Just got word from the ESRB:
Rockstar's upcoming Bully has been assigned a T (Teen 13+) rating with content descriptors for Crude Humor, Violence, Sexual Themes, Language and Use of Alcohol & Tobacco.
Currently, on the game's official site, Rockstar is displaying an image of Bully bearing the familiar T (13 & older) rating.
There has been much speculation that the game would receive an M (17 & older), but we can put that to rest now.
From the Could Be a Rumor Department...
A story on EuroGamer says that Rockstar is changing the name of Bully to Canis Canem Edit, Latin for dog eat dog. It also happens to be the motto of the fictional Bulworth Academy, where the game takes place.
Eurogamer is citing Rockstar itself as a source, although no individual is named. GP is withholding judgment on the veracity of this one.
Additional info from Computer & Video Games says that the change is for the European market only. Bully will still be Bully in the U.S.
John Callaham of Firing Squad has scored an interview with Jayne Hitchcock, the online safety expert who decided to give Bully a wedgie yesterday. Among Hitchcock's comments:
"...bullying is so prevalent today and is a real life problem that many kids and teens face. Some victims of bullies have committed suicide and I would hate to see that increase or the victims retaliate against their bullies because of this game."
( Read more... )
"It's a sad day when video game manufacturers play on the fears of kids and teens..."
So says a nationally-known Internet safety expert who has joined those expressing concern over Rockstar's upcoming release of Bully.
As detailed in a press release, Jayne Hitchcock, president of Working to Halt Online Abuse (WHOA), believes Bully may spark copycat violence.
"How long will it be before we hear on the news about a victim of bullies who is inspired by the new game and retaliates using a baseball bat? There is a tremendous probability that this new game will send out twisted messages, possibly even influence victims of bullying to resort to violence as a means of defense. Games can and do make impressions on young people, especially when they play the games over and over."
( Read more... )
GamePolitics has confirmed that the Peaceoholics, a Washington, D.C.-based community group, will stage a protest demonstration outside the Lower Manhattan offices of Take-Two Interactive later today.
Ronald Moten, co-founder and chief operating officer of the Peaceoholics, confirmed to GamePolitics last night that group members would board buses this morning for the trip to the Big Apple. The Peaceoholics are cooperating with anti-game activist Jack Thompson on the action, which is designed to draw attention to the upcoming release of Bully by Take-Two subsidiary Rockstar Games.
The grass roots community group is quite active in the D.C. area on anti-violence initiatives, including a failed 2005 attempt by City Councilman Adrian Fenty to regulate the sale of violent games. Thompson and the Peaceoholics teamed up to stage a similar demonstration outside Take-Two headquarters last August. That effort received coverage by New York television stations and newspapers.
It's the most vilified game that no one has ever seen.
We're talking about Bully, of course, Rockstar's controversial title scheduled for October 17th release. As we edge closer to the game's launch, Rockstar is beginning to pull the curtain back a bit.
A new Bully trailer showed up on YouTube yesterday and logged over 300,000 viewings.
The brand-new edition of Game Informer has a cover story on Bully, with some revealing insights. For example, Rockstar producer Devin Winterbottom tells GI, "It's not Grand Theft Auto in a school, which is really the most baseline thing people think about it."
( Read more... )
These days, Rockstar Games and parent company Take-Two Interactive seem to get more court time that the average NBA team.
Gamasutra is reporting that E.S.S. Entertainment, owners of the Play Pen, a Los Angeles "gentleman's club," filed suit against Rockstar in April 2005 for trademark infringement over the inclusion of a strip bar in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas called the Pig Pen.
At issue was the Pig Pen's similar awning and logo (both pictured) which, like those of the Play Pen, feature the nude silhouette of a female dancer in the stem of the first letter "P". Additionally, the GTA Pig Pen's exterior displayed the words "Totally Nude," a phrase also used by the real-world Play Pen.
AE: Maybe things are different up in L.A. but down here in San Diego, all the strip clubs feature the words "Totally Nude" somewhere on their signs. I only know this because I, um... can see them from the freeway.
Displaying a clear grasp on the concept of parody, Judge Margaret Morrow said in her ruling, "Any visual work that seeks to offer an artistic commentary on a particular subject must use identifiable features of that subject so that the commentary will be understood and appreciated by the consumer."
( Read more... )
The critics, it seems, are lining up to rip Rockstar's upcoming Bully. GamePolitics has reported on several over the last week.
But a free speech advocate sees the game in a different light. In an interview with Rocky Mountain News reporter Brian Crecente (you may know him better as editor of Kotaku), Joan Bertin (left), executive director of the National Coalition Against Censorship, said, "This is plainly a new way to communicate messages, to tell stories and a new way to get people conversing with one another."
( Read more... )
Will we be talking about Bully every day between now and its October 17th launch?
Seems like it.
There's a trailer now available for the game. The short video clip seems to depict a story with a fairly complex plot and some interesting characters.
Oh, and wedgies.
GP: Thanks to reader Matt Parsons for shooting us the video link!
While everyone seems to be buzzing about Bully of late, at least one respected financial analyst thinks sales of the game won't match the hype. Bully is scheduled for October release on the PS2.
Michael Pachter, who covers the video game industry for Wedbush Morgan, told Red Herring, "I think it sounds like a dopey game. But I've always thought that."
Pachter explained that video games generally fall into categories, and added that titles like Grand Theft Auto, World of Warcraft and Halo are "escapist" and "aspirational."
"I don't see how Bully is aspirational for anyone but 14-year-olds," Pachter said. "I don't get how this is going to resonate with (Rockstar's) constituency."
Pachter made similar comments to GamePolitics last summer. At the time, Pachter said, "Bully will be a stupid game, and will rock in England. Doubt it sells well in the U.S."
According to Reuters, Rockstar will announce today that its controversial title Bully will launch in October.
Although the Reuters story does not specify a date, it is reporting that the game's main character will be a 15-year-old boy named Jimmy Hopkins. Weapons in the game will include baseball bats, stink bombs and bags of marbles.
Bully will feature animated violence, but no blood or deaths, and has not yet been rated by the ESRB.
( Read more... )
Total Video Games is reporting that Rockstar has opted not to publish its upcoming Bully on the Xbox.
If true, the controversial game will be a PS2 exclusive. As explained by TVG, the cancellation fits in with an industry trend to scale down Xbox game development efforts. Makes sense, nearly a year into the life cycle of the Xbox 360, successor to the original Xbox.
Since the decision was made by Rockstar, the cancellation of the Xbox version of Bully would appear to have nothing at all to do with an ultimatum issued to Microsoft's Bill Gates by Miami Attorney Jack Thompson about this time last year. Thompson, of course, has been the planet's most vocal critic of Bully for some time. Here's the text of his August, 2005 letter to the World's Richest Man:
Dear Mr. Gates:
You have fifty-four (54) days in which to stop the release of Bully on XBox.
( Read more... )
Someone in the New York District Attorney's Office must be an avid GP reader...
Last week, in response to a public tongue-lashing handed out by Congress to the ESRB and FTC, GamePolitics ran an editorial calling on the House to subpoena Take-Two Interactive and Rockstar directly, since they were the companies at the center of the Hot Coffee fiasco.
A short time ago Reuters reported that Take-Two Interactive received grand jury subpoenas, not from Congress, but from New York's D.A. for documents relating to the Hot Coffee incident, as well as other financial information dating back to October, 2001. The subpoenas were served on the publisher on June 19th.
Specifically, the grand jury is seeking documents related to "company officers' and directors' knowledge about the creation and inclusion" of the Hot Coffee sex mini-game, as well as information about the submission of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas to the ESRB for rating.
( Read more... )
When a company happily accepts a public thrashing from the Federal Trade Commission along with the threat of crippling fines for future violations, you know they must have been really worried about the alternatives.
According to Next Generation, Take-Two CEO Paul Eibeler said yesterday, "We are pleased that the FTC has concluded its very thorough investigation, and that the matter has been resolved. We recognize the importance of the FTC investigation, and the necessity of maintaining public confidence in the ESRB rating system, and helping the ESRB educate parents and consumers about the rating system. We look forward to putting this behind us."
The embattled CEO was reacting to Thursday's FTC Hot Coffee report which said that Take-Two and its Rockstar subsidiary had engaged in deceptive marketing practices and circumvented the industry's rating system. The FTC threatened fines up of to $11,000 per unit sold for future servings of Hot Coffee.
Eibeler made the remarks during a quarterly conference call with investment analysts in which the firm disclosed a $50 million loss for the second quarter of 2006.
Take-Two stock (NASDAQ: TTWO) dropped nearly 14% in overnight trading to 14.45. TTWO has lost roughly half of its equity value since its pre-Hot Coffee high point.
Want to talk about it? You can discuss this story via the "comments" feature (click below), or in the new GamePolitics Forums...
In a long-awaited ruling, the Federal Trade Commission has found that the companies behind Grand Theft Auto San Andreas engaged in deceptive marketing practices.
The FTC issued a press release this morning, wrapping up a 10-month investigation into the so-called "Hot Coffee" scandal.
Although the FTC concluded that Take-Two and Rockstar used deceptive marketing practices by not revealing that hidden sex animations were on the GTA San Andreas disc, the proposed penalty was quite moderate, at least in economic terms. The ruling is a blow, however, to the public image of both companies as well as the video game industry.
Under terms of a proposed consent decree, the FTC will require Take-Two and Rockstar going forward to clearly disclose all content relevant to a game's rating on its packaging. The companies must also set up a content review system to spare the gaming public additional servings of Hot Coffee. Finally, the companies agreed that they would be subject to fines of up to $11,000 per game sold if they commit such violations in the future.
Essentially, the FTC is saying, "Don't do it again."
( Read more... )
Kotaku is reporting that the site of the next GTA title is up; that the game will be GTA Chicago; that it will be a PlayStation 3 exclusive planned for release in October, 2007.
OOPS! It's an April Fools joke. GP did a quick check of the domain registration info and found it is confidential, not corporate Rockstar or Take-Two as might be expected. Also, here's a great, big clue from the last few lines of the domain registration:
Domain servers in listed order:
APRIL.GTACHICAGO.COM
FOOLS.GTACHICAGO.COM
As I type this, Kotaku's servers are crashed and Brian Crecente can't make the necessary corrections to the apocryphal GTA Chicago story. Here's what Brian told GP moments ago:
"I just heard back from Rockstar. I asked them if the site was for real or a joke or perhaps a bit of fan fiction. Their reply: 'This is not a R* site, and as such, is a hoax.'"
Good gag. Now whoever perpetrated this April Fools mischief must atone for their sins by purchasing one dozen assorted Pixelante T-shirts.
Lowered net incomes, lawsuits up the wazoo, an SEC investigation, cash flow problems, a devastating product recall, horrendous P.R., negative political attention, key resignations, and a stockholder named Jack. For a publicly traded company, such indicators usually mean that your share price is headed for a swirly.
The latest round of bad news for Take-Two began on January 27th, when an SEC filing revealed the resignation of board member Barbara Kaczynski. T2 (NASDQ: TTWO) stock hit an all-time low of $14.69 at that point, a far cry from its June, 2005 pre-Hot Coffee peak of $27.81.
Take-Two had losses of $29.1 million (about 41 cents a share), and revenues were only half of what they were during the GTA: San Andreas sales peak. Surprisingly, the decaf version of GTA: San Andreas, was listed alongside GTA: Liberty City Stories as T2's best selling products for the quarter. Other top-selling titles included Civ IV
According to GameSpot, analysts went into ho-hum mode, most erring on the side of pessimism about the company's future performance. While revenues exceeded expectations, so did losses. Most analysts slashed their earnings-per-share estimates, and predicted that Take-Two had a rough year ahead.
Morgan Securities' Michael Pachter was skeptical about the company's efforts with regards to sports titles (especially Rockstar's upcoming title Table Tennis), and expects Bully to be "a mediocre title at best." He did note that, as a franchise. GTA was still going strong, accounting for 25% of revenues, and is "a key announcement away from providing a catalyst for rapid share appreciation." (CM: A possible GTA sequel? Read on...)
( Read more... )
The Miami-Dade School Board will likely give Rockstar's Bully a swirly today.
As reported earlier this week by the Miami Herald, the board is expected to vote on a resolution proposed by member Frank Bolanos which would ask Rockstar not to release the game, local merchants not to carry it and parents not to buy it.
A subcommittee unanimously approved the measure last week. If passed, Miami-Dade would be first major school system in the United States to take a stand against the controversial game.
"This game is built entirely around bullies and is staged in a school - it's the antithesis of everything we're trying to promote," said Bolanos.
The concept for such action was Jack Thompson's idea. He has indicated plans to submit the resolution to school boards around the country. The activist attorney told the Herald, "The goal is to make it such a negative thing that the retailers won't carry it. This thing hasn't really reached critical mass as a [public relations] problem yet; that's what I'm trying to do."
For its part, Rockstar offers only a written statement saying, "We all have different opinions about art and entertainment, but everyone agrees that real-life school violence is a serious issue which lacks easy answers."
Rockstar Games, as the saying goes, may not know much about art, but it knows what it likes - and what it doesn't.
And what it definitely didn't like, according to the The Daily Page, was an "online art installation" created by University of Wisconsin art student Dave Berg. Berg's work was displayed at The Highest Score, a site Berg created to "contemplate video game violence."
Berg's chosen medium of expression was Rockstar's 2005 release The Warriors. A short, looping clip of a gang character kicking a woman on the ground was displayed over and over. A counter on the page was synchronized with the onscreen action and exceeded 285,000 by the time Berg received a heavy-handed "cease and desist" order from Morrison Cohen LLP, a Big Apple law firm representing Rockstar
GP: What? No Blank Rome? Quick, somebody tell Jack of Miami...
What was Berg's point?
As he told the Daily Page, "...video games as a medium are perhaps one of the final frontiers where sexism and graphic violence exist, to a certain point, unchecked and definitely encouraged... what is depicted on my website is something that occurs in the game, but does not help you solve puzzles or learn lessons - it exists for pure entertainment... The saddest part concerning this "entertainment" approach to these issues is that while these games are rated for certain age groups, it is a common fact that video game rental stores and many other stores that actually sell the game do not check the purchaser's age at the time of the sale."
"Secondly, I'm very interested in the concept that our postmodern world has dealt with for the past 20 years, namely, the desensitivization of violent images on one's mind. The fact that this video clip is occurring at a constant sound beat and motion, and it is paired with a numeric value, I'm interested in the idea of this image becoming less and less hard to look at with every second that passes, due to the hypnotic rhythm that exists within the site."
"Paired with that, I wanted to point out how America seems to be so obsessed with large numbers... That is why I put a counter in the top left corner... I'm essentially conducting an experiment, as i am curious as to whether people will begin to lose their focus on how brutal the image is and begin to become obsessed with the number's growth."
By way of Kotaku comes word that state attorney generals in North Carolina and Connecticut have requested records and information from Take Two relating to the Hot Coffee scandal.
The information is contained in the company's annual report, which was filed yesterday with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and is available online.
While no suits have been filed by North Carolina or Connecticut, such action seems possible, perhaps even likely, given the request for records.
State-level video game legislation sponsored by Sen. Julia Boseman came close to passage in North Carolina last year. Connecticut, of course, is the home state of U.S. Senator Joseph Lieberman, a longtime watchdog of the video game industry. In addition, a Federal Trade Commission investigation of Hot Coffee has been ongoing since last July.
But the revelations concerning North Carolina and Connecticut aren't the only juicy bits in the annual report. Under the heading "Legal Proceedings," are listed the following:
- four class-action suits over Hot Coffee: two in New York state, one in Illinois, and one in Pennsylvania. As described by Take Two's annual report, "The complaints seek unspecified damages, declarations of various violations of law and litigation costs. We believe that these complaints are without merit and we intend to vigorously defend and seek dismissals of these actions."
( Read more... )