First of all, pull on your tight, black, leather gloves and have a sinister chuckle at our previous Manhunt post from 2004.
The unrepentant sequel, Manhunt 2 is due out in July. Hint: no gold-coin-collecting and princess-saving in this one either.
The real shocker this time is not the level of violence – predictably high – but the reaction of the BBFC, who have decided that only an outright ban is appropriate for the UK public.
No game at all. For anybody.
Bad puppy. As they say:
“Manhunt 2 is distinguishable from recent high-end video games by its unremitting bleakness and callousness of tone in an overall game context which constantly encourages visceral killing with exceptionally little alleviation or distancing”
Speaking personally, any game featuring – unforgettably – ‘unremitting bleakness’ is on my buy list. You can get some of Rockstar’s response, which is as rational as you might expect but will achieve little.
The first game to get an outright ban – ridiculously in retrospect – was Carmageddon, for the concept of reward for *chuckle* running over blind pedestrians. Back then in 1997, the publishers appealed, and actually overturned the ban.
That’s unlikely to happen in this case.
But they can play it in the US, right?
In the US they have a classification, Adults Only (AO). The only game to get this rating to date is… GTA San Andreas. But only after the foot-shooting Hot Coffee debacle.
Unfortunately, while this classification makes sense, Sony and Nintendo have self-censored and made it their policy never to allow AO titles to run on their kit.
This is predictable from Nintendo (SNES Mortal Kombat), but Sony? Ouch.
Why god why?
But is it really more dangerous than the first game? Tim Smith presents more plausible reasons for the ban of a game which – very likely – is no more in need of censorship than the first:
- Fear of media response. The Daily Mail effect.
- Atonement. Simply ‘correcting for’ their leniency with MH1.
The point the BBFC is really making is that their classification system just doesn’t work, and that we need a further measure: PG, 12, 15, 18, outright ban.
And how many outright bans of books or films end up looking ridiculous after a short span of years?
All of them.
22-Jun-07 at 2:45 pm | Permalink
Harrrgh! Carmageddon! Apparently in germany, instead of running down people, you had to run down floating rubbish bins. Or am I thinking of ‘Postal’?
ALSO: ‘unremitting bleakness’? Sign me up, doggzy.
Honestly, why does a game like this get a total ban when bullshit brown-lensed tortureporn balls like ‘Hostel 2′, ‘Luke Wilson Snuff Hijinks’, and ‘The Lady Trapped In Sand On The Side Of Buses’ film are aw over the cinema?
I guess there’s the argument that games are more participatory, but, you know, fuck that noise. Only people already predisposed to Bad Idiocy are going to be in any way influenced by a computer game in their ‘real’ life, right? And they’re just as likely to be affected adversely by a film, or, like, a loud noise or accidental eye contact.
That said, I could total do a hadouken in a real fight.
I’d try, anyway.
22-Jun-07 at 4:51 pm | Permalink
> The Lady Trapped In Sand On The Side Of Buses
Here is the poster in question.
And here is the relevant music video by Sir Mix-a-Lot (NSFW!).
23-Jun-07 at 8:11 pm | Permalink
Harrrgh! Carmageddon! > Was eventually released because some *vital* changes were made to the game in order to make it less disturbing. *crucially* the colour of blood was changed to green, and they’re not blind peds, see? They’re ZOMBIES. So that makes it ok.
ALSO: ‘unremitting bleakness’? Sign me up, doggzy. > It’s quite special
Apparently Nintendo somethin somethin magazine awarded it 97%…
Brown-lensed tortureporn balls > My point exactly. The BBFC’s offical stance on this is that computer games are a ‘pro-active’ source of entertainment. Thus, (sophie ellis bextor appears on MTV for a second and Jb loses her train of thought… Chebs..) in any given 1st person fuckemup, this is for all intents and purposes, ‘you’. A piss-weak argument, based upon supposition and fairytale, if ever I’ve heard one..
I still wouldn’t be surprised if MH2 hits the shelves. I hope it does, it was 4 years in the making.
31-Aug-07 at 6:17 am | Permalink
Looks like Rockshtar have introduced some ‘bleakness breaks’ in the US version, as the censorship board there have now rerated this threat to children as (M)ature.
31-Aug-07 at 10:35 pm | Permalink
Yeh well I’m up for a job at Jagex. There are over 40 possible random events in Runescape. *checks pants for devious mud*
04-Sep-07 at 2:18 pm | Permalink
Bleakness breaks > Hmm, I don’t know anything about that. Hmm.
40 possible random events > LOL. SWEET!!1
13-Sep-07 at 11:21 am | Permalink
A rundown of the changes they’ve made to get it past the censors.
The tone of the reviewer here is pretty disturbing when you get into page 2.
15-Mar-08 at 3:49 am | Permalink
Well that didn’t take too long.