Doom, Manhunt 2, Duke Nukem and British Censorship
Having admitted that I like motor racing, I might as well go on to make a full confession. I used to play video games. Not for a while now, but years ago I downloaded Doom from the internet (you could not buy it over the counter) and jolly good fun it was too. I do not think I was psychologically damaged by it, but who knows. I also had a copy of something called Duke Nukem but I never managed to get that running properly.
The British Board of Film Classification has recently decided to ban a new game, Manhunt 2, because of its “unremitting bleakness and encouragement of casual sadism.”
Rockstar Games trail the game in the following way:
One chance. They took your life. Time to take it back. Manhunt 2. Coming Summer 2007.
Today, The Times reports:
David Cooke, the director of the BBFC, said that the board preferred to ask for cuts rather than order an outright ban, but that was impossible in this case. “Manhunt 2 is distinguishable from recent high-end video games by its unremitting bleakness and callousness of tone in a game context which constantly encourages visceral killing with exceptionally little alleviation or distancing,” he said.Sounds like Doom to me.
“There is sustained and cumulative casual sadism in the way in which these killings are committed and encouraged.”
The board said that the game was worse than its predecessor, Manhunt, because of the “sheer lack of alternative pleasures on offer”. Sue Clark, a spokeswoman for the board, said: “The only thing [the main character] does is go around and kill people extremely violently. When he gets out of the mental institution he [tries] to find out who he is, but that just involves killing more people.”
As I recall, Doom was unremittingly bleak and callous and the game involved constant visceral killing. And didn’t I take my teenage children to see the most recent James Bond film, Casino Royale, during which Bond was sat naked in a chair with no seat whilst a sadist whipped his scrotum?
That film was not even an “18”. It was good "all round family entertainment."
Has anyone in this country watched The Sopranos? The best TV drama to come out of the USA in ten years (and American TV series drama is now as good as it gets) but full of sex, violence and sadism.
Back to Manhunt 2. David Cooke goes on to say
“The game presented a range of unjustifiable risks to adults and children”This is where I part company with David Cooke. This is Mary Whitehouse redux.
"Behave yourselves!"Who is Cooke to say what represents a risk to me? Who is he to prevent me playing a game that is available in many other parts of the world?
I shall now have to find a legal way to track down a copy of the game. I have friends in the USA. Maybe they will mail me one. It is not illegal to own the game in Britain, but it is illegal to supply it.
When I get hold of a copy, I will review it.
Meanwhile, I guess it’s back to something that has sanitized “acceptable” violence like Walking with Dinosaurs on the BBC.
God, I hate censorship.
Labels: Censorship, Doom, Duke Nukem, Manhunt 2, The Sopranos, Walking with Dinosaurs
16 Comments:
Can someone hak it so that Patricia Hewitt's face appears on all the people you slaughter?
If so, I'll buy it.
Yours with a firm handshake,
Nick.
I agree with you completely and also remember the bad old days of Whitehouse.
I can join the army and kill peole for real but can't play at it on a 14" computer screen.
Silly state nannying, and something I will probably be posting on in the near future.
The best TV drama to come out of the USA in ten years
No no no no no!
That has to go to Heroes.
Save the cheerleader, save the world!
Shrink, Heroes is still quite undiscovered over here.
Simply the best programme to come out of the states ever!
Dr C, i'm no wuss, i'm ex-military and have no problem with a bit of violence (rugby and competative martial arts...even been a bouncer for a few years) but Manhunt disturbed the hell out of me.I stopped playing it after a bit at my friends house.
I don't think it should be banned but if the second one is worse than the first then I can see why it should have an age limit.
As long as i don't have to play it it's all good.
Funny Pseudonym
i am sure you are probably right; but I want to make my own decision, not have nanny make it for me.
Of course, I don't buy video games now and have not for years and so would not have considered it if this had not happened.
Now of course, I have to have it!!
John
Heroes is fantastic but I'd go for The Sopranos personally since its been consistently fantastic over a lengthy period.
As for Manhunt 2, in the absence of any evidence linking computer games with violent behaviour, there can be no justification for the outright banning of a game.
I'm over 18, I'm a (sometimes) rational adult and if I want to play a violent game, that's my business. I can't imagine it being any worse than Hostel, Saw, Vacancy or any of the other torture movies coming out of the US at the moment, but even if it is, its fiction and proves again that the UK needs freedom of expression protected.
But you don't know what it's like, do you Dr C? Because you haven't seen it. Saying "it sounds like Doom" is not the same as having an actually informed opinion I'm afraid.
Good to see that it's becoming generally accepted that the best US dramas/series are absolutely streets ahead of our own. If only BBC and ITV would accept that and they might raise their game.
Another series I would recommend is 'The Shield' which is almost up there with 'The Sopranos'. Hugely underrated.
I hate censorship too -- for people like me! I was once given pause for thought when I heard that a screening of Reservoir Dogs in Liverpool got cheers from the posse of slack-jawed morons in the audience, during the scene when the captive policeman was having his ear sliced off.
The game deserves disdain for erroneously associating mental health problems with ultraviolence.but does not merit censorship.It's game-that is, a work of fiction/imagination, one which in this case is actually just a (very long) sequence of 0s and 1s.It may be horrific, bloodthirsty and distressing, but bloody hell, so is that other work of fiction, the Old Testament.
As a child, I can remember when the powers that be tried to ban Tom and Jerry because it was seen as being too violent. I also remember going on a school trip to the London Dungeons and marvelling at the diplays of torture there...surely a case in point that people really don't need any external influence to think up ways of hurting /killing each other. Personally, I find video games a bit of a bore (not being that blessed in the hand/eye coordination department) but my other half and both kids love them....especially the Splinter Cell series and Halo. I do remember Doom when I was a student...one of my friends was a physics student and he installed some extra software that turned the rocket launcher into a chicken launcher :0)
I do think that the question of censorship and games is a tricky one...in the US shops can be prosecuted for selling CDs that have that "explict lyrics" sticker on it to under 18s (or 21s in some states). Not sure that its a road that we want to follow. I'm afraid that trying to blame video games for the way a minority behave is right up there with "the devil made me do it".
Dr C, sorry i thought i made it clear thats how i felt. The only thing is i agree with a degree of censorship (like the age limit) i don't want kids sitting up all night scared, same reason i would censor the films they watch.
Saw/ Hostel etc i like a good musical ;)
Andrew, the shield... another great series, i got the second series on DVD and watched the whol lot in a few days. I never knew it was more tha n2 series long!
Alisdairc, another person talking without the benifit of any first hand info.
It's not associating mental health and violence. It's about a guy who was put inside by an enemy and he has to fight his way out and get revenge. No indication he has any mental health issues... other than killing dozens of peope of course.
Oh and if you want some good clen family gaming fun, get a Wii.
Blown away, most fun i have had in ages. Plus the whole family can play (and i can win a bowling game which i never do in real life!)
I prefer Battlefield though..driving tanks is so much better than golf :)
In theory, I hate censorship too - but what would you say if someone devised a video game based on the paedophilia that was the cause of the major arrests this week? Is it far-fetched to imagine that there are mad people out there who would just love something like that?
Where would you draw the line?
judith said...
In theory, I hate censorship too - but what would you say if someone devised a video game based on the paedophilia that was the cause of the major arrests this week? Is it far-fetched to imagine that there are mad people out there who would just love something like that?
Where would you draw the line?
Friday, June 22, 2007 12:05:00 AM
+++++++
Excellent point. In those long ago dusty days when I did law, one always tested a law by postulating the most extreme case and seeing if the law would cope.
So here goes. Out comes the video game called Paedophile Rape.
I would hunt down the makers, prosecute them and lock them up. I would do the same to anyone who sold the video.
BUT I would not make it a criminal offence to watch the video
This is an extreme example because making such a video game would be a criminal offence.
Let us take the middle ground, where a game is made that is NOT illegal, but which the majority of people would find deeply distasteful. Like Manhunt 2.
IF it is not criminal, I would not ban it. I don't want someone else deciding what I can or cannot watch
John
Friday, June 22, 2007 12:20:00 AM
Delete
For the record, I completely agree with you -- censorship bad, freedom good -- but Manhunt and Doom really are completely dissimilar. Doom's violence is almost cartoon-like by modern standards, and the setting of the story presents a situation where killing is probably justified by most people's standards: dispatching monsters from hell is not going to ruffle a reasonable person's feathers.
Manhunt, on the other hand, is pretty sick: it not only involves particularly sadistic killing, but presents a setting where killing itself (let alone the sadistic aspect) is completely unjustified. It is extremely graphic; picture someone struggling as you hold a plastic bag over their head until they suffocate. It is unrelenting: killing is unavoidable, players cannot complete the game any other way, and rarely have the option *not* to kill an enemy when one is encountered. I think it's reasonable to say that, in the case of Manhunt, killing is an end, not a means to an end, and that places it in a category apart from other games.
I don't think it should be banned either, but I do think it should be available only to adults, and I think such ratings should be well enforced.
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home