Reality Panic

As noted previously, after my Bully debate with the Canadian Teachers Federation, I reached out to them asking if we could be a part of the solution (as opposed to the perception that games are part of the problem). I’m happy to say that I found my way to the head of their cyberbullying group and we are arranging to speak in more detail, etc. More on that as progress is made.

In terms of being “part of the solution” a few recent examples crossed my path:

• Ruckus Nation: HopeLab’s global competition to get kids moving announced their award winners.
• Future of Interactive Technology for Peace Conference: CMU is using the event to determine if games can be used to enhance the peacemaking process.
• Games For Health Conference: Now in its fourth iteration is on for early May…
• ESA Foundation Scholarships: …with a focus on getting more women and minorities into game development.

Of course, we have the ever popular Child’s Play Charity raising millions to help sick children. As well as more novel efforts like OneBigGame to create unique games for the benefit of children’s charities.

And, that’s just off the top of my head. There’s a bunch more stuff like this going on that I’m barely aware of…

I’ve got a Bully interview/debate set for tomorrow morning on CBC News:Sunday with Mary-Lou Donnelly of the Canadian Teachers’ Federation. I tried to punt this one to journalist Steve Tilley, as I thought he did a great job editorializing on the irony surrounding the teachers’ condemnation of the release of Bully: Scholarship Edition (but he wasn’t available :(

So, I’m doing a bit more research and prep, and trying to understand the core of the teachers’ concern/complaint. In reviewing the CTF’s official statement, they spend most of their words describing how problematic bullying is. OK, no debate there, bullying is a serious and complex issue that needs society’s ongoing attention.

But what about the game itself? It is quite evident that none of the teachers actually played the game or bothered to do much research on it - seemingly defaulting to their likely model of all games being bad. Not only do they misrepresent what the game is about (along with content that doesn’t actually exist), they miss the whole point about the player-character being a kind of anti-bully. That many of the missions are to protect the weaker characters, and connect with the various factions at school. That you need to attend (and excel at) class in order to get ahead. And that actually being a bully has negative repercussions that slow down your progress.

The saddest part of all this is that the teachers are missing a prime opportunity to make progress. Their statement laments that the game “undermine[s] efforts to create safe schools”. Whereas, I’d argue that teachers could have leveraged Bully to both better understand the social politics of high school (by embodying a troubled teen) and open a much needed dialog with students about bullying.

Can we blame them? While some argue that Bully could have been an even more scathing critique of school life, the challenge is that many simply do not look to games for meaningful social commentary (like The Breakfast Club, for example). The mental model (certainly for digital immigrant teachers) is still stuck in the realm of frivolous toy as opposed to valuable cultural artifact…

Update 1: Clint Hocking offers to play Bully with the CTF to understand/evaluate it (book club style). Also, after the TV debate I contacted the CTF to open discussion and find ways to work together… I’ll post updates if/as things develop…

Update 2: Had a nice chat with Mary-Lou Donnelly from the CTF. She’s going to put me in touch with the folks heading up their anti-cyberbullying efforts (which lead the charge to ban Bully). Ultimately, we all want to stop bullying and build safe/effective schools, and there’s no doubt that games can play an important role in that effort. We’ll see what happens next…

By chance, I consumed the following bits pretty much back-to-back (my brain is still churning…):

• Awesomely engaging Lawrence Lessig talk from TED on user generated content (thanks Kim!)
• David Edery’s thoughts on a new approach to licensing IP
• Raph Koster’s big brain dump slides from GDC Prime
• Denis Dyack on the one console future and open standards

UGC * IP = culture remixed!

While most of the free world is rampaging against (mind you, Dr. Phil was way more measured this time out) the release of Manhunt2 and the various hacks - in turn helping it to sell - there’s perhaps a more serious issue at play for developers…

While the specter of censorship floats over the game industry at large, a developer not getting fair/accurate credit for their contribution to a project could cause serious/direct damage.

Ex-Rockstar Vienna producer Jurie Horneman posted the unpublished credits for the Vienna team members that worked on Manhunt2 for over two years (ie, before Take-2 shut down the studio and moved development to their London studio.) Kudos to Jurie for giving his teammates their deserved props, and for bringing the issue to light.

Why is this important? Accurate, complete, and fair credits are essential to ongoing employment, professional development, and artistic fulfillment for all developers. Further, having accurate credits also helps employers make informed hiring decisions.

In that regard, the work that the IGDA’s Credit Standards Committee is of particular significance…

In honor of the one year anniversary of the tragic shooting at Dawson College, Danny Ledonne has released a special edit trailer of his coming-soon documentary Playing Columbine: A True Story of Video Game Controversy.

I was interviewed for the film when Danny came to Montreal to spend some time with Dawson survivors. And, I was thoroughly impressed with the mature approach Danny was taking. This is well reflected in the new trailer.

Unbelievable that only a year has passed. Seems like ages ago… Admittedly, I personally got a little more heat that usual given that I’m in Montreal… In some regards, the discourse has evolved in interesting ways, though it mostly wallows in the muck of ignorance (leading to debates in futility).

Oh well. I’m looking forward to the final cut of the film (which I do believe Danny is planning to screen during the Montreal Game Summit later in November)…

Lots of attention is being given to the American Medical Association’s push to have “video game addiction” recognized as a formal diagnostic disorder. Refreshingly, the media coverage has been pretty balanced and not nearly as sensationalistic as when it comes to concerns over media violence - one paper even strongly blaming poor parenting.

I was called in to do an interview for MSNBC. I was a bit concerned given the overly negative piece that ran as their cover story on the web site. Sadly, I can’t yet find a online version of the video or transcript. Overall the interview went well, though I was anxious/nervous at the start and kinda fumbled on my words a bit (having sat in the video booth for 40 minutes during technical difficulties didn’t help ease my nerves any).

I was also called by CNBC for another interview/debate later that evening. Unfortunately, I had a schedule conflict and wasn’t able to do it. Instead, I referred them to Hal Halpin of the Entertainment Consumers Association, who did a fine job considering he stepped in at the last moment…

Anyway, a few somewhat random thoughts come to mind on this issue:

• there’s no denying the concern for someone that does something on an extremely excessive basis (be it gaming, watching TV, doing exercise, working, etc). In most cases, this has more to do with the person than the thing: mental stability, depression, social anxieties, low self-esteem, whatever. Let’s find better ways to help the people and worry less about the “things”.
• the usage of the term “addiction” is tricky given the clinical definition (ie, physiological dependency of a given substance, etc) is way different than the casual/lay use of the word (ie, obsessed, passionate, etc)…
• Americans average approx 28 hours of TV watching a week. Stereotypical gamers do about 7 hours of gaming a week. That’s 4x more for TV. I don’t see any calls to declare TV watching as a formal disorder (though, I’d speculate that someone probably tried a few decades back). FYI, in the AMA report, 2 hours or more a day is considered heavy game use.
• the overly negative framing of the AMA report only works to further alienate parents and non-gamers. You get the sense that parents are being told to take out the Purel and disinfect anything that comes in contact with games/gamers. Instead, we should be educating parents to make them more media literate and help them to engage with their children via their pop culture.
• moderation is a good thing. Related to the first point, no one is suggesting that playing games incessantly is wise. Having a diverse media diet coupled with other activities along with rules/boundaries (whether self imposed for adults, or by parents) is fine.
• a formal declaration is a precursor to further legislation and censorship by the government. And, as an expressive medium, video games should be given the same level of respect and protection as other forms of art and entertainment
• more research is welcome. But please, do it in an unbiased manner. Don’t assign it to the Center for Disease Control! What kind of message/assumption does that indicate?

Hmm, well, those are all my thoughts for now. Gotta go get my fix of gaming in for today!

Update: The AMA has backed off, citing the need for more research. Of course, they still hold that reducing screen time for children is a good thing. Sure. Though, to what degree does this quote reflect a dated view of what games are and/or how people play?

The more time kids spend on video games, the less time they will have socializing, the less time they will have with their families, the less time they will have exercising.

DDR? WoW? Wii? …