Moral Kombat

[Zukan]

A short segment from the film has been uploaded where Lorne talks about the evolution of competitive gaming.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qbUsbUPa99A

Apparently the film was shown just recently in San Francisco, where Lorne was invited to a panel discussing the film. Anyone know if there's a transcript of that event floating around?

[abe619]

i think i saw the beggining of this vid a while , didn't watch the whole vid , when i heard it's against violence in video games.

[Sekto Springs]

lol Moral Kombat. IGETIT!

Did Lorne dye his hair or is this footage old?

[Xavier]

This footage is old, but I have to admit i forgot about this movie before even seeing it.

The panel discussing it, on the other hand, was gold.

[OANST]

This footage is old, but I have to admit i forgot about this movie before even seeing it.

The panel discussing it, on the other hand, was gold.

He probably should have toned it down for that panel. He made Thompson look like the good guy.

[Xavier]

On the other hand Thompson got permanently disbarred a few months after it...

...

meh, I dunno what he should have done...

[Zukan]

Just to make it clear this is a NEW panel discussion held last week. The panel with Jack Thompson is a different one from 2007.

Here it is in full video form.
Part 1
part 2
part 3
part 4

Taken from GP:

They (media groups) want the sensationalism. They will broadcast anytime there’s a shooting; they will find people that have a very specific, loud, sensational, fearful opinion of it, and they will give them prime airtime. If you add up those minutes of airtime it’s actually a fair amount of penetration into the public mind.

But then, we look at the court cases and the Supreme Court decisions and court decisions in nine states, at the time I looked into it. And all of them, throughout all of these cases… they were sham cases. Those court cases, and the results of that, never get any airtime, because that’s not selling news. So we wind up with a very distorted opinion from the public perspective, those that rely on the corporate media. The results of the court case maybe be on page 9, probably on page 19 and take up a tenth of a page.

[abe619]

by watching this vid , u officially say ed boon and john tobias made a piece of blood crap called "mortal kombat" even the title of the video is a paradoy of it.

[Nate]

Yes, the title of the documentary is an homage to Mortal Kombat. Why does that mean that Spencer Halpin thinks the game is bloody crap?

[abe619]

cuz this video is against violence in video games , mk's main target is to be the most violent fighting game in history , and it was once.

[Nate]

This documentary is not against violence in video games. It's a documentary that discusses the issue, using interviews with people on both sides of the debate.

They chose a title that would provide brand recognition and reflect a pop culture icon. What is your problem with that?

[Zukan]

A lot of people seems to have gotten the impression this documentary was made to put yet another bad mark on video games. I can only imagine it's because of gut-reactions generated by the film's trailer.
If you read some impressions written by people who've actually seen the real film though, it becomes pretty clear this documentary is something way different than that.

Have you even listened to any of the things Lorne has said? He's not against video games in any way. Why would he even be in the documentary if that was true?

[Xavier]

I'm planning to upload the videos on The Oddworld Cinema tonight, so you guys will be able to download it easily if you want to.

So when will this film be available to the general public?

[abe619]

u r right , lorne would never go against videogames

[Zukan]

The full documentary can now be seen for free here.

I though it was very balanced and insightful, all the fear-mongering surrounding the bias against video games was more or less a fault of the trailer and not the final product. Lorne is featured several times and he even shared the touching story about Alf and how Oddworld changed his life.
As I interpreted it, Moral Kombat simply wants to get past all the nonsense we hear on the news and just tell it as it is to the general public. It's an attempt to raise awareness of both the negative and the positive aspects of virtual worlds.
It's definitely something I'd show to my non-gaming peers.

[Aleks55]

I don't like people saying a bunch of bull crap like that violence in video games are bad.

[Xavier]

Thanks for the update Zukan, I'll watch it asap

[Lord Stanley]

Violence in video games is only bad if you're the bad guys killing the good guys, and doing bad things to people. What Abe and Munch do is okay. What Stranger was doing in the first half of Stranger's Wrath wasn't so good. Helping the Grubbs kill Sekto was a very good deed, though...which was also backed up by his desire for revenge.

[Wil]

The first half of the game promoted keeping criminals alive. The second half was a bloodbath.

[Hazz-JB]

The first half of the game promoted keeping criminals alive. The second half was a bloodbath.

Exactly, it's not as black and white as cops and robbers.

I'm fairly conservative about the issue, I think there will be a point where we have to draw the line on realism in violent games. At some point it's going to get to the stage where ultra-realistic experiences are going to start to affect real-life behaviour (for better or for worse). Especially in children, so I'd guess that age ratings will be taken much more seriously in future.

Edit:

OK, so the film more or less covered everything I just said.

[MeechMunchie]

Of course, the impression of violence you get from games is important. At the end of many games you finish thinking that violence is horrible, war affecting the main characters badly. In something more like GTA, you finish with the impression that violence is fun. And of course, it is, but you've got to take these things into account.

[Rampage48]

When I saw this it provided me with a lot of info about Violent video games but another reason i watched it was because it had Lorne in it and I just wanted to see if he was still alive :-\

[Xavier]

He was still alive when the video was shot years ago...

I watched it and while the video touches quite a few interesting points and questions I don't see how it answers to anything.

[Fargin Icehole]

Very interesting and insightful. This is what has separated OWI from the run of the mill game developers. Their abilities of story telling and forcing the player to make moral decisions makes Oddysee and Exoddus still fresh and fun today.

[Lord Stanley]

Let's hear it for game violence!!!