Gta Kills Again!!!

humanji

I seems yet another frivolous lawsuit has been filed against Take-Two, the parent company of Rockstar, because another teenage american psycho killed three cops.

Devin Thompson, 18, is accused of the slayings, which occurred after he was arrested in 2003 for suspicion of the crime of grand theft auto. According to the Associated Press, when he was caught, Thompson said, "Life is a video game. You've got to die sometime." While being booked at the station, he allegedly grabbed a police officer's pistol and then shot its owner and two other officers in the head--all three died. Thompson is then said to have driven off in a stolen police car, but was later apprehended. He is currently being charged with three counts of first-degree murder, and is set to go to trial on July 11.

Two of the victims' next-of-kin have filed a lawsuit accusing the two GTA games as having "trained and motivated" Thompson to commit his crimes. Besides Take-Two, the other defendants named in the near-60-page, $600 million suit are Wal-Mart and GameStop, where Thompson is said to have bought both M-rated games while under the ESRB-mandated 17-year-old purchase age. Sony Computer Entertainment America, makers of Thompson's PlayStation 2 console, is also named in the legal filing.

From: Gamespot.com

The article goes on to say that the plaintiff's attorney is Jack Thompson, the Guy who campaigned agains Ice-T's "Cop Killer" song as well as other attempts to sue Take-Two.

Is anyone else sick to death of some Americans inability to comprehend that there are people out there who are just nuts? Why do they feel the need to find something/someone else to blame for influencing their "innocent youth"? I love watching Columbo, but I don't go around solving crimes in a dirty mac!

smiaras

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Winters

"trained and motivated"

Ah yes. Because driving in real life is exactly the same as driving in a game.

ambro25

Winters wrote:

"trained and motivated"

Ah yes. Because driving in real life is exactly the same as driving in a game.

You can apply that to pistol shooting as well, mate.

seamus

It sounds like GTA was inspiration, sure, but that doesn't make it responsible. Clearly he's a ****ed up little boy, who would have committed a similar crime anyway.

skywalker

i think it was in scream it was said "movies dont create killers, they just make killers more creative."

Mimikyu

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ionapaul

Well, wasn't it in the UK that the parents blamed Manhunt for murder? We are almost as ligitous as the Americans - don't think they have some monopoly of stupidity! The average Irish citizen is as stupid as the average American anyday, and if we had 300+ million living on this island, we'd see the exact same lawsuits...

MickFarr

ionapaul wrote:

Well, wasn't it in the UK that the parents blamed Manhunt for murder? We are almost as ligitous as the Americans - don't think they have some monopoly of stupidity! The average Irish citizen is as stupid as the average American anyday, and if we had 300+ million living on this island, we'd see the exact same lawsuits...

only more!

bizmark

God not again :rolleyes:

Tusky

Do you think there is any chance they could win the case and GTA games could be banned ? Unlikely yes but a scary thought none the less, ****ing Americans.

grimloch

Tusky wrote:

Do you think there is any chance they could win the case and GTA games could be banned ? Unlikely yes but a scary thought none the less, ****ing Americans.

i highly doubt GTA games will be banned, at least i hope to god they dont get banned

ambro25

Very marginal chance some first-instance US judge may rule against the publisher/developer, but it'll in all probability be overturned in Appeal.
Just another case of nefarious and self-serving politicking by uneducated and opportunistic plebes.

Maybe the US vg industry association should tone down the softly-softly PR approach and now just go for the jugular with such politicians/individuals, dish the dirt presidential election-stylee... it'd be a much more efficient use of such an association's resources, as those would think twice before jumping on the bandwagon

Balfa

Gamespot.com wrote:

he allegedly grabbed a police officer's pistol and then shot its owner and two other officers in the head .... accusing the two GTA games as having "trained and motivated"

Man! I tried that exact same thing, but i couldn't find the damn right analogue stick to aim my shots! what's up with that?? I found the trigger alright, i THINK it was R1, but it just kept shooting down at the floor. Can anyone suggest a better PS2 controller cos the Colt Model M su><0r!

Headshot

america is the lands of guns a nation controlled by the media and people try to blame games instead of blaming the parents who buy the games for their children

rabbitinlights

I wonder what star rating he got? 3 cops....... id say thats about 4 stars...........

radiospan

rabbitinlights wrote:

I wonder what star rating he got? 3 cops....... id say thats about 4 stars...........

d22ontour

People were commiting murders such as the one above years before games of any kind came out i wonder what the blame was put on.The same crap was spouted after the columbine massacre and probably will continue when such things happen again.Civilisation is the problem (no not the game) and americas lack of gun control doesn't help them ,but its their right to own guns maybe they should look at that 1st before they blame anything else.

grimloch

d22ontour wrote:

americas lack of gun control doesn't help them ,but its their right to own guns maybe they should look at that 1st before they blame anything else.

Canada also have similar gun laws but they have very few murders in comparison to America

garthv

Another case of a mother blaming everybody else except their son.....

Thorbar

Personally I'm not going to be so quick to jump on the band wagon and say these people are "stupid" for suing Take Two interactive. First of all why is everyone so sure that GTA had nothing to do with this kid flipping out? Only arguement I saw put forward above was that these kinds of murders happened before games were around but I'm not sure if that's true, have any examples that back this up?

I'm not saying I agree that GTA trained and motivated this kid, I'd have to know a lot more about his personal situation and probably be a lot smarter to make an accurate decision on that. Personally I'd be crushed if GTA got banned as I've played all the games and loved em, but I still wouldn't let me little nephew any where near them just as I wouldn't expose him to alcohol or hardcore porn.

I think as games become more and more realistic they should be treated the same as violent movies. Its the responsibility of developers and anyone else who makes money of these games to make sure they don't get into underage hands but unfortunately if it wasn't for law suits like this then they'll just keep on making their millions.

kinkstr

Canadians actually own more guns per household than americans afaik

seamus

Thorbar wrote:

I think as games become more and more realistic they should be treated the same as violent movies. Its the responsibility of developers and anyone else who makes money of these games to make sure they don't get into underage hands but unfortunately if it wasn't for law suits like this then they'll just keep on making their millions.

How are the developers supposed to ensure it doesn't get into underage hands? That's like suing the director when a 12 year old sees a 15's movie. Sure Wal-Mart and whoever else sold it, have failed in a duty of care, but that's minimal. His parents can't have not seen him playing them, where were they? Why not sue them for allowing him to play the game? Oh wait, because they don't have hundreds of millions of dollars. :rolleyes:

The very fact that a person cannot separate reality from a video game proves conclusively that there's more here than "Oh wow, that looks like fun!". Even young childen know the difference between make-believe pretending you're a policeman, and actually being a policeman.

Thorbar

If developers make millions of dollars off a product I think they have a moral and ethical responsibility to make sure it doesn't fall into the right hands. Same way I think gun companies should be sued if they call into the wrong hands. Developers should only supply their games to stores that have strict overage policies and should pay for education campagnes which tell parents its not ok to buy little Johnny doom 3.

If kids are so good are separating make-believe and reality why do we have restrictions on porn, alcohol and so on?

seamus

Thorbar wrote:

Developers should only supply their games to stores that have strict overage policies and should pay for education campagnes which tell parents its not ok to buy little Johnny doom 3.

I'm sure all stores have strict overage policies. All it takes though is one apathetic cashier (and there are plenty of them) and anyone can get their hands on them.

If kids are so good are separating make-believe and reality why do we have restrictions on porn, alcohol and so on?

For totally different reasons. Adults can barely control their alcohol intake. Imagine if we had alcohol for free sale to all children. 6 cans of budweiser and 12-year-old Jimmy dies in a gutter from alcohol poisoning. Porn, well that's a multi-pronged thing. In this country, are laws are based mainly on religious concerns. By and large, it's the parental lobby which keep the control on porn in other countries. Anyone who wants porn either won't care about age controls (they'll be old enough), or they won't be old enough to vote, ergo have no voice.
Ask any parent why their child shouldn't see porn, and you'll get a myriad of reasons, ranging from "It's sends out the wrong message to impressionable minds" to "It's just wrong, sex is for one man and one woman."
The big difference with porn is also that it *is* reality - i.e. it's photos, the events actually occured. When you see a movie, you know it's a movie, it's not real, when you see porn, you know it is real (even if it's not realistic).

Headshot

any one ever see bowling for combine that documentry

po0k

seamus wrote:

6 cans of budweiser and 12-year-old Jimmy dies in a gutter from alcohol poisoning.

But American Bud is píss-water. He'd be lucky to get a wee bit merry of six cans.



Also, one of the titles named in the Columbine suit was Mechwarrior.
Utterly rediculous.


Also, in this case, I'd assume that the pistol had the safety catch engaged - if it didn't I believe that's negligence on the Cop's part?
I don't know of any game that has ever implemented a safety catch, least of all GTA.
This man (he's 18 now - and will be someone's wife in prison if he doesn't get the death penalty) obviously learnt how to disengage the safety catch on firewarms from a source other than GTA.

Also, this

Thorbar

I agree with you on the apathetic cashier point, and so I believe we should introduce the same penalities and laws on game sales that alcohol and over 18 movie sales now have.

I understand that there are different reasons for not allowing kids near drink or porn compared to computer games but isn't the end result the same? There are certain things you shouldn't be exposed to when you're under a certain age. Do you honestly believe that a game like GTA 3 will have no effect whatsoever on a six year old?

I'm not running around screaming will someone please think of the children here. What I'm saying is that don't let the little ****ers near our games incase the powers that be decide to ban them for everyone.

Also don't you think the developers have some responsbility here considering the huge profits they're making out of this game. As a programmer myself I consider my ethical obligation not to produce or release software that is damaging to society. Now I don't believe GTA 3 is damaging to society in general but I'm not willing to say that there is absolutely no way in hell a realistic violent game wont have an affect on a child.

Headshot

snoopdog wrote:

any one ever see bowling for combine that documentry

someone must of seen it any way its great tells about how easy is to get guns in america and how easy is to kill a person how the media control the nation

Thorbar

Its an interesting movie but it isn't fact, I'd consider Moore to be just as bias as Fox News just in the other side of the coin. Doesn't mean I think he's full of **** just something to keep in mind when you're watching his stuff.

Balfa

keep it on topic, please\