15th June 2008, 8:33 PM
A Black Falcon Wrote:One problem is that different people react to different things. There isn't just one standard that all people who get seizures from video will all react to... demands like that one would be hard to meet.
I'm not opposed to at least trying to meet them, though. People getting seizures obviously isn't a good thing. Putting in a warning isn't the same as removing the problem in the first place...
The first paragraph you stated is exactly the reason I'm opposed (I think?) to the second paragraph.
Games are optional and people bring them into their own homes. As such there's no reason to go through with anything more than a warning, and really, what would the world be like without psychadelic visual light shows? You might as well strip a rainbow of it's color!
You know that's what Korea is like right? The entire place is in black and white! Grayer and greyer and greier! It's enough to make you want to slit your wrists just to see color!
Are you a terrorist!?
I am with you on removing the source though. That source is the subject's brain. MANDATORY NEURAL RESEQUENCING! Okay maybe not mandatory... Stupid ethics board... HOUSE wouldn't have to deal with this... House gets away with everything...
In all seriousness, they already are taking out CERTAIN sources of light patterns (the infamous "Pokemon cartoon" style) from games these days, including emulated releases of older games and rereleases of older shows. However, as you have stated, different brain physiology is susceptible to some alternate forms of light stimulation. I'm not going to hyperbolize and suggest that the variations "could be anything" because I'm not someone from Fox News. However, they certainly have a wide enough variation that it takes away a lot of options if we were to even just eliminate all known sorts of stimulation. I'm also not going to say something stupid like "because we can't help all of them, we shouldn't help any of them". Certainly helping as many as possible is still a good idea. However, my main objection is that there is no logical reason that this restriction should be required because of this danger.
Why? Think about it. The reason we put guard rails in a building is because people have to work there, so it might as well be made safe. The reason we install ramps is because handicapped people have to eat, so they might as well be enabled to do so. It's the easiest solution to the problem, hurting the smallest number to help the most. Now what's the easiest solution that requires the least amount of effort for this? Well, that would be NOT PLAYING GAMES THESE GAMES. They are optional. No one needs this sort of thing. I'm fine with the epileptic warning. In fact I think the warning shouldn't be limited just to video games. I think a small pamphlet should also be included with movies, and a warning shown before anything else starts playing in a theater. Heck dump an extra warning with sales of computers and PC games in general, perhaps even a warning page displayed when someone installs a web browser. Also, where reasonable, certain restrictions on flashing lights in public spaces might be called for. There is a limitation to that but you get the idea.
BUT, no laws requiring the outright banning of such video displaying should ever be enacted. For the majority of people, it's perfectly safe, and such mediums are optional in nature. It's far less efficient to force everyone else to adapt to this (and far more costly) than to simply require people with the disorder (and their parents) to bear the burden of watching out. So long as they are made aware of the obvious, this should not be a problem.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)