“Trust the System”

Were you surprised by the furor over the GTA Hot Coffee scenes?
Once it became known what the Hot Coffee content contained, it was fairly predictable that critics of the industry or people that are concerned about these issues of media violence and sexual content would have expressed their concerns.

What lesson should the public draw from the resolution of the controversy?
The industry has an extremely effective self-regulatory system that moves quickly and expeditiously to address situations like this when they come up. This is the first time in 11 years that there has been anything even remotely similar to this. The public and consumers can have an enormous amount of confidence that the industry takes this responsibility of providing information about what’s in games very seriously. People can trust the system and rely on these ratings.

Are there any lessons here for the industry at large?
I think the ESRB has made it clear that companies must disclose all content that is on a disk that is going to ship whether it is playable content or not. I think that message has been heard loud-and-clear by the industry. I wouldn’t say that that’s a lesson so much as a heightened sense of awareness about what must be disclosed to the ESRB.

How much of the fight against violent and graphic videogaming is rooted in the perception of the hobby as a juvenile activity?
There certainly is among the baby-boom generation a sense that videogames are all for children. They are much less aware of the diversity of the market as well as the diversity of the content. So the extent that they perceive everything out there that is made as targeted at children fuels some of their concerns. This generation is to some degree out of touch with interactive entertainment because that’s not what they grew up with.

You previously said that game designers can’t ignore their “responsibility for shaping the quality and values of the culture we live in.” What is this responsibility?
Each individual has to assess their responsibility from their personal level. We can no longer operate in some cocoon that we think protects us from cultural criticism. As you sit there developing a product, it’s your responsibility to ask questions about whether the creative decisions you are making are necessary to accomplish your art. Be conscious of the fact that some of those decisions have consequences beyond your circle of friends who play videogames. That thinking ought to inform the creative process on some level. Potential responses shouldn’t discourage people from the artistic expression they wish to pursue. But to make believe that nobody is paying attention and these creative discussions don’t have potential consequences for how the industry is perceived is myopic.

“To make believe that nobody is paying attention and these creative discussions don’t have potential consequences for how the industry is perceived is myopic.”

This article originally appeared in Computer Games Magazine #179