VietNamNet Bridge – The multiuser game industry and its supporters say a few horror stories don’t justify tough controls on online games. 

“Anything has a good and bad side. Online games and gamers are governed by the law of supply and demand.  That ought to be clear,” said Vietnam Software Association vice chair Truong Hoai Trang at a recent talk on online games in HCM City.

Trang said it is difficult to ban online games, because gamers can access offshore servers.  More likely, he said, restriction on games here will simply make it tough for Vietnamese game companies that have invested millions of dollars in the business.

“When a house is condemned to build a road, the house owner is informed in advance. It must be the same for the online games industry. Moreover, we still don’t have criteria on violence in games,” Trang added.

HCM City Information Technology Association General Secretary Pham Thien Nghe also called the proposed regulations unfair. A few cases of violence and suicide linked to online games don’t mean that all online games and gamers are bad, he insists.

The HCM City Department of Education and Training tends to agree. It conducted a survey on the impacts of online games on students at schools and colleges, and found that online games are not a major factor driving school violence. Family problems and other social drivers are much more influential, it seems.

“We can’t ban online games; it’s contrary to the global trend and the IT age. We should educate children and encourage families and the society to understand and control their children,” says HCM City Department of Education and Training deputy director Le Hong Son.

The DoET survey, carried out two months ago, also shows that up to 90 percent of the sample played games at home, not at Internet cafes. Therefore, experts said that families and society need to join hands to educate children, in addition to imposing administrative measures to control gamers and Internet cafes.

The editor of the Vietnam edition of PC World, Phi Quan said that Vietnam has not addressed violence, sex, gambling in media products. “Many films on television feature violence and gambling scenes,” he said. “Why single out online games?”

Some experts say that if the authorities ban online games, they ought to open other playgrounds for children.  Some have proposed that the central government commission research on the online games phenomenon.  Some argue that if online games are banned, this market will simply belong to foreign companies.

Other experts have suggested adding educational content into the online games.

An online games distributor, Vinagame director Le Hong Minh said: “We don’t want our clients to be addicted to games.  If they play games immoderately, they will not be able to be our clients for a long time. Moreover, there will arise bad public opinion about the community of gamers.”

Another game distributor, VTC Intercom deputy director Nguyen Lam Thanh said: “We are about to introduce some educating games but this kind of game is not attractive to the community”.

HCM City Department of Information and Communications director Le Manh Ha notes that the online game industry in Vietnam is not fully developed because so far, Vietnam has had only one successful multiuser game, Thuan Thien Kiem.  All other games available on the market are imports. Ha says that “restricting online game imports would encourage the development of this industry.”

Luu Vu Hai, chief of the MoIC’s Radio, Television Broadcast and Electronic Information Management Department, agrees that a ban of online game would not work.

“We can’t completely manage such issues by administrative measures. We can try to tip the balance,” Hai said.

Hoang Trong Hieu, an executive at the internet service provider VTC, said that the HCM City Department of Information and Communications’ proposed standards to classify violence games are incorrect. He says the department misunderstood the nature of the product and failed to distinguish between virtual and real life.

“Technology develops day by day, allowing games and other entertainment forms to imitate real life better. Gamers are smart enough to know what is real and what is virtual. Games ought to be classified based on the age of gamers. Can banning online games reduce violence among youth? You can answer that question yourselves. When I was a schoolboy, there was neither Internet nor online games, but still we fought amongst ourselves. That’s the nature of education at every family, school and the entire society,” Hieu said.

Luu Vu Hai, the MoIC senior official, agreed that violence has existed even without the agency of Internet or online games but “nobody can deny that violent games exacerbate the matter.”

Game distributors said unanimously that they always obey the Government’s rules. It’s not fair, they argue, to portray this form of entertainment as a social evil based on some individual cases.

Members of big online forums on online games like Gamethu.net and Gamevn also complained that the public only pays attention to the negative side of online games.

All are waiting to see for the revised regulations on management of online games that are due to be issued in the next several months. A few dare hope that these would both control and encourage the healthy development of online games.

Many gamers stated flatly that if online games are banned in Vietnam, they will play games on overseas servers.

PV