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 Post subject: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: April 29th, 2012, 7:19 pm 
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Political correctness is one of the greatest obstacles game developers and publishers have to overcome before sending a game out to the public. The purpose of a game is to entertain, not to offend nor support a certain action or cause. It's alright to be politically correct, yet when it masks the truth of a situation, it goes too far. I think it's about high time political correctness took a step back out of gaming development. Let me give you an example of what I'm talking about.

Medal of Honor Devs Rename Taliban to Opposing Force

When the new Medal of Honor game was coming out in 2010, people (namely friends and family of folks in the military) were up in arms that the multiplayer faction in the game was called the "Taliban." As UK Defence Secretary Dr Liam Fox put it, he believed it "shocking that someone would think it acceptable to recreate the acts of the Taliban against British soldiers." Due to these concerns, EA changed the name of the faction to simply the "Opposing Force," an appropriate and fitting name, but still a concession to the concerned and a masking of the truth. The US military said it would still not sell the game on its bases even though it would allow it on base if purchased elsewhere, clearly showing they were not totally against the game being bought by soldiers, only in supporting its sales.

Even though the game has been released now, we should still consider some things going into the future of game development. 1) Did the game creators intend for the game to offend people, 2) should those people have been offended, and 3) should political correctness therefore be a consideration in game development?

To answer the first part, no, I don't believe EA intended to offend anyone or in any way condone or mimic the actions of the Taliban. Rather, they were aiming for a realism in their game. By calling the other force the Taliban, they were only sticking to real life context. As Amanda Taggart, senior PR manager for EA said at the time, "Most of us having been doing this since we were 7 - if someone's the cop, someone's gotta be the robber, someone's gotta be the pirate and someone's gotta be the alien. In Medal of Honor multiplayer, someone's gotta be the Taliban."

We all know that in a fight, there are two sides. Regardless of whether or not you call the other the "Opposing Force" rather than its real name doesn't change the fact that we are still talking about the same entity, and that entity has a name and a certain association that goes along with that name. To not call the force the Taliban is to ignore the truth of the matter that this is who we are fighting. We care more about the thoughts of feelings of a minority of people rather than the truth. The same argument could be made, but was not, against Call of Duty for allowing players to play as the Germans fighting against the Allies in CoD 1, 2, or 3. The issue to gamers isn't great, but are critics fine with challenging the truth?

Second, sure, the people had a reason to be offended, but it wasn't a reasonable complaint. Of course we don't support or agree with the Taliban and what they did or do to our soldiers, but calling them by their name in a game is neither a show of support nor a condoning of their actions, only a matter of context and realism. Most gamers do not necessarily associate with the people they are playing as. When playing an FPS game especially, few actually care which team they get put on (or if they do, they care more about who is on their team and how good their abilities are). It's not about being the actual person in the game, but just playing and enjoying the game. For all the gamer cares, you could call the teams Black and White and they wouldn't care that much.

Third and lastly, does political correctness belong in gaming development? I say no. Political correctness, while good in some circumstances, serves to do no good in a game. If it were to block a game from reaching its full potential (not necessarily in this case), then I would strongly urge against including it. And we need to remember, too, that the game is for the player, not the peanut gallery critic who won't end up playing the game themselves.

If I were to add in some social commentary, I'd say that society focuses on the little things too much rather than on the important things. Society also has a pretty thin skin and can get easily offended, though we have come a long way from the 40's and 50's when it comes to modesty. Still, my greatest gripe isn't with being offended or focusing on the little things. It comes with masking the truth. To me, there is no greater problem or wrong doing than hiding the truth. It may not be pretty, it may not be nice to think about, but the truth is the truth no matter how much you play with it or sugar coat it.

The bottom line in all this is that, sure, people make get offended at games and some of their content and for good reason. But, this doesn't mean that developers should tailor games to the wills and whims of these people. Games are made for gamers, not for the critic. Truly, as long as the gamer is happy with the product, that's what developers need to keep focusing on. You can't please everyone in this world, nor should you try. By doing so, you do yourself no favors nor the people for which you are making the game. Publishers and developers should focus on creating an excellent game for their players and ignore side criticism from others who won't play the game. Only then can they reach the best quality result.

This was originally posted as an Informer Gaming article.

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PostPosted: April 29th, 2012, 7:19 pm 
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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: April 30th, 2012, 5:45 am 
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The UK military wasn't just ***** about the name. That's just what the press decided to concentrate on. They had an issue with EA recreating a military base in there game that at the time was occupied by UK soldiers in the real world. There lives are at risk and you've got some game company making a game where a player can play as the taliban and run riot in a UK held military base.

Pretty insensitive of them. Even if MOH didn't turn out to be **** i still wouldn't of bought it all the while they had that **** in there.

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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: April 30th, 2012, 1:58 pm 
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That's a reasonable complaint. It makes sense that they shouldn't be able to copy real life situations that still exist. It's not as much being insensitive as it is being stupid. Using an actual base from real life as opposed to a made up base is a very sensitive area for the military. That's a different issue, too. Being able to copy something over from real life into a game that is considered sensitive information. I was just more focused about the name for the Taliban for the sake of the article.

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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: May 1st, 2012, 10:29 am 
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More about masking the truth than being politically correct. Because in that case it masks the truth, I don't see why not being politically correct doesn't mask the truth either. Thinking of the whole "CHRISTMAS NOT HOLIDAYS" thing, not to start a debate on that but it's the main thing people label them selves as anti-pc over so it's easy to think of XD. Calling it the holidays doesn't mask that people are celebrating Christmas but making a point of calling it Christmas masks the fact that there are people not celebrating christmas yet they are still on a holiday.


So purely in the case of changing the name to op force, I think the problem is that it was changed to mask what they are, not because the change was politically correct.
It's funny because even if the media made the issue about the name, there were people who were offended over purely the name. Which doesn't really make sense, as you said changing the name doesn't change the game and it doesn't change the conflict. Which works for both sides. Getting the named changed doesn't remove that people will be playing as the taliban, but changing the name doesn't take anything away from the game... unless you have no imagination. It's not a big deal either way.


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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: May 1st, 2012, 1:49 pm 
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It's masking the truth by being politically correct if you want to be precise. As to the holidays, by saying "Merry Christmas," I'd say we were already incorporating "Happy Holidays" into it's meaning. Still, if it is really that bothersome, I could settle for people who like Christmas saying "Merry Christmas" and people who don't appreciate it saying "Happy Holidays." To each his own, in a manner or speaking. One last thing to say on that is that if you are going to say "Happy Holidays" for Christmas, you have to say that for every special day of the year. I'm sure there are people who don't celebrate Easter or Valentine's or Memorial day or any other special days, too. People should say "Happy Holidays" for every single holiday from now on and not just one.

If it was simply changed to mask what they are, then what was the reason (if it was not political correctness)? There doesn't seem to be any justification for changing the name other than to avoid offending.

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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: May 1st, 2012, 7:12 pm 
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Restating what I said since I'm misunderstanding what you're saying or you misunderstood what I said:
I said the problem was that it was masking the truth of the matter, and the problem wasn't that the change was politically correct. It being politically correct is irrelevant. They did it because bodies were upset about it. Is that politically correct? It doesn't matter, that's not the problem. The problem is that it masks the truth.

When you restated, I heard "It masks the truth because it is politically correct" which I completely disagree with if that is the case. Politically correctness is a neutral thing. It can't make something good and it can't make something bad. You can define things as politically correct, but that has no bearing on whether it is a positive or negative thing.


And I didn't want to start a debate over that but I guess people really are offended when you say happy holidays instead of happy Christmas. To sum what I feel about that in short: I've never seen anyone have an issue with calling it happy Christmas (unless "oh I don't celebrate Christmas but thanks" is having an issue with it), but every single year WAH WAH HAPPY HOLIDAYS? WHAT IS THIS? FASCIST LAND and it's so very annoying because it's a war against no one. Seriously, who is on the other side opposing you? No one. Call it whatever the **** you want, but don't pretend anyone is forcing anything on anyone if they want to call it the holidays. Don't make a point about calling it Christmas. Don't shoot someone down if they wish you happy holidays. Don't start crying if you walk into a mall and there's a banner "happy holidays". Seriously it's so frustrating ughhh. I guess that wasn't short but w/e.


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PostPosted: May 1st, 2012, 7:12 pm 
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 Post subject: Re: [Informer Article] Sorry to Offend...
PostPosted: May 1st, 2012, 11:58 pm 
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Yes, I see what you are saying, but I disagree. I believe that political correctness was quite relevant in this case. EA changing the name because people were upset is political correctness. The idea of political correctness is to avoid offending someone to the least degree or at all whenever possible. Yes, masking the truth of the matter is a more important issue, but how that became an issue was because of change brought on by political correctness. Therefore, it is quite important to address political correctness as I believe it caused the truth to be masked.

When I restated, I said "It's masking the truth by being politically correct..." meaning that by being politically correct in the situation of MoH, it led to a masking of the truth. You could say political correctness is neutral, but what it really comes down to is intention in being politically correct. I would actually say that more often then not, political correctness is a bad thing as it either masks the truth or avoids the truth as much as possible (which I think we both can agree is a bad thing). Political correctness can also be used to the advantage of the minority as well. "Sure, the majority of people may believe in "x", but because a minority doesn't and we don't want to offend them, we just won't ever practice "x" or talk about "x."" Now whether we agree on the issue of a minority using political correctness to their advantage is one thing, but we can agree that it does happen.

As for the issue of holidays, I'm not really debating. I agree, it shouldn't be a big issue. What's the value in a name or saying anyway? I guess the big thing to keep in mind is that it's the value that people assign something that is important. Without getting to much into deal, Christmas has had a certain historical significance and values assigned to it throughout the years. Christmas has a certain connotation to it that "the Holidays" just doesn't have. And that's where the difference is. It's in the meaning of the words, not the word itself if that makes sense.

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