Barbelith Underground > Games & Gameplay

After a school shooting in Germany laws have been drafted to ban violence against 'humans or human-looking characters' from video games. The wording is fuzzy enough that almost any game could fall under the ban. This was put forth because the shooter mentioned above was an avid player of Counter-Strike and employed tactics similar to those found in the game (smoke bombs from what I have been able to find).

I will not be surprised if these laws are passed in Germany. Considering Germany currently has pretty heavy levels of censorship in their media industry already. Games like City of Heroes had to make changes to villain groups in order to work within the 'no Nazi' laws in effect there.

Moving across the pond to America we have everyones favorite lawyer Jack Thompson who crusades against violent and sexual content in video games. Thompson has attempted to sue the makers of the Grand Theft Auto series of games many times. Most recently he tried to get the game Bully banned in Florida, and was not so politely kicked out of court (the Judge threatened to hold him in contempt).

Thompson, along with the German politicians pushing for the law, believe that violent video games cause people to commit criminal acts. The argument always comes down to whether games which are violent provoke a violent action, or whether people with a propensity towards violence prefer the more violent games.

Personally I think the idea that GTA or Counter Strike are 'Murder Trainers' (a term coined by Jack Thompson) preposterous. I think that if someone has it within themselves to commit mass murder they will do it, whether they 'trained' on a video game or not.

Video Games and The Law