Legal Issues in the Games Industry

Due to the size of the games industry has grown in popularity and the large amounts of money that companies make from creating video games, laws and requirements are put in place, companies and people also patent their design and copyright names so other people and companies can’t use them for their own profit. Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of original work exclusive rights to it, companies who breach these rights and use the copyrighted material can be sued, and can end up owing sometimes millions of pounds worth of money if they lose the case. In the game industry video game and console clones are sometimes made by smaller companies. These clones generally break copyright laws, enabling the larger company to take court action, which likely leave the smaller company in legal trouble.

Although video game clones could be seen as an issue, it is clear the biggest legal issue is piracy as it has gotten the attention of nearly every major video game publisher. This issue has become a more prevalent issue in recent years due to the rise of file sharing websites and services such as UTorrent and Pirate Bay. For example the BBC reported that “Video game piracy in the United Kingdom led to 1.45 Billion British Pounds in losses in 2010 due to pirated games being played on modified consoles.” This shows that piracy presents a serious threat to the revenue and growth of video game companies economically. In response to piracy, many video game publishers such as EA and Ubisoft implement DRM (Digital-Rights Management) into their online gaming services. The main form of DRM is referred to as ‘always online in which users have to be connected to the official online service in order to play the game they purchased, an example of this is Blizzard Entertainments Diablo 3, which sparked some controversy because the online services were not working for most people for the first week, rendering them unable to play the game.

However Piracy is being tackled, an example of this is the downfall of LimeWire in 2010, the owner of lime wire was sued for 75 trillion dollars of damage to copyright holders, and this stopped a lot of copyright infringement but most people who previously used LimeWire now use alternatives such as UTorrent which uses torrent files.  In conclusion there is a divide in thoughts regarding legal issues in the gaming industry. Some people think piracy is a large issue, however others think that piracy isn’t a very large threat, and that DRM can cause inconvenience to consumers.

BlockScape: New Minecraft!

 This game looks amazing, i hope it gets through Steam greenlight, there is so much potential! Check it out!
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=93066848

Regulatory Issues In The Game Industry

What do I mean by ‘Regulatory Issues in the game industry’, you may ask. I basically mean issues about regulations in the games industry. The basic definition of regulation is: A rule or directive made and maintained by an authority. In Video games regulations are used to protect people from certain things they might need to know about in a video game, like violence, sex, drugs, horror, etc. Regulations are mainly used to help parents choose acceptable games for their children. There are multiple other regulations, but the biggest are concerning age regulations. Age regulations stop people of ages younger than the certified age rating from purchasing the game, this is the most controversial because a lot of people under the required age are still purchasing them from shops.

There are many different organisations around that help regulate video games. In the UK there is TIGA (The Independent Game Association), and in the USA there is ESA (The Entertainment Software Association). Not heard of TIGA? Well, TIGA is made up of representatives from across the UK games industry. It has included members from Blitz Games, Revolution, SCEE, and more. ESA’s members on the other hand are some of the world’s top publishers. ESA run E3, fight against piracy and censorship, and support the ESRB. But these organisations didn’t always exist, before 1994 and the creations of ERSB, video games were rated by the producers and publishers. The ESRB (Entertainment Software Ratings Board) assigns an overall age rating to a product as well as making notes on thirty different topics of content such as alcohol, violence, language and sex.

However some Video games can be considered so bad, it is banned entirely in a country! In Germany, depicting Nazis in games is illegal, as is unnecessary violence. Many games have fallen, including Left 4 Dead 2 in some countries. Culture modifying in games is not uncommon, because it is easier to modify it for different countries than start a whole new project, in China corpses can’t be shown in games so some character skins have be re-adjusted to this region. Games can spend up to 10 years on a banned game waiting list before they are re-evaluated and can be published again. However most video games can be censored, a prime example is Left 4 Dead 2, the Australian version cut down on loads of gore and blood, and bodies vanish after touching the floor, although many people might think this is entirely bad, the Australian version runs 30% faster due to the cutting of the effects from the game.

Character back story (DIX)

 This is a backstory on my character DIX (Named from roman numerals) Untit 509.

The Past

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away…

On the planet of Iron Star III, the only iron star planet left that hasn’t been destroyed by the ‘Great War’ which has been raging for the last 3 centuries, its inhabitants known only as the Droid race.

A peaceful race of robotic humanoids, The Droids are a race of metallic metal  creatures who dwelt below-ground for thousands of years until the mysterious morbots forced them out of their underground home  years ago. Since then, they have adapted to surface life and quickly established themselves as the most powerful race, until…

An exceptional droid scientist, Dr Volex wanted to evolve the droid race far beyond its capabilities presently, after years of work and research his goal seemed within his grasp. To the dismay of the entire race, Dr Volex accidently created an evil and very powerful robot, this robot towered above every other bot, he was  highly advanced, and he had Templatic metal armour (Templatic metal is the hardest on Iron Star II). The robot later named itself General Alloy, the general went on a rampage and destroyed the lab he was created in, and Dr Volex’s body was never found.

After creating an army to do his will, General Alloy took over Iron Star I and after years of fighting the planet was later destroyed from a brutal battle in the planets core which ended in a large explosion. Iron Star II to the day is used to mine resources by the imprisoned droids which couldn’t fight, both sides decided it’d be best not to fight here, General alloy didn’t want this because his resources could be destroyed, and the rebels didn’t want it because the imprisoned droids could be harmed. The Rebels and General corrosives army are coming to Iron Star III.

Present Day

In the largest city of Iron Star III:  MechaChrome city was the only city left where Droids were free. The robot production line in the SteelCo robot factory in the centre of the city was working hard for the Generals demands of more soldier bots. The newest line of soldier bots, with their advanced technology were going to change the tides of the battle towards General alloys favour.

This is where Unit 509 (DIX) was first created.

The DIX units were in production, the first unit emerged from rising steam and noise, the chrome finish of the armour glistened in the flashing light that twirled overhead.  The alarm had been set off, and the sirens screamed. The huge metal door smashed down, sealing DIX alone. The production line had been shut off. The light sounding of beeping could be heard, it grew louder, and beeped faster. BOOOOOMMMMMPPPHHH! The ground shook. Smoke debris and flames swept everywhere, as the smoke settled, multiple silhouettes could be seen. Now the smoke had totally disappeared there were 4 huge robots.

These bots were droids, the rebel bots were coloured grey, and were heavily armoured from head to foot, much larger and chunkier looking than DIX, a smaller bot emerged from in-between the larger ones, in his metal hand he held a strange device with a purple crystal attached to it. The bot unscrewed the back panel from DIX revealing wiring and ports; he reached into the hole and unplugged a large red wire. He grabbed the wire from the device and plugged it into the empty port, the device crackled with energy, enveloping the device in purple light and static. Everything went dark.

DIX gained conscience the next day…

He sat up, looking into the wall his head turned to look at a sheet of blacked out glass. He heard a voice, a voice he recognised. It was the smaller bot from the previous night. The speaker had told him to be calm and that they were friends. The robot: Dr CILEX had been Dr Volex’s assistant. They said they helped DIX escape and they needed his help. DIX agreed, and became a Rebel bot; the only one of his type, the rebels blew up the factory, leaving the rest of his unit in smouldering pieces of wreckage, along with General Alloy’s re-enforcements.

When DIX returns to MechaChrome city, he is told that a chip exists in MechaChrome city that would allow the rebellion to shut down General Alloy permanently. DIX sneaks into MechaChrome city and steals the chip, then delivers it to the rebels. He then returns to the city, because he learned that Dr Volex is alive and being held prisoner in MechaChrome city. DIX finds Dr Volex and brings him back to Droid Town. Once there, Dr Volex calls for re-enforcements, revealing that he is in control of General Alloy and that he is the one seeking to enslave droid kind.  He Fights Dr Volex in an epic battle, however he manages to escape, and swears his revenge on DIX.

The Future

Things go back to normal, until the rebellion get news Dr Volex is building a doomsday device…

Ethics in the Game industry

Ethics in video games are always taken very seriously because the gaming market provides for a vast amount of people who all have different opinions and ideas about different things. Most cultures and countries play video games however different cultures would consider some things ethically incorrect whilst other cultures might not. An example is Resident Evil 5, in the E3 trailer we see American hero Chris Redfield (A large muscular white man, with blonde hair and blue eyes) running through an African shanty town slaughtering the Ethiopian locals. As gamers we recognise the locals are infected and are now murderous zombies; however anyone else viewing this footage could think something entirely different. The footage shows the infected acting entirely different from original zombies which were slow moaning chomping brain munchers, but the zombies in the E3 trailer were quick agile, held weaponry, and seemed to be able to do anything any normal healthy person could do. The trailer also failed to mention the existence of Sheva, Chris’ Ethiopian accomplish. The Japanese developer Capcom never intended for any racism; however there has been plenty of controversy over the matter. But the matter was resolved later.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaQmoC-vMm8

However the biggest ethical problem in video games are the how women are portrayed, Most people issues are women are portrayed as Big breasted, Big assed, little clothing, blonde haired women, which doesn’t correctly portray women, as the average cup size is C, the average hair colour is brown, and the majority of females wear an appropriate amount of clothing for normal social interaction. If games have female characters, they are normally beautiful, well-endowed individuals, examples include; explorer Lara Croft, High school Juliet Starling, and every female fighter in any fighting game ever. These female characters are provocatively dressed and have possess excessive cleavage because the developers want to expand their audience and gain more interest from male gamers, who are the majority of gamers. However even teenage males can find this marketing strategy obnoxious since it is an obvious attempt at pandering to an audience to excuse a lack of game quality.

Examples of female characters in video games being overly sexualised are a common sight; however some cases have caused more controversy than others such as the Hitman: Absolution trailer where a group of women in provocative nun clothing walking through a car park towards the home of agent 47, riddled with Machine guns, and various weaponry, one of the women is even carrying an RPG. Agent 47 being the highly trained assassin that he is spots the women and manages to escape the room before its blown to smithereens. The camera then shows Agent 47 silently taking out the women until one of the ‘nuns’ sees his attack and fires her gun, alerting the others he uses blinding skill to overcome these worthy opponents, with staining injuries  of his own in the process. The video had so much controversy because people thought that this was sexist. The woman in the video were clearly trained professionals who meant harm to agent 47 and he only attacked in self-defence, however the people in the video were complaining that creating female characters to dress them in provocative clothing and then kill them is wrong. On the other hand many fans of the Hitman series complained as the developers were only using the nuns to appeal to the male audience. What do you think?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQ_jhw5TuxA