Call to Nutter Duty…Keith Vaz will whinge at Parliament about latest video game

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Based on article from technology.timesonline.co.uk

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, the latest in a series of first-person war games, features bloody conflict. It is so realistic that at some points a warning offers players the option to skip scenes. In the course of the ten hours or so the game will take to complete in solo mode, the player will assume a variety of roles in a global war against Russian ultranationalists led by Vladimir Makarov. One of the most controversial of these is an episode in which a character must choose whether to kill unarmed civilians in a Russian airport to infiltrate a terrorist group successfully. The scene is ’so shocking’ that Activision, the game’s distributor, issued a statement. At the beginning of the game, there are two ‘checkpoints’ where the player is advised that some people may find an upcoming segment disturbing. These checkpoints can’t be disabled, it said. Modern Warfare 2 is a fantasy action game designed for intense, realistic game play that mirrors real life conflicts, much like epic, action movies. It is appropriately rated 18 for violent scenes. Nutters, however, have accused Activision of being disingenuous. Warnings of extreme content had a strong appeal to younger players, they said. Keith Vaz, Labour MP for Leicester East, told The Times: I am absolutely shocked by the level of violence in this game and am particularly concerned about how realistic the game itself looks. Whilst I appreciate that this game has been certified as an 18, I firmly believe that certain levels of violence should not be made into interactive entertainment. This would include acting as a terrorist, as is the case here, or violence against women. I will be raising this issue in Parliament on Monday.