Daily Q: Could the ESA be doomed?
Category: Features, Posted: 05/25/2008 at 09:49AM CDT by Creighton DeSimone, Staff Writer
I am one who strongly supports the ESA and the ESRB. Having an Entertainment Software Association to act like a band of brothers when the going gets tough has done a lot for the industry. The ESA has stood up for games and the freedom that publishers have to create games in front of congress on more than one occasion.
Earlier this month we learned that Activision/Vivendi were leaving the ESA thinking they would be better off alone. I chalked it up to getting a big head because they are the largest publisher. But now, something strange is happening; LucasArts left two weeks ago, and now iD software has also announced they have left the ESA.
I ask you, community, Is the ESA Doomed?
The largest publisher is gone, and now it seems the smaller ones are making their way to the door. Who will be there when more porn gets slipped into the Wall-E game? Or when someone parents group blames videogames for their antisocial kids and is on the hunt for blood. There was a kind of protection out there with the ESA, but as more companies leave there is less of a reason for the remainder to stay.
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i wonder how much it costs to be affiliated with the ESA though, and if its even worth it now.
This could be bad. Now morons like jack tompson may actually have a leg to stand on. With a rating system like movies, only the parents could be to blame for their own stupidity. Now while I think they should be involved enough to know what their kids are doing, a case in court could be made that a parent bought a game that is violent with no rating, and claim they did not know. Stupidity like that is why products like irons have to say in their manuals: "Do not iron with clothes on". One loop hole = lawsuit. I sure hope the game industry has a contingency plan.
The ESA is doomed Doomed I say.
aren't there some companies that aren't affiliated with ESA that still use their ratings? (i can't think of any off of the top of my head... so consider this a serious question please...).
i would think that a big time UNrated game would garner some bad press for whoever made it.. and i wouldn't be surprised if places like walmart and best buy don't sell unrated games (unless they treat unrated games the same way as they treat unrated movies... but given that the media is different and there is usually a very good reason why scenes were cut from movies...).
I'm not going to pronounce doom on the ESA just yet but they got a good hole to claw themselves out of...
The ESRB is the ratings system and not the ESA, no one is removing ratings from games.
i withdraw my question...