Those who take issue with violence in gaming and its impact on young people have
found a new issue to take up, as
Game critics slam violent 'mods'
on ZDNet (originally published in the
Wall
Street Journal Online) looks at the fact that some of those making game
modifications are minors, who are not only exposed to violent imagery, but are
involved in creating it (thanks Mirsky). Here is a bit from the article that
offers quotes from both sides of the issue:
David Walsh, president of
National Institute on Media and the Family, a nonpartisan organization that
looks at the impact of entertainment on children, contends that underage mod
makers are the moral equivalent of teenage pornographers. He thinks the game
industry should apply the same rating system used on games to the mods
themselves and restrict kids' access to Web sites where mods are posted.
The issue is starting to catch the attention of Congress. "This is a whole
new problem," says Dan Gerstein, communications director for Sen. Joseph
Lieberman, Democrat of Connecticut. Lieberman is the author of a bill that would
authorize the Federal Trade Commission to penalize companies that intentionally
market adult-rated entertainment directly to children. But the legislation is
finely tailored to address deceptive marketing rather than prohibit kids from
making mods for mature-rated games, Gerstein says.
Game companies say they are essentially powerless to regulate mods since they're
usually written by people in their homes and posted on Web sites. (The
companies' games, on the other hand, usually can't be downloaded from the Web
but instead must be purchased from retailers.) Mark Rein, vice president of Epic
Games Inc., the Raleigh, N.C., developer of Unreal Tournament, says people are
getting upset about mods when the problem is that parents let their kids have
the games. "If you don't have the game, the mod is worthless to you,"
he says.