German states mull violent game ban

[wraggster]

via joystiq

The Financial Times reports that the German states of Bavaria and Lower Saxony have drafted legislation the would lead to fines and jail time for developers, distributors and even players of games that involve "cruel violence on humans or human-looking characters." The proposed laws, which would affect nearly 19 million Germans, come in response to a recent school shooting by a masked, 18-year-old German Counter-Strike fan that has turned public sentiment in the country against violent games.

Bavarian Interior Minister Gunther Beckstein is leading the effort to pass the legislation, arguing "it is absolutely beyond any doubt that such killer games desensitise [sic] unstable characters and can have a stimulating effect." Despite complaints by German gamers, 59 percent of Germans at large support such a ban, according to a poll cited by the Financial Times.

Germany has a long history of tough restrictions on violent games from Doom to Gears of War, and an outright ban would likely affect high-profile PS3 launch games like Resistance: Fall of Man and Call of Duty 3.

[JKKDARK]

fcuking country And I'm not one of these 59 percent of Germans, they are fcuking gays!

[ExcruciationX]

fcuking country And I'm not one of these 59 percent of Germans, they are fcuking gays!

Sucks to be you ...

[UchihaSasuke]

First it was Doom, Now is all of them

What the **** is wrong with them?

A game is a game now if you are stupid enough to imitate what they do on games like rising dead when you hit zombies with soccer balls now this

[Hawq]

The latest in a long series of changes made to games, this change ban them, previous changes? I remember the humans in Turok were replaced with robots for the german version (the British one was unedited so I wonder how many tried importing that one or doing something similar from france etc..), Contra was renamed so it didnt share its name with german special forces and had its human characters replaced by... you guessed it robots (this change affected everyone in the same geologic area so we Brits got stuck with it as well back in the day

[steve-b]

All this will do is force Germans to pirate their violence

[rehbock]

Its quit funny I live in Germany they show the 'eval'
Counter Strike on Tv first 3 sequenz were Quake 3.
And say that Counter Strike is the fault of school
shooting quite lame

[VampDude]

fcuking country And I'm not one of these 59 percent of Germans, they are fcuking gays!

lmao, germany sucks!

The latest in a long series of changes made to games, this change ban them, previous changes? I remember the humans in Turok were replaced with robots for the german version (the British one was unedited so I wonder how many tried importing that one or doing something similar from france etc..), Contra was renamed so it didnt share its name with german special forces and had its human characters replaced by... you guessed it robots (this change affected everyone in the same geologic area so we Brits got stuck with it as well back in the day

robots? that's funny!

[Destroyer699]

All I can do is shake my stick at Germany.

*Unsheaths stick*
Now you will learn germany.
*Shakes stickmaster 3000*
HA! Its what we want, violence.
*Sheathes stick and walks back listening to Dio*

All I can say to Germany is....wtf?

[Eric]

Well you all havent seen me in awhile and probably would disagree with me. There is alot of people out there who get so into games and mentally pick up the training from video games to go out and something stupid. Music does the samething to people look at what hip hop and rap do turns kids into gangsters and sexual monsters and not just that women love it turning them into you know whats. Anyways the main point is yes violence in games can do things to people dont pass a controller to a person who is mental in the head.

Eric