Post by Noelemahc on Jun 3, 2014 2:23:23 GMT -5
As usual, most problems of USAican society stem from how disconnected its law-making bodies are from the real world.
(I admit it's a worldwide problem, but the American Way is touted as the Right Way, so we have all the time in the world to berate it)
Simple thing: when Russia introduced a systemic age-rating system, the law just said "media". And it covers all forms of media. The classification itself is shit (smoking or the use of the word "suicide" bumps it up to 16+ immediately), but the fact that it was quickly, simply, and encompassingly implemented to all forms of media, from websites to ads to magazines to movies to games to books to comics, demonstrates that the ESRB is really really really unnecessary.
And now, Mortal Kombat. My parents bought it for me, but strictly controlled how much time I spent playing it (interestingly, they reasoned against Half-life, but in favour of Doom, in favour of Duke Nukem 3D but against Warcraft II, etc). It being the primary non-hardware-intensive fightening game of the PC (Sango Fighter arrived in Russia belatedly, Street Fighter's PC ports were utter crud and One Must Fall, which I played the heck out of when I got a better PC, required something better than a 486 to be comfortable), of course I played it as much as I could, because BLOOD, GUTS, AWESOME. Didn't learn to care or learn about matchups, combos or the Spirit Of Good Gaming In Fightening Games until a couple of decades later, when I started frequenting Shoryuken - but at the time, none of it mattered, because "look at those tits!" and "Imma beat you up!" and, of course, "GET OVER HERE".
No, wait, I did learn about matchups. Stryker was the first time I learned about the importance of air control (if you forgot, him being the Jonny Cage replacement, his MK3/UMK3 iteration is all about fucking up any attempts for aerial attacks on him), and abused the heck out of people who were still in the "divekick for victory" camp - it helped that a lot of boys on my street played and we had a variety of opponents, all with different tastes in multicoloured ninjas to be entertaining both in TMNT games and in MK. And that's the story of why I main with Ermac in MK9 =D
(I admit it's a worldwide problem, but the American Way is touted as the Right Way, so we have all the time in the world to berate it)
Simple thing: when Russia introduced a systemic age-rating system, the law just said "media". And it covers all forms of media. The classification itself is shit (smoking or the use of the word "suicide" bumps it up to 16+ immediately), but the fact that it was quickly, simply, and encompassingly implemented to all forms of media, from websites to ads to magazines to movies to games to books to comics, demonstrates that the ESRB is really really really unnecessary.
And now, Mortal Kombat. My parents bought it for me, but strictly controlled how much time I spent playing it (interestingly, they reasoned against Half-life, but in favour of Doom, in favour of Duke Nukem 3D but against Warcraft II, etc). It being the primary non-hardware-intensive fightening game of the PC (Sango Fighter arrived in Russia belatedly, Street Fighter's PC ports were utter crud and One Must Fall, which I played the heck out of when I got a better PC, required something better than a 486 to be comfortable), of course I played it as much as I could, because BLOOD, GUTS, AWESOME. Didn't learn to care or learn about matchups, combos or the Spirit Of Good Gaming In Fightening Games until a couple of decades later, when I started frequenting Shoryuken - but at the time, none of it mattered, because "look at those tits!" and "Imma beat you up!" and, of course, "GET OVER HERE".
No, wait, I did learn about matchups. Stryker was the first time I learned about the importance of air control (if you forgot, him being the Jonny Cage replacement, his MK3/UMK3 iteration is all about fucking up any attempts for aerial attacks on him), and abused the heck out of people who were still in the "divekick for victory" camp - it helped that a lot of boys on my street played and we had a variety of opponents, all with different tastes in multicoloured ninjas to be entertaining both in TMNT games and in MK. And that's the story of why I main with Ermac in MK9 =D