EA responds to Fox News nonsense

By Games Industry.biz Published 24 January, 2008

"A new level of recklessness."

Electronic Arts has written a letter to Fox News Channel asking the media company to correct alleged inaccuracies that appeared during a recent segment on Bioware's Mass Effect game.

The letter, obtained by Kotaku, was written by Jeff Brown, EA's VP of communications.

"As the parent company of BioWare, the studio which created the game, EA would like you to set the record straight on a number of errors and misstatements which incorrectly characterise the story and character interactions in Mass Effect," Brown wrote.

The headline for Fox's televised story indicated that Mass Effect showed full digital nudity, with a reporter indicating that the game allowed players to engage in graphic sex and was being marketed to kids and teenagers.

EA's letter described the game's content - comparing the sexual content to that of network television - and made it clear that the game was rated Mature.

Mass Effect was initially banned in Singapore due to the inclusion of a sex scene between a human woman and a female alien, but that ban was later overturned and the game was released under an M18 rating.

The scene gained media attention and attracted some criticism, leading up to Monday's segment on Fox News television.

"As videogames continue to take audiences away from television, we expect to see more TV news stories warning parents about the corrupting influence of interactive entertainment," Brown's letter continued.

"But this represents a new level of recklessness."

Fox has not yet responded to the letter at the time of writing.

GamesIndustry.biz often appears fully nude on television. But only in reflection, sadly.

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Comments (38) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Eraysor #1 4 years ago

    Good work EA.

    I swear a kitten just died for me saying that.

  • BartonFink #2 4 years ago

    I swear that 'news' article on Fox was enough to make you throw kittens at the tv.

    Misinformed, misleading, biased, twaddle.

  • Lexx87 #3 4 years ago

    .

  • hana_fubuki #4 4 years ago

    For those who haven't, go read the full letter on Kotaku, it's really worth your time. It isn't just your basic, boring corporate statement, but an excellent argument from someone who obviously knows his job. A good read.
    It's nice to see EA using its (heavy) weight for something else than mammoth marketing campaigns. Gamers like it when companies not only sell stuff to them, but stand up for them. Oh, and for those who didn't see the Fox segment, here it is - watch it and weep, curse, tear your hair out, whatever... (Geoff is a brave, brave man!)

  • skillian #5 4 years ago

    It was a truly hilarious/unbelievable news piece.

    "SE"XBOX - Jesus, even the headline was terrible.

  • bad09 #6 4 years ago

    I've watched this and it was seriously funny! A bunch of idiots who knew absolutely NOTHING about the game or games in general. One woman even said "what happened to Atari, pong and things like that?"

    Another women said that some BS study had been done that says young boys can't tell the difference between real life and video games!!!!

    If that really is the case rather than knock games America should knock their own people for being so retarded!!!

    Now I'm of to play Mass Effect to learn how to have sex.....

  • Avaloner #7 4 years ago

    The TV is in an all out war against videogames. I don't blame them. I love videogames and have no time whatsoever to watch TV. Eventually TV will have to start EMBRACING videogames with programs aimed directly at videogame players just like they do with sports. So, just give up TV people. You can try to change the masses but you are set to fail.
    Edited by 1 at 24/01/08 @ 09:19

  • Eighthours #8 4 years ago

    Fox News? Nonsense?!

    This is a shock beyond belief!

  • Rirekon #9 4 years ago

    "Misinformed, misleading, biased, twaddle."

    Isn't that Fox News' tagline?

  • Darren #10 4 years ago

    The sex scene in Mass Effect amounts to five seconds in all, showing a bit of leg and a couple kissing 'tis all. In fact, it's so tame I doubt the BBC would bat an eyelid if it was shown in Eastenders or something. Typical overreaction by the media who really should know better. /rolls eyes

  • NegativeZero #11 4 years ago

    Faux News.

  • jellyhead #12 4 years ago

    Good to see EA has some intelligent bite to it when defending the industry. Interesting to see what drivel Fox respond with.

  • bad09 #13 4 years ago

    @ Avaloner

    That's an interesting point which may be why the media is so anti-games. They hate games because people are not just sitting like vegetables being bombarded with the advertising that pays their way.

    The same goes for Newspapers and the evils of the internet, they lose readers if people can get news for nothing on the net!

  • ParmaViolet #14 4 years ago

    Good work by EA on countering this kind of stuff...

    I can't understand why it is that the newspapers and TV have been seriously trying to 'put the boot in' on Computer Games recently without actually doing any kind of research. We get some self-righteous columnist in the Telegraph (or whichever rag it was) telling parents that any kind of soap opera or trash cartoon is better for kids than Games, yet mentions no actual facts to back this claim up - it's all just incredibly sloppy journalism.....pure opinion (as far as I'm concerned, opinions are like a***holes - there are way too many of them in this country)

    If any of us did such a half-arse job within our chosen proffessions, wouldn't we be fired??

    :-)

  • w00t #15 4 years ago

    In other news, the lady who laughed when she said she didn't play the game is being review spammed to oblivion on Amazon.

    Makes me feel warm inside that lies are repaid.

    :{D>

  • bad09 #16 4 years ago

    @ w00t

    Classic!

  • rudedudejude #17 4 years ago

    Link to the letter?

    Come on EG, get with the program, I had to SEARCH for it!

  • Bulbatron #18 4 years ago

    We can only thank our lucky stars that these ignorant moorons have barely a braincell to share between them, and thus will probably only ever be a danger to those whose level of willful ignorance is equal to their own.

    I should think that anybody with the merest iota of intelligence would see this for the sensationalist nonsense that this clearly is. The man they had on there defending the game may as well have not bothered turning up, since the lady hosting this piece had already made up her mind, which was something in itself considering the basis for all her arguments came from a couple of trailers.

    It was good that he asked them if they had played Mass Effect, and predictably, none of them had. And as for the lady saying she had to go with the research! Words fail me.

    And all of this was based upon the lies that were contained within this piece.

    I will never understand what drives people to behave like this. Where do poeple get this level of spite from, and why are others so happy to remain so ignorant, and yet still feel it is their right to supress what they can't or won't understand?

    And yes, the letter from EA was very good, and restrained, simply stating where the piece went wrong - unlike this piece of 'journalism' which contained more fiction than Mass Effect itself.

  • Meho #19 4 years ago

    Jesus, after watching that Fox News clip I am actually glad I live in a country in the far end of nowehere where you just get generic newspapers column here and there saying 'violence in games is bad' but hardly anyone bats an eyelid because hardly anyone thinks about games... We have a licensed Fox channel too but noone watches it because frankly it's shite... But this 'debate', Jesus Christ, it's really enough to make a grown man cry. The most painful part is when Cooper Lawrence says that the research shows that adolescents can't tell videogames from reality. However, the round-tale 'debate' that follows is also incredibly frustrating, seeing how there's five people who have never played videogames (at least not modern ones), pretending to discuss the topic...

  • marilena #20 4 years ago

    As I said on the forum, props to the Spike TV guy, he did his best. They only gave him a few seconds, but he went in full throttle, noted they haven't played the game, stated that there was no actual sex or full nudity, and departed shouting that it's a good game. It all went downhill after they cut him off.

    The amount of outright lies the smiling psychologist woman spouted was completely frightening, though.

  • Rodney #21 4 years ago

    Adam_T

    could you put the link up of that letter

    thanks

  • Arnold__ #22 4 years ago

    I would like to hear what Bill O'Reilly has to say about this. Am I the only one who thinks Fox delivers fair and balanced news reporting? Remember, the spin stops here.

    And thats the memo.
    Edited by 1 at 24/01/08 @ 10:52

  • hana_fubuki #23 4 years ago

    marilena - True, Geoff Keighley did the best he could with what little time he was given.

    It's sad that the one guy who actually knows about the issue is the one who gets the less air time. Geoff has been one of the best voices of the videogame community for some time now. I'm not the type to build shrines to anybody, but Geoff obviously is serious about his job and, I think, represents us gamers in the best possible light.

    It's about time the "mainstream" media realized that most gamers nowadays are adults, both male and female, and not exclusively asocial teenage boys... I remember reading (was it on Kotaku) that well over 60% of Americans played videogames. Does that mean there are almost 200 millions male teenagers in the US?

    Rodney - Here is the link to Jeff Brown's letter on Kotaku: <a href="http://kotaku.com/348187/ea-calls -fox-out-on-insulting-mass-effect-inaccuracies"> EA Calls Fox Out on "Insulting" Mass Effect Inaccuracies</A>.
    I love this part: "This isn't a legal threat; it's an appeal to your sense of fairness." Read: this isn't a legal threat... yet.
    Edited by 1 at 24/01/08 @ 11:23

  • gremly #24 4 years ago

    "Inclusion of a sex scene between a human woman and a female alien"

    Female Alien? I did not know Sherri Blair was in Mass Effect!

  • miiiguel #25 4 years ago

    Typical BS, from ppl who didn't play nor even saw the said scene. It's a "movie like" scene of intimacy, quite classy and in pace with the plot, I should add.

  • aldo_14 #26 4 years ago

    Am I the only one who thinks Fox delivers fair and balanced news reporting?

    Yup.

  • AusFreelancer #27 4 years ago

    NegativeZero - "Faux News."

    LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  • team_evil #28 4 years ago

    I saw that news piece. The U.S. reporter was talking crazy fast. Like she was all wacked out on goofballs or something. It was exhausting to watch.

  • NthSimulachum #29 4 years ago

    Interestingly enough, EA's editorial input will probably reak havoc with the Mass Effect sequel. I'm expecting guitars, space crash mode, and some gangsa rappa as a character. It will lead to "a new level of recklessness".

    Or not. I hope Bioware get some better dialogue writers for the next game. The universe was wonderfully created, but the dialogue felt about as natural as an electric duck scrawling pentagrams on the riverbank.

  • TuftyMcTavish #30 4 years ago

    I have to confess I watched the Fox piece online while thinking to myself, "I bet that blonde presenter's a dirty girl..." Oops!

  • StevilKnevil #31 4 years ago

    That video clip was like satire, it just needed to finish with a clip of Ned Flanders sitting on his couch rocking backwards and forwards going "amen, amen". The level of ignorance on display would be funny if it wasnt so typical. EA should proceed to sue Fox "news" , you never know it just might go some way towards stopping some of this ignorant , ill informed BS from getting broadcast in the first place.

  • Royal Fool #32 4 years ago

    Fox News.

    That's all there needs to be said.

  • Kyle #33 4 years ago

    Wasn't it Fox News that ran the ridiculous story about a group of "hackers calling themselves Annonymous", and that they were getting "big LULZ" by doing things like hacking peoples MySpace and putting pics of gay porn on this one guys page then his girlfriend dumped him and they kept putting in random scenes of cars exploding to scare American viewers who know nothing about teh Internets?

    Top notch journalism.

    Oh and where the chuff was that news anchor going with the whoile "I had to put my age in to enter the website" tangent?

    Also as soon as the plug for that stupid womans book came up and it was revealed she knew nothing of the game I couldn't take anything she said seriously.
    Edited by 1 at 24/01/08 @ 15:20

  • ruttyboy #34 4 years ago

    I actually wish games would be banned in the USA. That way Western development and game design would become focused in Europe. No more wanker DJs in Burnout, no more guys calling you 'Dude' all the time in Colin McRae etc. etc..

  • Donkeh #35 4 years ago

    Oooh I just realised. What if EA did go ahead and sue, how would that effect the Fox/EA realtionship?:

    EA: Oh you have The Simpsons 2 movie coming out? Can we make the game for it?
    Fox: Errrr hello? You sued us remember?
    EA: Oh yeah, but we're still cool right? Right? Where you going? Come back! I didn't mean it!!

  • kangarootoo #36 4 years ago

    @Donkeh

    It doesn't really work like that. EA and Fox would still work together if it was profitable to do so, regardless of whether they actually "liked" each other.

  • johlee991 #37 4 years ago

    Here's one of the 'reviews' on Cooper Lawrence's book on Amazon.com. Hilarious stuff!

    "I recently saw this book in a used bookstore holding up one end of a broken table. I read as much as I could before my arm got tired of holding up the above mentioned table. After a few chapters I realized the book was indeed best used for furniture support. Don't waste your time. "

  • Donkeh #38 4 years ago

    @kanga

    Yeah true, money is money at the end of the day.