The 'games make kids violent' furore has now turned its fiery attention on Nintendo as the company gears up to launch the gun-shaped Wii Blaster Remote attachment.
Angry parents are in fits over Nintendo's decision to release the peripheral for the family-orientated console. "Great, this is what we need," said one furious parent blogger. "Children with guns learning how to aim and shoot. Then we can sit back and wonder what is happening to our country with kids killing kids."
They added: "What's next? Could we make it squirt blood, too?" Well, no because it would go all over the TV and that would be rubbish.
"Why don't they enclose an application to the NRA (National Rifle Association) in every box as well? The marketing person who came up with this brain child of an idea should be fired," commented a "very concerned grandparent".
Another said in the US blog: "I think it's irresponsible for Wii to come out with a controller that looks like a gun. What kind of message are we sending as parents when we buy these things for our kids?" If you think it's irresponsible, why would you buy it for your child?
Is it not down to the parent to take responsibility for what games their children own and play?
"I think it's irresponsible for Wii to come out with a controller that looks like a gun. What kind of message are we sending as parents when we buy these things for our kids?"
This is the best line ever. Its like theyve got to buy it or something
I too think its irresponsible, irresponsible for a country to have such relaxed gun laws! Most sensible kids who don't wish to get involved in gun crime won't be affected at all. If a kid wants to get hold of and fire a gun they'll do it regardless of wether they played this game or not. Maybe these stupid irresponsible parents should worry about bringing their kids up properly then they wouldn't have to worry about what type of games they play!
1985 - the Nintendo Zapper (for NES) 1987 - The Light Phaser (for Spectrum / C64) 1987 - the Atari XG1 (for Atari XEGS) 1992 - the Sega Lock-On (for Megadrive) 1995 - the Nintendo Super Scope (for SNES) 2000 - The Dreamcast Lightgun (for Dreamcast) 2003 - the GunCon (for PS2)
And now we're suddenly worried about what's essentially yet another light gun? Pfft. Mothers Against Everything strikes again.
I'm against all the stupid peripherals for the Wii, but this argument is utter b******s.
Errrr, haven't kids had toy guns for about the last few hundred years? I know I did, I even had the big rocket launcher thingy for the snes and still I haven't shot anyone or blown anything up.
By the sounds of things I haven't done my self justice and have wasted all those years of playing on my snes!
"I think it's irresponsible for Wii to come out with a controller that looks like a gun. What kind of message are we sending as parents when we buy these things for our kids?"
This is the best line ever. Its like theyve got to buy it or something
This is hilarious that comment just goes to show the mentality of these parents. The line only in America springs to mind! Looking at the blog though it appears that most people don't agree with these cretins and rightly so.
I wonder if theyve ever seen a lightgun game?! Bloody hell gaming will be ruined. Some of those guns look very realistic. Or maybe its because the Nintendo Wii is a machine for everyone therefore adult/mature themes are not aloud to exist on it?
i used to use that awkward Super Nes bazooka thing that you used to put on your shoulder- but i can only wish i knew how to use a real bazooka. These "parents" are eejits
The problem stems from the fact that so many people bought Wiis all at once, and the demand was so high that it was all you ever heard about. It was therefor in the public eye and now pretty much anything it does that isn't Cutesy Fuffy Bunnies Go To Happytown is going to be complained about.
I bet if you could do a survey, you'd find that it's probably middle-class housewives and mothers with a high income and too much spare time that are creating all this fuss. The very same people who buy their child whatever they like, then complain when they find out that it's not suitable.
As tomreeves84 said, kids have been playing with pretend guns and toy soldiers for centuries. If that was all it took to create someone who enjoys killing innocent people, the world would be a very different place.
If the Zapper was to be used for a GTA-like game, where the character wondered the streets shooting innocents, then I could see where they're coming from. Fact of the matter is, is that it's being lined up for games like Umbrella Chronicles, where the player will be shooting zombies... what's wrong with being able to handle a gun? Is what you do with it that matters, and in my books Nintendo aren't promoting the miss-use of a gun, which is the most important thing.
Maybe these parents should think first, before they encourage their kids to grow up and have stupid irrational opinions of their own.
Does this mean we should blame popular 70's plastic gun novelty "Tin Can Alley" for the recent increase in inner-city gun crime?
Or maybe duck hunt?
Or Operation Wolf?
Or Lazer Tag?
Funny how Pilot Wings has never been blamed for teaching kids how to fly bi-planes or jet packs! Oh the humanity!! Won't someone think of the children!!
parents against everything because that woman who donates cakes to the school fair said nintendo is bad, rather than listen to qualified experts who have done research into finding out if there is any correlation between videogames and violence. which there isn't.
its a well known fact that when a person becomes a parent no matter how smart they were before, they instantly become idiots forever after.
This won't teach a kid to shoot a gun accurately at all as from my experience you have to aim the WiiMote at the sensor bar. If you point the WiiMote at the center of your telly you certainly won't see any crosshairs, they'll be slightly further down the screen. Well thats what I've noticed when I've had a go on my sons Wii, unless he hasn't set it up right in the first place (I can't be bottomd doing it).
People like this need to be banned from life. Overprotective, uneducated suburban idiots who believe that life is exactely as it's seen on the news.
So... this is ok but recruiting for the Army at 16+ isn't?
Parents too weak minded to teach their kids fundamentals like shooting people is wrong will always immediately find the nearest thing to blame for their own shortcomings as responsible adults. Someone please start another war to keep their mind off our harmless hobbies...
Funny how Pilot Wings has never been blamed for teaching kids how to fly bi-planes or jet packs! Oh the humanity!! Won't someone think of the children!!
Wasn't MS Flight Simulator blamed in part for training the 9/11 terrorist pilots?
1985 - the Nintendo Zapper (for NES) 1987 - The Light Phaser (for Spectrum / C64) 1987 - the Atari XG1 (for Atari XEGS) 1992 - the Sega Lock-On (for Megadrive) 1995 - the Nintendo Super Scope (for SNES) 2000 - The Dreamcast Lightgun (for Dreamcast) 2003 - the GunCon (for PS2)
And now we're suddenly worried about what's essentially yet another light gun? Pfft. Mothers Against Everything strikes again.
I'm against all the stupid peripherals for the Wii, but this argument is utter b******s.
Exactly. There was never any fuss before this is just parents who have nothing better to do with they're time except p**s and moan. And the wii is for everyone!! Retards!
I’ve said it before and I'll say it again, you have to be fu**ed up in the first place to think a game is real.
Also which is more influential, a videogame or the real wars being waged by America against the world? When the kid turns on CNN and sees his big brother shooting people for real don’t you think that will screw the kid up more than a game?
what utter rubbish! toy guns and light-guns have been around for years. surely if there gonna say it helps kids to point and aim, they should ask nintendo to just ban the wiimote control. it's the wiimote that you're using to point and aim, it's just housed in the zapper's plastic casing! just ban the wii, and be done with it! after the manhunt 2 ban, i guess this would be next. will resident evil 5 get banned next year for being racist? parents should be more worried about their kids getting hold of real guns, not toys.
pfft, RUBBISH, the wii zapper isnt going to train anyone!.
i learnt to defend myself from zombies in hotd, then i got a hold of the pink arcade time crisis gun. that taught me to be a terrorist and everything!
i can see bullets coming, when im in a gun fight all the bullets miss, but if oen is about to come for me, i see a red flash before the person even fires! so i just hide behind whatever im near.
I love how parents of violent gun crime kids try to shift the blame to cover up the fact that they have raised a phychopathic child who doesn't know right from wrong.
Will everyone stop saying "those people/parents are stupid". This will be two people maximum moaning to get press coverage and some attention. This whole article should never have been made to give them the attention they seek. Shame on everyone.
As tomreeves84 said, kids have been playing with pretend guns and toy soldiers for centuries. If that was all it took to create someone who enjoys killing innocent people, the world would be a very different place.
But isn't that exactly what they wanted to happen anyway? So they can send them off to shoot innocent civilians in the 'war on terror' and protect the homeland... Yay! War is fun
what is all the fuss about. i have been playing with light gun games since i had a pong game thingy with a gun attachment google images -binatone gun- and it hasn't done me any harm. OH! apart from that time i shot next doors dog to bits with a 12 bore i knicked from the local gun shop and i borrowed my dads bazooka and blew up the local 7-11. s**t! and what about the time after playing battlezone i went to the local army base, borrowed a tank and started causing havoc in my local village maybe they have a point
That's nothing. I work in a secret research facility, and this one time there was an accident in the test chamber and weird alien stuff started pouring out into our world. Well thankfully I had enough training to kill my way out with merely a crowbar, before stealing a dying security guy's gun and piling the corpses up as I tried to get to safety. Then I had to fight off hordes of government hit squads who had been sent in to keep up quiet.
I tell you, if I hadn't had all that Duck Hunt training I'd never have overthrown that pesky alien body-snatching government.
Right, its gone too far now. Everyone, grab your shotguns, rifles, whatever you can find and lets wipe out all OAP's and concerned parents on this world. They clearly arent needed, and just cause us gamers bother!
Look - people are (or should be) free to say what they think. If these people don't think kids should be playing with toys that emulate guns, they should be free to say so.
On the flip side, I should also be allowed to say that kids shouldn't be allowed to read books about rape, incest and murder - and thus demand that the bible is R rated.
The Nintendo Zapper never had this sort of impact. I'm a pretty good shot. Last time I played, I got to round 21. High enough that missing a single duck is a game over. I got my NES with Duck Hunt when I was 5 years old, and now I'm 24. And guess what? I don't like guns. The only gun I've ever used was a spring-loaded pellet gun.
So what makes the the Wii Blaster different from the NES Zapper? Society is different. Playing a game with a gun is nothing new. It's these parents who whine and moan about kids playing with squirt guns, saying that the water on the shirt where they get shot is like blood. These parents blame everyone else for the behavior their kids learn, and they take no responsibility themselves. That's the real problem here.
Seriously, these ppl must be stuck in the 60's because they must be on drugs. Not the Drugs on the Street anymore, the Wii blaster is responsible for all societies ills. Really think they should bring out a license to be a parent.
Like anyone needs a computer game to learn how to use a gun? It's not like it's going to teach little Timmy how to build a gun from general items found around the house now, is it?
I'm actually surprised that the uproar isn't about how cack it looks rather than how realistic it is.
I was kinda thinking that myself, it's the least 'gun-like' peripheral I've seen since the Super Scope and the Menacer on the SNES and Mega Drive respectively but hey, as long as it works that's fine by me.
first manhunt 2,then the devolopers of condemned 2 toned down their game,and now this.it's gettin out of hand,if nintendo decide to cancell the zapper then im getting rid of my wii.it will really p**s me of if nintendo do this just to keep their cute little image.
Ive been around weapons for years and have never seen anyone use one for a crime that had been taught right from wrong as a child. These idiots blame guns for their poor parenting skills. I bet they blame pencils for misspelled words also! And spoons and ice cream for thier fat asses. These people should spend more time teaching thier children self disciplin and right from wrong than protesting a potenially fun TOY!
This won't teach a kid to shoot a gun accurately at all as from my experience you have to aim the WiiMote at the sensor bar. If you point the WiiMote at the center of your telly you certainly won't see any crosshairs, they'll be slightly further down the screen.
Yes you are right, but I'm hoping that when they release the Gun attachment and some games for it, there will be a colaboration screen that will mean you actually shoot where you aim. I know that this is technically possible (it was the same thing with the SNES Super Scope) but will Nintendo bother
Seriously. Parents, do your job. Don't look at the easy targets. Don't then go on to blame said targets. Pull your finger out and do your job and educate. Educate your kid, let them know right from wrong and then teach them a good set of values - this can only be taught from home really. Blaming games is the easy route out, passing the buck on parenting. Games are games. PG - Parental Guidance, 12 = 12 years old (not 8 or 9 or 10 or 11), 15 = 15 and over......you get the idea.
wow get a life, these kind of things have been around for years. ITS NOT GAMES MAKING KIDS SHOOT EACH OTHER ITS THEIR CRAPPY PARENTS BRINGING THEM UP TO BE t**tS
Like anyone needs a computer game to learn how to use a gun? It's not like it's going to teach little Timmy how to build a gun from general items found around the house now, is it?
Funny how Pilot Wings has never been blamed for teaching kids how to fly bi-planes or jet packs! Oh the humanity!! Won't someone think of the children!!
Wasn't MS Flight Simulator blamed in part for training the 9/11 terrorist pilots?
Good point. The only difference being that Pilot Wings was great and not very realistic and MS Flight Simulator is perhaps a little too realistic. If for no other reason except that it's as dull as dishwater!
Preaching to the converted here but don't you think it'll be great when people finally get their head around the idea that games aren't just for kids and that maybe, just maybe, these peripherals aren't for Surf's Up or Spyro!!
I've been in the army and I can safely say that lightguns do not teach you how to use firearms. I was pretty hot stuff with my light gun on my commodore 64 as a kid. Yet, when I got my hands on a real rifle I couldn't hit the broad side of a whale at 3 inches.... It's not even remotely the same.
Some of these so called "parents" need to wake up and realise that we don't live in a fairytale world where everything is done the way they want it to be done. Another thing some people in this world need to do is realise that violent computer games do not make people into psychopathic killers...
When Jack The Ripper was doing his stuff in White Chapel, computers hadn't even been invented, yet we still had murderers on the lose... Or maybe we're to believe that these murderers were actually time travellers who'd played a few hours of Manhunt, then jumped into the nearest TARDIS and travelled back to victorian times to act out their fantasies....
First thing I thought when I read this article was that I don't remember anyone caring about the countless other Zappers Nintendo has made in the past.
Well if these kids are so impressionable, at least they will be able to save the world in the event of a zombie invasion due to all of their intense firearm training with the highly realistic blaster.
seriously if you dont want kids playing adult games dont by them (why should i have to suffer??). its time to take resposibility for your kids
where the hell have these people been the last 20 years?
i hope everyone realizes that these kinds of people who have power and dont know what they're talking about, ARE the real problem. its not all the violence in the country that we should be focusing on (although it is still a problem). i think it's the lack of common sense this country has as a whole. A LOT of times even any sense whatsoever. i cant think of a better example than this story. if there's some kind of campaign to get these people out of power, then i would sign up in a heartbeat. just give me a link. i cant take this crap anymore.
I do recall the guncon getting a lot of grief because of its colour. I think they changed it to blue in the end to make it look less like a real gun.
Pathetic really. Probably there was a small storm in a tea cup over all these guns at some point and just like those this issue will blow over unnoticed by the majority.
i think this is pretty much a downright insult to all kids, really.
how would you feel if a bunch of grown ups were telling other people that you were mindless and couldn't tell the difference between a fake plastic toy and the real thing? its kind of loosely exaggerated, but you get the idea.
Christ, whining about fake guns that look nothing like REAL GUNS! And they've got nothing against Handgun Ammo in Wal-Mart. It makes me sick. I mean, unless there's a game called "How to make an Assault Rifle out of a stick and a blender" or "How to overthrow the goverment with a rubber band" kids won't learn how to shoot people! And it's there own damn fault if they don't teach their kids the difference between wrong and right. And Resi 5 in't racist! It's set in Africa! They're ZOMBIES!
So here I am coming home from a lovely week in Cornwall to celebrate my b day and now this, stupid stupid idiotic spastic people!!!
I mean does anyone remember Duck Hunt for the Nes or the Virtua Cop Gun for the Saturn and even the ill fated Bazooka like Snes Scope, and its only now that these C**ts start twitching!
Nintendo and Capcom have teamed up with the Government to train kids how to use guns for future wars. Genius...
You forgot Ubisoft and Tom Clancy. Must...join...counter-terrorism...team.
That's nothing. I work in a secret research facility, and this one time there was an accident in the test chamber and weird alien stuff started pouring out into our world. Well thankfully I had enough training to kill my way out with merely a crowbar, before stealing a dying security guy's gun and piling the corpses up as I tried to get to safety. Then I had to fight off hordes of government hit squads who had been sent in to keep up quiet.
I tell you, if I hadn't had all that Duck Hunt training I'd never have overthrown that pesky alien body-snatching government.
probably been mentioned as i havent read everyones posts but why are parents even considering buying a wii shooter game which probably wont even be suitable age wise for said child.
I love the way a few idiotic parents manage to post their disgust on the internet and suddenly it is an uproar.....
The fact is kids have always had gun shaped toys that look a lot more realistic than the zapper, some where they are are meant to shoot at each other rather than a screen.
The idea that this will turn kids to gun crime is ludicrous, but then we all knew that anyway.
I'm a parent. Love video games. Most definitely control what my son plays.
My guess is that most parents who are upset at something like this, including violence in video games, control their children too. They would be hypocritical if they didn't.
What many of you miss, is the fact that these parents who are upset, are not upset with what they can and can't control in their own children, but, they are concerned about what they can't control in someone else's child.
A parent, concerned about the way a neighbor brings up a child, cannot control what that neighbor does (or doesn't do). Doesn't stop a parent from being concerned or voicing their opinions on the subject.
I'm a parent. Love video games. Most definitely control what my son plays.
My guess is that most parents who are upset at something like this, including violence in video games, control their children too. They would be hypocritical if they didn't.
What many of you miss, is the fact that these parents who are upset, are not upset with what they can and can't control in their own children, but, they are concerned about what they can't control in someone else's child.
A parent, concerned about the way a neighbor brings up a child, cannot control what that neighbor does (or doesn't do). Doesn't stop a parent from being concerned or voicing their opinions on the subject.
From your spelling of neighbor (sic.) I surmise you're American... In which case the problem you have has nothing to do with guns in computer games, but real guns that are far too easily accessible by kids, or anyone else for that matter.
This is yet again a question of the real problem being side-stepped in favour of an easier target. The gun lobby over there is absurdly powerful so instead let's just blame computer games... well computer games don't kill people - people kill people, but the guns sure do help.
in light of this i have made a list of things to be ban
toy guns ALL GAMES (apart for need for speed as its ok to tell kids to drive modded tricked out cars while drive 100 mph down the motorway while 28 cop cars fire bullets at you for hiting all the old grannies at the old grannies home and then using randomly place ramps to fly in a asda and making food fly everwhere and hurting everyone then crashing into a stripclub and partying there till morn) laser quest ........ thats all
Copyright 2006 - 2009 Future Publishing Limited, Beauford Court, 30 Monmouth Street, Bath, UK BA1 2BW England and Wales company registration number 2008885
maybe they have a point 
And they've got nothing against Handgun Ammo in Wal-Mart. It makes me sick. I mean, unless there's a game called "How to make an Assault Rifle out of a stick and a blender" or "How to overthrow the goverment with a rubber band" kids won't learn how to shoot people! And it's there own damn fault if they don't teach their kids the difference between wrong and right. And Resi 5 in't racist! It's set in Africa! They're ZOMBIES!
