Video Games

In his letter to Bill Gates, Microsoft is only again abused by anti-game activist Jack Thompson’s latest barrage of threats, threats that stem from an over-zealous confusion of moral value and necessity of legal action.  The game that’s pissing Mr. Thompson this time is Halo 3 for the Xbox 360, a game that he calls “hyperviolent.”  Furthermore, he erroneously alleges that the original Halo was the source of inspiration for Lee Boyd Malvo, the DC Beltway sniper, and that Halo allowed Malvo to become “remarkably efficient” in his killing.  However, JT couldn’t leave his letter as a mere judgment of Halo 3’s content, so he decided to threaten Gates with legal action if it didn’t prevent the sale of it to minors.  Here’s Jack Thompson’s letter in full to Microsoft’s Chairman Bill Gates:

Bill Gates
Microsoft Corporation
Redmond, Washington

Re: Halo 3

Dear Mr. Gates:

As you know, the Federal Trade Commission has repeatedly found that games rated “Mature” by the video game industry-captured Entertainment Software Rating Board are routinely sold to kids under the age of 17 despite the age rating. The most recent failure rate of the ratings on “Mature” games, according to the FTC, is 42%. The entire rating system is a fraud, and “broken,” the latter description aptly provided by Senator Hillary Clinton.

As you also know, Lee Boyd Malvo trained on Microsoft’s Halo to further enable him to become the remarkably efficient “DC Beltway Sniper.” That was reported by NBC News at the time and was noted in Malvo’s criminal trial.

You appeared on CBS’ 60 Minutes II and rather revealing and usefully noted that “the cool thing about these games is that they transport you to a world you think is real.” Precisely. Capcom has recently disclosed to investors that your video game industry’s violent games, sold to children, pose a real hazard to the health of the industry. Right on.

The hyperviolent Microsoft Xbox 360 game Halo 3 is scheduled by your company for commercial release in September of this year. The Beta version that was released last week shows us all just how violent the game is and how inappropriate it is for play by anyone under 17, as the “Mature” rating it will surely receive indicates.

Here’s the deal, Mr. Gates: Either Microsoft undertakes dramatic, real steps, through its marketing, wholesale, and retail operations to assure that Halo 3 is not sold, via the Internet and in stores, directly to anyone under 17, or I shall proceed to make sure that Microsoft is held to that standard by appropriate legal means. I have done that before successfully as to Best Buy, and I shall do so again as to Microsoft and all retailers of Halo 3.

Regards, Jack Thompson

I wonder what will come of Mr. Thompson’s latest endeavors.  Will he successfully sue Microsoft for perceived crimes of passivity?  How will he be able to prove Microsoft culpable for the legal violations of retailers who sell its games?  We’ll keep you posted.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007 at 10:37 pm and is tagged with lee boyd malvo, chairman bill gates, video game industry, cbs 60 minutes, beltway sniper, senator hillary clinton, 60 minutes ii, jack thompson, game halo, gates bill, mr gates, cbs 60 minutes ii, dc beltway, mr thompson, latter description, nbc news, halo 3, microsoft xbox, real hazard, mature games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback.

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