November 2, 2007
GamePolitics has audio from the ESRB's just-concluded press conference on the Manhunt 2 hack controversy.
Due to some hardware issues, we didn't record ESRB president Patricia Vance's statement, but we pick up just as San Jose Mercury-News reporter Dean Takahashi is asking the first question.
All media questions - as well as Vance's replies - are on the 8-minute mp3.
Enjoy...
Due to some hardware issues, we didn't record ESRB president Patricia Vance's statement, but we pick up just as San Jose Mercury-News reporter Dean Takahashi is asking the first question.
All media questions - as well as Vance's replies - are on the 8-minute mp3.
Enjoy...
Comments
Yep, she's right. And there will continue to be.
Good clip, but one thing that bothered me was (I think) at the beginning, where she said she didn't know enough about technology to explain what the hackers did. I've never programmed anything in my life, but even I know what a boolean variable is.
This should shut up the jibber jabbers. Of course, sadly, it won't.
E. Zachary Knight
Divine Knight Gaming
Random Tower: Game News and Commentary
“I wonder why they allowed this to happen again. I would think if the just deleted whatever material was there that they had to blur out that it would not have been possible to do this type of thing.”
Dude, if you delete every stealth kill in the game, it’s not Manhunt anymore.
Vance’s response wasn’t much better. She basically said that hackers will find a way. That doesn't address Takahashi's comment or explain the reality of the situation.
Andrew Eisen
The message is still clear, though -- the ESRB knew what was there, and considers the use of third-party hacks to be the fault of those using them, not the manufacturer of the game.
At least Vance had a decent response this time.
Andrew Eisen
Yes because the DMCA applies as you need to illegal modify your console to make it work.
Exactly. Now try explaining that to a certain someone from Miami.
Vance admitted that was a question for someone far more technical than her. She handled it the best she could--and obviously used [and reused] some fallback statements to those questions.
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To those who wonder the same thing as Takahashi, here's a bit about how 3D modeling and gaming works, based on our current programing standards...
Be aware, I'm not a game or 3D programmer. Just a techie who has a basic barebones knowledge of how 3D Video works.
Layers:
[Object] The character
[3D Models] The "Shape" of the Characters - Including Floors/Walls
[Texturing] The "skin" of that Character
[Animation] The action of the Textured 3D Model
[Lighting] - A (complicated) filter of how light-sources act
[Shading] - This leads to the change in color, as well as our shadows
[Special Effects] - The blurs, the particles, the pretty glowing orbs
Under this basic model, you can sometimes combine Lighting and Shading to just overall "Shading". To fully delete the scenes in question, one would have to go as far deep as removing the [Texturing] of blood and guts, the [Animation], and the underly script that controls the [Object] doing this. Bare minimum.
This leaves a few holes and pits.
The pit is a model or FUNCTION() will sometimes be left "orphaned". The FUNCTION() is coded, but it has no script that wants to call it. Yet the FUNCTION() has to be reported to the ESRB or Removed--once removed ,the game has to be recompiled AGAIN. That's a lot of time and money.
The holes are what to do with the scenes that suddenly skip the death scenes. Is it still the same game and story you want to tell? Even if it is, how do you keep the video and gametime fluid? That requires more planning, coding, animation, texturing, lighting, shading, filtering and compiling all over again . Again--that's more time and money.
Rockstar obviously feels (based on their press releases) that the mood of the game would be seriously affected by removing the death scenes. This means they had to choose a way that would keep the story--and the scenes--with the least amount of work that will go into compliance. They did that by adding a [Special Effect] - a simple blur filter. Minimal compiling needed--all they did was add a filter that goes over textured and shaded animations. There's no fault in this, and it's Rockstar's right to try to do the best they can to tell a story--and sell a product with the most profit.
It simply wouldn’t BE Manhunt anymore if the kills were cut.
That's pretty much what Vance said in the interview.
Well, according to Rockstar and Take-Two, they truly felt that the original submission deserved an M rating.
Andrew Eisen
In other words, they wanted to stir up controversey because they didn't material months, maybe years, before the ESRB rated it? I mean really...they're not psychic. Yeah, they probably knew they were pushing the envelope, but the guidlines are vauge.
"Violence" can apply to Looney Toons, Fable, Halo or Manhunt. It's the arbitrarily determined "level" of violence that makes the rating...there's no way to know what rating it will get until it's submitted. And by then, the game is basically done, and you're in the situation that Silphion described.
for somereason i always think of that song with these mondern day whitch hunters on the prowl.
Right.
She goes to a press conference about a specific hack done by users, a hack the ESRB has been investigating, and she doesn't know enough to give any kind of specifics.
*coughBScough*
This sounds a lot like Mr. Gonzales' "I can't recall" defense. Or the new AG nominee unaware of what Waterboarding is.
It's a defensive tactic that gives you a quick out on any tough questions, even though you look like an incompetent fool for not coming prepared.
My bet? Rockstar made the change and forgot the make it hard to remove it. Rockstar did enough for the ESRB to label it as being the Hacker's fault, but not enough to not look partly responsible in the public's eye.
Why don't we consider, for a moment, that maybe not everyone attacking Rockstar and Manhunt 2 are evil douchebags with their head up their bums? Maybe they have a valid point!
Or is that too complex a thought for Game Politics?
You are right. Be sure to consider, however, there are limits on what one can do in a short amount of time. See my above post about 3D Modeling.
As for people who attack R*, a lot of people do, just that you may be mixed in with the silly lil bandwagon as the long-time haters never generated enough noise.
There are a LOT of things contained in .ini files. Anything in them can be removed. But they are needed to configure game parameters and renderer parameters (lots of other things too). If you don't have .ini files, you have to recompile the game every single time you make a change. You think 5 years is a long time to wait for a game?
Assuming that the game was lowered to M because of some silly render effect I think is irresponsible and ignorant. It's obvious that there was a lot more removed (a lot more offensive things) to obtain the M rating.