Gaming! So many games, not enough posts!
France considers cracking down on sexism in video games
France considers cracking down on sexism in video games
The French government is considering several measures aimed at combating sexism in video games, according to a report published this week by Le Figaro. Axelle Lemaire, the French Minister of Digital Affairs, met with representatives from the French video game industry last month to discuss the set of measures, Le Figaro reports, which include financial incentives and labels for games that give a "positive image of women."
theverge.com




Wow, that's a nice start. It seems sad that this isn't already the standard.
I'm not sure if I want to know who were opposed to this amendment...
Well, with the original amendment taking financial incentives away from companies who produce games that don't have positive representation, I'd assume people who felt it was an unfair penalty against a form of art or media.
I don't really have an opinion one way or another on the original amendment. I'm sure the MDA's announcement will bring certain groups forward to complain and hate, but I think this is a good way to go about it--incentivizing devs who go out of their way to make a positive influence.
I'm all for feminist critique of gaming as if it were any other art form but legislating what themes and political messages can go into art seems a bit too far. What if those themes were unintentional? Who gets to decide what's appropriate? The answer to both of these questions should be the audience. If we buy games that cater to our own personal beliefs and refuse to purchase games that reinforce negative and ignorant ideas that permeate our society the people making games will listen and make games for that audience. It's already happening.
but they're not doing that. they, in fact, did not approve the amendment that would have carried loss of tax incentives for games that were deemed to have harmful portrayals of women.
the MDA's plan is to instead keep the market as is, but potentially create financial incentives above what game companies already get, with those incentives applying to games that go out of their way to make a positive portrayal of women.
so it's not saying "you can't have this, and you will face a penalty for doing so." it's saying, "you can have whatever you want, but if you have this then we'll reward you for a little extra for it."
voting with your wallet sounds nice, but we're in a global market when it comes to games, and they're played by literally hundreds of millions of people. the small pro-diversity/pro-positive portrayals of women section of that market doesn't get noticed on financial sheets, plus maybe that small section also wants to buy certain games even if they have a negative portrayal because they like that series.
there's also the fact that it's not exactly easy for someone to pre-judge whether or not a game may have themes/elements they disagree with. for example, i read multiple reviews of Persona Q and none of them brought up some of the things i found distasteful. i could've watched a play through of the game, but some of these problems didn't really surface until over 20+ hours into the game. requiring a buyer to spoil the game for themselves and potentially watch 40 or more hours of gameplay and story before deciding if they want to buy a game (especially a game in a series they may already like) seems like one hell of a burden. that's an amount of research i've never seen my grandfather put into buying a car or equipment for the farm, nor have i heard of anyone spending 40 hours researching what cell phone they want to buy.
having an agency that would go through all of a game, cite moments when it has problems, and make a list or label for a game seems very pro-consumer and helpful for the market. and it's not unprecedented; the ESRB already has extensive lists for games, explaining why it got the rating it did and what kind of violence, story elements, or other items you'll find.
Videogames are art. And France is basically trying to dictate to artists what they should or should not create. It would be a great loss for freedom of expression and freedom of speech.
A game like Bioshock could never be sold or created by a French company if it contained themes about subjugation and women as second class citizens, in other words. Or it would suffer penalties that would have made it unattractive to create in the first place.
I think that gamers could agree that if we prevent creation of the Mass Effects, Dragon Age, Bioshocks of our time because of political correctness it would be a massive loss for gaming, freedom of speech and artistic expression.