AfterDawn: News

Germany may get even tougher on video game violence

Even though it already has some of the toughest laws in Europe that address video game violence, Germany could soon get even tougher and even completely ban some game titles. A group of German politicians have drawn up legislation that apparently could see developers and retailers penalized with prison sentences of up to 12 months. The bill, which was presented by the states of Bavaria and Lower Saxony will be debated next year.

It refers specifically to games that feature "cruel violence". This comes after a school shooting in the last month in the town of Emsdetten, where an 18 year old injured 11 people before shooting himself. The local media emphasized the point that he was an avid player of Counter Strike. A survey taken after the shooting found that 72% of respondents attributed such crimes to video game violence and 59% were in favor of a ban.



"We have among the most drastic censorship rules for games. Now we are being labelled as a breeding ground for unstable, dysfunctional and violent youngsters." Deutsche E-Sport Bund boss Frank Sliwka said. After a seperate shooting in 2003, Germany introduced rules that restricted depictions of violence against human-like characters. For example, some German versions of games feature green blood to appear less gorey.

Source:
GamesIndustry.biz

Written by: James Delahunty @ 11 Dec 2006 9:23

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• 21 comments

• georgeluv

  well they may not be able to play games with violence against human figures but at least they can buy gummy worms with cannibus in them.

  11.12.2006 09:43 #1

• limelight

  Every country should do something about this.
  
  Blood and gore in video games has been done to death (no pun intended). Its time for game companies to start thinking of new ideas for videogames anyway.

  11.12.2006 09:49 #2

• freemail

  Oh, the things I do to keep posting comments and to avoid being banned constantly! This is like my 4th email account.
  
  Ok.......this is where society needs to STOP and let parents do their job. Blood and violence will never be 'done to death' and you're crazy to think that BUT video games don't cause kids to want to shoot others then themselves.........shi**y parenting does. Teach your brat right from wrong and only let them play games such as these when they're older but be real about banning from an entire country. It's getting real old to see governments taking away GOD given rights for their own crappy assed benefits. People are responsible for their own actions with some exceptions like retards and the mentally insane. Besides..............those who commit the crimes and then turn the gun on themselves..........well that's beautiful, just BEAUTIFUL because it's justice served.

  11.12.2006 11:18 #3

• natony

  Take us back to the good old days before video games were around and everybody acted with love and respect towards their fellow human beings and there was no violence in the world. *Sigh*

  11.12.2006 12:13 #4

• alphabit

  You would think video games were the root of all evil.
  They had crime and violence long before the advent of video games.Some of the reasons for violence were unjust laws (ex. prohibition making gangsters),made by a few people who thought that more laws were the answer. What if they find out that video games allowed people with violent tendancies an outlet to vent their hostelities.Sure blame it all on video games. I have played all the most violent and even banned games (a sega cd that featured a rape scene in beginning) And it hasnt made me or my 74 year old father (who likes playing Fear) commit any crimes against anyone.People who commit these violent, senseless crimes will do them with or without video games and when they ban so-called "violent" games they are just punishing people like my father,I and other non violent people that dont want to get stuck playing wimpy games, by limiting our choices. You know that guy ate at(ex. McDonalds) before he killed these people. Maybe we should ban (ex. McDonalds).or maybe he wiped his butt with Charmin ..ban charmin you get my point. (maybe this guys problem was really the teachers...Yeah ban teachers) Without video games that will end violence,or maybe be the cause of more from bored children...Just my opinion..

  11.12.2006 16:08 #5

• Fux

  ...This is why we have Rammstein.

  11.12.2006 17:16 #6

• sleepele

  ahhaha i love rammstein

  11.12.2006 17:47 #7

• Loler

  What a load of crap.
  
  How many million people world wide play video games like counter strike and even worse?
  How many of them are actualy violent?
  
  Just cause some f@cked up kid went ape-shit now some politians are trying to use the chance and make it look like they are actualy doing something of importance...
  
  i hate the world.

  11.12.2006 20:23 #8

• solidicex

  yeah, its easy to feel "sorry" for the parents and what not. That is to say by not blaming their parenting or not blaming the child for not controlling their own behavior. These days, it is all-too-easy to blame such "Faceless" industries and or corporatoins such as The Videogame and Entertainment industry. **Remember those spineless people who have no self-control blaming McDonalds for making them fat?

  11.12.2006 20:44 #9

• ZippyDSM

  From what I know its a bunch of ant game zealots trying to pushing something 80% of the rest of them don't give a damn about,meaning no one cares sicne Germany already has some of he toughest game laws in the world.

  12.12.2006 12:06 #10

• arcanix

  It sucks to be German. Quite harsh laws in a country that produces 92% of worlds anal porn.

  12.12.2006 13:37 #11

• ZippyDSM

  arcanix
  *L*
  how else do they find there heads :P
  *L*
  no bad...anyway Greamny is a nanny state its a shame that a socialist country would turn into a gray bland nanny state but then thats what true socialism turns into .

  12.12.2006 13:48 #12

• lxhotboy

  Video games do not influence people to committ violent acts, or kill someone. That is called either, I have some mental issues, or my PARENTS did not do a good enough job raising me issue. Grownups and parents need to look in the mirror and stop blaming their teenagers behavior on video games. Plus the games have ratings on them. I bet people would not ban soap operas b.c they have to much sexual viewing for a year old. Would they ban alcohol b.c it cause so many preventable deaths. No they wont, they will sit back and keep drinking their alcohol and i guarantee it is worse than any video game. It makes some grownups kill people so lets ban it to the old farts who want to ban the video games.

  15.12.2006 02:26 #13

• PaulMann

  Why don't they give thir kid a g*n to carry to school so in case like this the kid can sh**t the other kid and we will call it self protection. Ha Ha Ha.
  
  I always wanted to go to school in a tank. Unfortunately my dad did not buy one for me.
  
  Hey an idea! may be you should keep an eye out for if your kid is carrying a gun.

  15.12.2006 20:55 #14

• Tashammer

  The banning of gore, bloodshed etc does make sense and it is nothing to do with morality and everything to do with the structure of the brain and how that structure is exploited by the wasichu moneygrubbers.
  
  But the argument which applies to computer games applies equally as well to graphics, news reports, films, indeed anything where there is a representation of reality.
  
  Google up the brain and the capacity of the earlier layers of the brain to distinguish between fact and fiction and getting the body ready for fight or flight.

  16.12.2006 11:14 #15

• akaangus

  NO to banning violent video games.
  YES to banning Uwe Boll's violent movies!

  16.12.2006 14:21 #16

• Nbj

  Video games are exactly where we need to put violence. Everyone agrees violence in real life sucks, so why not shift it to a fictional reality since we obvoiusly need an outlet for our immense creative potential. There are hundreds of reasons why people hurt people in real life, and video games are an unfortunate scape goat for much bigger behavior problems at hand.

  16.12.2006 19:15 #17

• ZippyDSM

  Nbj
  because the fundies dont understand it,its like TV was its like movies was its like it like comics was its like rock and roll was OMG new thing burn it at the stake BURN IT!!!!

  16.12.2006 22:13 #18

• Mikiec

  I've got customers in Germany and if you talk to them about the state of the country you'll find out that the nazi movement is stronger than its ever been and the government is scared sh1tless about it. They will do anything to help stem the movement and by blaming violent games they're grasping at straws in a big way. But you can't blame them. There are already outspoken nazi members in positions of power in Germany! I'm not joking.
  Like 'freemail' said, its down to crap parenting, and crazy senseless killings will still happen if all games were burnt tomorrow. If kids aren't taught the difference between right and wrong and they associate killing people on screen with having fun, then they're probably going to associate killing people in real life with even more fun!

  18.12.2006 00:05 #19

• scorpNZ

  It would be a good thing for no more violent games period,only singstar and yugi oh etc to be sold world wide then they'll have to find some other scape goat to blame the ever increasing violence in society,it seems no-one worldwide takes responsability for their actions anymore.
  Here's an example of something that happened a few weeks ago in New Zealand where i live.
  A party at the sky tower a few too many drinks,a stair railing was used to slide down, unfortunatley for this young women she slipped off the wrong side and landed quite a number of feet down on the ground and died,a few days later boyfriend says in news item it's too early to blame someone.
  my point is and just like the German dumbass politicians instead of pointing the finger at the individual responsable it's always someone elses fault,and where i live it's all too common

  21.12.2006 15:36 #20

• Nbj

  sarcasm will not help the situation. Removing violence from video games is impossible (what do you define as violent). Instead we waste our time trying to define violence and play the blame game. Maybe if we stopped wasting our time defining violence and blaming video games in long pointless studies, we could focus on defining and removing violence in real life.

  22.12.2006 07:52 #21