As an aside folks, while I wouldn’t be surprised if Jack Thompson really did spend his time trolling game-related forums and news websites to speak up on whatever bullshit issue catches his eye… I remain skeptical of a poster claiming to be him, especially on a site like filefront news that doesn’t require any sort of registration.

It’s easy to spot a game at a crime scene and blame it for the crime because it takes next to no investigating and it instantly draws media attention thanks to people like Jack Thompson and because games are a relatively new form of media that mostly kids and teens use.

What’s harder to do is to actually figure out how the crime happened. How could someone unstable manage to get access to a gun? If they were that unstable, did it show in their day to day activities and why didn’t anyone try to help them out before it was too late? Was there a history of violence and abuse in the family? Was there a substance abuse problem? That takes too long to answer, there was a game in his room and it might’ve been his roommate’s but it’s probably the game’s fault anyway.

You can’t go from a stable person who knows the difference between a game and real life to a murdering psychopath because of a game. By that logic, violent movies, books, and music turn people into criminals. Violent crimes have actually been declining since the 90s, when games started to become more mainstream.

But still it’s easier to listen to the sob story of a family ruined because their child could do no wrong but was corrupted by a video game. There already is a ratings board for games and a big M and a picture of a crazed lunatic with any assortment of weapons on the cover of a game should be a big warning flag for adults who actually keep track of their kids. Hopefully despite the lazy parents who don’t watch their kids and unstable people who don’t get help in time and have access to weapons we won’t see any real blows to gaming.

“Grow up, kids”
hate to break the news to you Jack, but not all gamers are kids.

Nobody ever said that Take-Two wants someone to train on this and kill anyone. Are you people daft. You’re really reaching now. How desperate can you get.

The “training” function comes as an unintended consequence. Ever hear of that?

Kind of like playing tennis and getting tennis elbow. Do you play to get the tendinitis? No. But stuff happens. Grow up, kids, and learn how to think.

Jack Thompson

Folks, we make it a point to make our comment system as easy to use as possible. Naturally this gives people the ability to post whatever they choose. However, please refrain from personal attacks on other posters. State your opinion, and allow others to state theirs.

Ron Whitaker
Gaming Today
FileFront.com

And if you’re looking for integrity in journalism, you came to the wrong site.

All we guarantee is that we don’t make things up.

And regardless, the point of this author’s ramble was to basically call Jack Thompson a tool. Worked for me.

Has this author ever trained as a news writer/journalist? It’s pretty poor.

I only ask because I’d like to read more about what he meant, rather than your basic attempt at figuring it out.

Very poorly written article that doesn’t even attempt to get to the meat of the story.