Bully Ruling Is In
Jack Thompson has been defeated in court again. Let us rejoice. This time, it was his attempt to block the sale of Bully in Florida that was denied. Destructoid has managed to have a reporter in the courtroom for the hearing, and they just posted the judge’s descision:
At 1:51, Niero called, saying that the judge will not prohibit the the sale of Bully. In the time that he played the game, the judge said that he did not see anything so violent that would require the game to be held from being shipped. The judge and Take Two employee used a cheat code in order to skip around in the game and play through various parts, including the more graphic portions of the game. The judge said “There’s nothing in the game that you wouldn’t see on TV every night,” and that he “wouldn’t want his kids to play the game, but that shouldn’t mean that the game won’t ship.”
According to Niero, the courthouse got pretty heated, and at one point, the judge had to ask Mr. Thompson to sit down. Thompson was saying to the judge that this is not just a hearing, and was complaining that he didn’t get to actually sit down and play the game. Yet, a Take Two spokesman said that the judge, Mr. Thompson, and an employee all got to see gameplay. A total of two hours, actually. Also, Mr. Thompson silenced his “expert witness” when he was going to say something during the judge’s ruling. The judge said that Mr. Thompson could appeal his case to the 3rd Appellate Court, but Mr. Thompson expressed no interest in doing so, since it would be after the game had shipped.
Major props should go out to both Destructoid and GamePolitics for their excellent coverage of this event. I have to admit that I was really nervous regarding this whole thing, since I viewed it as a possible first step towards massive government censorship.
What a wonderful way to start the weekend.
Jack Thompson Ruling!
Boy of Tomorrow
Posted to Video Games on 13 October 2006
Other stuff like this: Bully, Destructoid, GamePolitics, Jack Thompson, Rockstar Games, Take Two Software, Wal-Mart
