Fox News / EA Spar Over Mass Effect 'Controversy'

The whacked out rantings of Kevin McCullogh have been a hot topic on games blogs in recent weeks, as his lurid description of Mass Effect prompted vitriol from actual gamers. That exchange would have been easily left behind if not for the fact that Fox News stepped into the fray, adding a measure of 'fair and balanced' to the discussion. Their 'Sexbox Sexpose' drew in veteran games journalist Geoff Keighley, who optimistically thought he'd be given the chance to set the record straight. Instead they filled the airwaves with plainly false generalizations about the game's sexual content. Kotaku is reporting that EA is fighting back, protecting BioWare's property and demanding a correction. From EA's letter to Fox: "The resulting coverage was insulting to the men and women who spent years creating a game which is acclaimed by critics for its high creative standards. As video games continue to take audiences away from television, we expect to see more TV news stories warning parents about the corrupting influence of interactive entertainment. But this represents a new level of recklessness." I hope the EA folks aren't holding their breath.

Four words.

[Optio]

Stable door. Horse. Bolted.

Faux News aren't going to back down, as the voice of "fair and balanced" coverage; and for all their vitriol, the gaming community is going to struggle with the mainstream for a fair few years yet.

Wow, EA

[Applekid]

I'm generally in the camp that EA executives are full of crap, but...

As video games continue to take audiences away from television, we expect to see more TV news stories warning parents about the corrupting influence of interactive entertainment.

... I find that quote to be rather insightful. The same congressional members that make laws granting more and more power to the MAFIAA at the expense of the people are the ones demanding game companies be held to an unrealistic standard of decency in entertainment.

Recently /. had a story about how some parent's group was "outraged" that game companies are now trying to lobby congress for favor, but, as long as the TV, radio, and film conglomerates have deeper pockets and the numbers keep dropping in favor of interactive entertainment, it's not going to be enough. Faux News is showing their hand without fear since the existing career politicians are already beholden to those guys.

Definitions

[eldavojohn]

I once heard a much older person refer to the language of Goodfellas as "pornographic." I corrected her saying the f-word isn't referring to anything sexual--in fact those men in that movie view it as an interjection or part of speech and nothing more. She ended up winning the argument as there are two definitions for pornographic [wiktionary.org]:

1. Containing an explicit depiction of sexual activity.
2. Depicting something in details, usually unnecessarily.

She pointed out that it was an almost gratuitous manner in which they used curses and was probably unnecessary to tell the story. That could probably be arguable but she likened that swearing to people using the bathroom. Everyone does it but we don't see it in movies unless it's got an important plot point (see Pulp Fiction or Unforgiven).

So, to relate this to the story, if Fox News is accusing Mass Effect of 'depicting something in details, unnecessarily' then I guess the game could be described as pornographic in nature. Indeed, some of the games today have such vivid detail that is not necessarily needed for the plot ... but, a very enjoyable side effect, it makes it seem completely and utterly real. Perhaps these details are necessary then?

One thing you must admit, there might be this gradual transition that we need to draw a cut off line at. Where we used to sit and play the original NES and play 8-bit, low detail Guantlet we can now sit and play PS3 high def red warrior needs blood Gauntlet. I went from shooting pixelated nothings to full upright three dimensional beings. Where does the video game become so real that it is a rated R movie in and of itself? If the argument is to make Mass Effect accessible only to 17 & 18 year old people, then I don't see a problem with this argument. Did Fox over sensationalize what was going on and mislead the public? Yes, of course, that's their job! It sells.

I'm just sad that nobody is approaching this from a neutral point of view and actually doing some objective journalism on this topic. Perhaps objectivity is no longer possible in this debate ...

Re:Batshit insane

[Pojut]

Read the book that came out last year, and read through the codex entries in the game...look at all the side quests, and how different they are from each other. Look at how fleshed out your crew members become...look at the detail inherent just in the Citadel.

I like to compare Mass Effect to The Dark Crystal...sure, (mostly) everyone loves it, but hardly anyone realizes the unfathomable amount of detail and creativity that it took to create the universe and the species/people/stories that inhabit it.

Re:Wow, EA

[jollyreaper]

I generally think the whole convergence thing is a load of hotair but I think that's just because the pundits called it a decade or two early. We really are seeing this now, communications and entertainment all coming down one pipe. And because of this, entertainment will drastically change, too. Are you gaming tonight, are you going to watch something? Video on demand isn't coming to us the way that was anticipated, we're seeing it via PVR (the super-vcr) and bittorrent (a product completely bypassing the cable company middleman!)and whole season DVD's. Behavior patterns and expectations are shifting now, not in the future but now. People are getting used to the fact of moving away from the primetime structure, of watching what they want when they want or doing something else if they feel like it. Back before TV, radio and movies were the kings of pop culture. Before radio, sheet music reigned supreme and families played piano, singing along. For single entertainment, books and newspapers were available.

Newspapers aren't dead and I truly think that the Internet is giving them new life and relevance, they're just not going to be quite the way we knew papers in the past. The written word is the cheapest form of information creation and distribution we have and the computer only gives it more power. We already see amateurs creating works with a worldwide following. It may not be on quite the same scale as Dickens in his day but on a smaller scale, it remains possible. I mean hell, web comics are turning a profit! That's astounding. And when you're independent and not beholden to a big stupid parent company, it doesn't take nearly as much revenue to remain in business.

Anyway, dems my thoughts.

Re:Batshit insane

[Pojut]

That's just it though...the Mass Effect universe as a whole is so large that any part of it could easily become it's own story.

Each of the species alone could have an entire game-length storyline dedicated to their history. Hell, the Krogan and the Rachnii by themselves could have an entire SERIES devoted to their race. Or what about the protheans? Or maybe the discovery of humanity by the rest of the galaxy? Or our discovery of them? Or what about the BUILDING of the citadel, and the origin of the keepers? Then again, you could do an entire story line about the thresher maws...a good place to start would be how the hell they appear on so many different planets that are so far away.

There is of course the shadow broker, they could do an entire story line on that. Or how about the consort, how did she become who she was? Or perhaps Benezia? How did she come under sovereign's power so easily? What caused it to happen? What went on while it was happening? What was she like prior to the indoctrination?

What I'm getting at here is that while a lot of the things I have mentioned were touched on in the game, each of them has enough creativity and life in them to be able to hold a storyline for an entire book (if not an entire series of books) individually. Nearly everything in the Mass Effect universe (much like our own) has a very long and complex history, one which could be fleshed out in countless numbers of books and video games.

Perhaps, when seeing it in that way, you can understand why the Mass Effect universe is appealing to me...it's not just some little world created for a game...it's like an entire alternate reality.

Re:Four words.

[CowboyBob500]

How about these four: Rated M for Mature

Seriously? Here in the UK it's rated 12 (as in suitable for 12 year olds).

Bob

Re:Four words.

[moderatorrater]

You've got to give them credit for trying though. Fox News is obviously making an attempt to distort the facts, and often the threat of a lawsuit is enough to bring them in line.

On that same note, this is one of the perks that Bioware gets from being part of EA, the use of a large legal department.

Re:Faux News

[Bloodoflethe]

Well-trolled *cough*, I guess I'll bite: I know plenty of well-informed non-fundies that read/listen/watch content from The News Corporation, including Fox. Why, because they also read/listen/watch liberal stations. There is plenty to take seriously from each side, the effort is spent sifting through the fallacies and weighing out bias to get at the heart of the matter and from there deciding what your stance on the issue will be. Remember, the truth is more easily found when most conflict is filtered out. There are exceptions - i.e. the big issues, in which the points of view of either side perfectly cancel out. These are fundamental differences and will determine your stances on other things. *shrug* Go with what you feel comfortable with, I just try not to have a herd mentality.

Re:Four words.

[AKAImBatman]

Bugger that common language crap, here in the UK we're generally far more permissive than folk in the US. /sweeping generalisation.

Except for Nunchuks and Ninjas. Thus the cartoon "Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles" in which Michaelangelo had a grappling hook rather than a pair of 'chuks.

Yet there are naked women in the newspaper.

It's surprising how much the taboos of cultures can vary. Something perfectly acceptable to one culture is utterly offensive to another culture. Weird, isn't it? =)

Hypocrisy

[Rebelgecko]

I went to http://www.fox.com/ [fox.com] looking for an email address to send a complaint to and saw an ad for the Terminator TV show with, you guessed it, a naked woman (or robot, or whatever) who is showing way more skin than I saw when I played Mass Effect.

Re:Four words.

[ecavalli]

And if the game had been rated by the American film or television rating system you would have seen similar results here in the States.

The reality here is that the "sex act" in question is literally a 10 second, non-interactive cutscene 90% of the way into Mass Effect that shows a blue female form from the side, a half-second of rump cleavage and even less than that of the side of the alien woman's breast.

It's easily less offensive than anything you'd see on primetime television and in many cases is much more tame.

Fox News is simply having a slow news cycle so pointing to a popular game and telling parents -- who haven't been paying much attention -- that it's filled with sodomy and penetration is an easy way to jack up the ratings.

I'd like to say that EA is defending the title based on some moral highground, but the reality is that they have to protect their investment -- they own BioWare now, y'know.