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Venezuela to jail violent-game merchants

By Tom Magrino, GameSpotPosted Nov 5, 2009 3:13 pm PT

National Assembly of Hugo Chavez-led country signs off on bill that would see purveyors of "war" games and toys face up to five years in prison.

A number of states in the US have taken various steps to add restrictions or limit the sale of violent video games. However, thanks largely to the lobbying efforts of the Entertainment Software Association, state legislatures have yet to successfully keep a bill on the law books limiting or penalizing the sale of violent games.

Violent-game merchants may want to get out of Venezuela ASAP.

Venezuela, however, is a different story. The Agence France-Presse reports that the National Assembly of Venezuela approved a law last week that would punish merchants who sell violent games with up to five years in prison. The law, which also outlaws the sale of toy weapons, is reportedly intended to "prevent the manufacture, importation, distribution, sale, rental and use of videos, games and war toys of a violent nature."

According to the report, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a vocal opponent of US foreign policy, has promoted the use of more traditional games, such as yo-yos. The AFP reports that President Chavez has previously railed against games and other electronic toys, saying they promote "egoism, individualism, and violence."

The Venezuelan government has previously taken issue with violent games, particularly Pandemic Studios' Mercenaries 2: World in Flames. In 2006, backers of President Chavez decried Electronic Arts and Pandemic's Mercenaries 2, a game set in Venezuela where players take on "a power-hungry tyrant" in control of the country. At the time, it was decried by one legislator as "a justification for imperial aggression."

467 Comments

  • GameShark9000

    Posted Nov 17, 2009 5:22 pm PT

    @wallywallas
    I think things already got out of hand when I read the yo-yo part.

  • GameShark9000

    Posted Nov 17, 2009 5:18 pm PT

    Arresting game merchants that just want to make money and not violence?! I smell a revolutionary war.

  • AuronTsubaki85

    Posted Nov 11, 2009 9:35 am PT

    Um..President Hugo Chavez, this has to be the most stupidest & pointless everyone has ever heard of. There are more important things you need to worry about then brainwashing Venezuela to arrest game merchants for selling Mature rated games on a daily basis

  • S3P4eeever

    Posted Nov 10, 2009 6:52 pm PT

    texas masacre

  • sillycatfish

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 6:33 pm PT

    righteously put Allan x

  • Allan_X

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 1:26 pm PT

    Egoism? Individualism? Just how are those things bad, exactly? Last time I checked, I wasn't joined at the hip with my next-door neighbor. Why should I pretend as though that were the case?

  • joeboosauce

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 11:47 am PT

    @capitalthoughts
    No, I don't think that the former USSR is democratic. I think you need to read things better. Why the hell would you infer that? Because I do not see the USA as a democracy? So then the conclusion is, "gee, then he gotta think USSR and China are democracies." Sorry the world functions beyond simple dichotomies. Yes, the USA has democratic mechanisms but does not mean that it is democratically run. (Need I bring up the stolen election of 2000?) It is rather an oligopoly or plutocracy.

    And no, your wife may not be lying, but may believe what she holds on Chavez and Venezuela. Can she remember the actual impact of the neoliberal policies pushed by the West via the BWIs before 2000??? Before many of the leaders of South America broke the stranglehold of the West on them?

  • joeboosauce

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 11:34 am PT

    @imaidiot
    You are right on some of those programs as far as being more "socialism" oriented BUT they are offered to all citizens, rich or poor. It does not exclude the rich as you state. If they choose not to use this, that is their choice. BUT, what I was saying when I stated that "The US practices socialism for the rich and capitalism for the rest of us" was in regards to big business. The average person in this country pays a larger percentage of their income towards running this society than, yes rich people, but more specifically big business. All corporations in the Fortune 100 have "benefited from industrial policies, meaning, State intervention in their behalf. And twenty of the hundred had been saved from total disaster, that is, collapse, by just State bail-out." Mind you that this well before the Obama bank bailout program. The quote is from a lecture by Noam Chomsky. Read or listen to this as it brings forward info that most people are unaware of. Check it out and then get back to me if you want. Enjoy!:
    http://www.chomsky.info/talks/19960413.htm

  • Gamingclone

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 8:33 am PT

    They do know that Yo-yos were originally weapons? xD

  • slingshot_ylo

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 8:19 am PT

    You can't fight a revolution with yo-yos...or can you?

  • Xaviersx

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 4:58 am PT

    Well how long before the U.N. takes on a softball issue like this?

  • Jack_n_Coke07

    Posted Nov 9, 2009 12:07 am PT

    For a country that constantly has a chance of war breaking out, good call.

  • rtejerof

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 8:02 pm PT

    Ignorance: The people's worst enemy.... I'm venezuelan and I'm ashamed of policies like this... Please, Chavez, our problems aren't the war games or violent games... our problem, is YOU! GET OUT OF HERE.

  • GrayFox_360

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 6:54 pm PT

    Thank God i dont have this crap on my county

  • savetehhaloz

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 6:30 pm PT

    I live in Maracaibo and laws arent enforced. Purchasing original software is unpopular is an entire market based around pirated software; games are expensive and are hand carried into the country. So this law will be an epic fail.

  • skatatay

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 6:03 pm PT

    @ Deano, i agree with you and i live in the U.S lol.

  • chiefenator

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 5:41 pm PT

    i guess that means Chavez is the new villain for MW3

  • darkcomedian

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 4:48 pm PT

    @ WTA2k5
    I agree, that would be terrible.

  • Spartan_418

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 3:55 pm PT

    Well, I guess that means it's time to put down CoD 4 and get my yo-yo out :/

    It seems though that the Venezuelan government is classifying video games as toys, lol. This wouldn't happen if politicians had even basic understandings of what video games are.

  • urban_mongol

    Posted Nov 8, 2009 3:26 pm PT

    haha! this will make conquering venezuela much easier! thank you Hugo Chavez

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