play Taliban in that game benefit from acquiring real practical experience on how the Taliban fight? That actually can save their lives in their actual deployment?

The game could even garner public support for British forces in Britain if the young generation sympathize with the British forces in game and couldn't agree with the method of the Taliban.

Would actually playing Taliban make one to hate the British and the other way around? It could very well give them respect to the capability of the RL British forces. . . .




You see the man's reasoning has NO BASIS aside from his sentiment. It's called politicking though he chose the wrong subject by bringing game into his politics. Doesn't he have more important job than trying to regulate how a game should be designed? If not he ought to be a game programmer than a public officer.

Where do you stop. . . once you begin politicizing a game?!



Come on politics in gaming?!

[Flaxpants]

And what about lethal weapons? Would you ban guns in games by the same token unless they were sport shooting games? I suppose a game such as Lemmings could be construed as offensive by somebody who likes that particular animal, the list goes on.

The biggest question about your argument Skybird is where exactly would you draw the line?

[Castout]

Originally Posted by Flaxpants

And what about lethal weapons? Would you ban guns in games by the same token unless they were sport shooting games? I suppose a game such as Lemmings could be construed as offensive by somebody who likes that particular animal, the list goes on.

The biggest question about your argument Skybird is where exactly would you draw the line?

hunting game promotes hurting animals...BANNED.


I thought the point in gaming is to do what otherwise couldn't . . . who's the jerk that . . .

Monopoly should be banned too. London IS NOT FOR SALE!

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Flaxpants

And what about lethal weapons? Would you ban guns in games by the same token unless they were sport shooting games? I suppose a game such as Lemmings could be construed as offensive by somebody who likes that particular animal, the list goes on.

The biggest question about your argument Skybird is where exactly would you draw the line?

When a game starts to give shooters and bots a face, when you get invivted to idenitfy yourself with ideology, or the task of killing enemies. If you are a bit-open-minded you can understand by my earlier explanations what that means. Also, what we define as terror and/or severe criminality must not be made object of a game, at least it must not allow the player to act on behalf of what our culture understands as terrorism.

In principle I think it is quite simple. It only becomes comlicated where it is tried to make it more complicate in order to allow such distortions. but one does not need to take an ethics course to see where the problem is when you start to play a terrorists assassinating civilians, identifying yourself with the role.

that'S why I think that EA can shove their opportunistic claim about how "neutral" their approach is, right into their lower bottom.

[Raptor1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

The Taliban's point of view is and should be of no concern for us.

I indeed supoort the idea that shooters should not enable the player to identify himself with any faction shown in the game on odeological grounds, especially when the faction is trying to simulate a faction from reality. Psychologically it makes a difference whether you shoot at the "blue Alliance" or Red Bots, or at Nazi figures, Allied aces or UN blue helmets. In the first case, you game against bits and bytes and oixels. In the second you haven given it a face, making you shooting at something that is a bit more human than just bits and bytes and pixels.

Leave it to "Bluefor" and "OpFor". does not change the mission a bit, nor the gameplay, but psychologically it makes a difference. Ort did oyu think the game "America's Army" is named like that just by random coincidence...? Here, the identification effect is a wanted ingrendient, since the game was designed to acchieve right this effect - for recruiting purposes. I oppose such projects.

Let's leave it to tactical challenge and strategic problems. It's like with sports shooters. These guys for the most to not imagine to shoot at real people, and they do not prject mental images of people they hate onto the target poster. They are about the mental focussing, calobrating the instrument, and getting a good point score for the series they fired. If one of them starts to pin photos of faces onto his target posters, I would avoid him at all costs (and report him to the staff).

Of course it changes things, otherwise there won't be any atmosphere or story, you would just go around shooting faceless mooks without any point. Sure, the game is about the same, but it would not be much fun.

Nobody playing such games is identifying with factions or imagining they're shooting at real people anyway, they are just playing a game.

Originally Posted by Raptor1

Nobody playing such games is identifying with factions or imagining they're shooting at real people anyway, they are just playing a game.

..and even if they ARE imagining they're shooting at real people, they are probably that type of person OUTSIDE of the game and the game is, if anything, PREVENTING violence by giving that person the medium to get out their violent tendencies, would you prefer that person take out his need to kill on real people or 3D models with textures?

[Wolfehunter]

Originally Posted by Skybird

The Taliban's point of view is and should be of no concern for us.

I indeed supoort the idea that shooters should not enable the player to identify himself with any faction shown in the game on odeological grounds, especially when the faction is trying to simulate a faction from reality. Psychologically it makes a difference whether you shoot at the "blue Alliance" or Red Bots, or at Nazi figures, Allied aces or UN blue helmets. In the first case, you game against bits and bytes and oixels. In the second you haven given it a face, making you shooting at something that is a bit more human than just bits and bytes and pixels.

Leave it to "Bluefor" and "OpFor". does not change the mission a bit, nor the gameplay, but psychologically it makes a difference. Ort did oyu think the game "America's Army" is named like that just by random coincidence...? Here, the identification effect is a wanted ingrendient, since the game was designed to acchieve right this effect - for recruiting purposes. I oppose such projects.

Let's leave it to tactical challenge and strategic problems. It's like with sports shooters. These guys for the most to not imagine to shoot at real people, and they do not prject mental images of people they hate onto the target poster. They are about the mental focussing, calobrating the instrument, and getting a good point score for the series they fired. If one of them starts to pin photos of faces onto his target posters, I would avoid him at all costs (and report him to the staff).

Why is this an issue its a game nothing more. You play a character from the other side of the fence. Why is it ok for the UK or USA to make shooters that target other nations and not other other way around? If you don't like the game don't play it. If you don't like to see it don't watch it. Jezz...

I want a game where I can shoot this "Dr. Fox" over and over again.

Call it: Idiot Douchebag Hunter...

[Flaxpants]

Perhaps he could be the victim in the stoning simulator.

I indeed supoort the idea that shooters should not enable the player to identify himself with any faction shown in the game, especially when the faction is trying to simulate a faction from reality.

So no more silent hunter then, all them WWII flight sims better go too.
Damn I was really looking forward to killing another 109 or sinking an British troopship.

[Safe-Keeper]

I went through a phase like this, where I refused to play WWII games, and especially the German side. I see where people are coming from. Still... it's a game, and the fact that you can gun down Talibans more than makes up for the fact that you can play as them.

Originally Posted by Castout

Let me google that and see if they got Israelis too

No, they just have HAMAS fighters sitting around very bored, the wall keeping them from making themselves useful. Though you do get a shovel and the ability to try fruitlessly to dig tunnels to Israeli settlements.

Also, on a humorous note, let's ban the game of chess: It's a racist game because you use WHITE pieces to try to beat BLACK pieces. Or vice versa.

Never thought of that. I add to your concerns the fact that White always goes first.