Lawyer: California Law Could Destroy Videogame Industry

A lawyer said that, if upheld by the Supreme Court, the California law could rip the videogame industry apart.

Patrick Sweeney leads the videogame division at Reed Smith LLP, a law firm that argues for clients like EA, THQ, Sony Online Entertainment, and Nintendo. He said that the fate of the videogame industry will be decided next week by the Supreme Court. If the Court decides to uphold the California law which proposes to regulate videogames like the government currently does pornography, liquor or cigarettes, then videogame industry as we know it could cease to exist.

“Certainly less games would be produced and there would be a corresponding job loss,” Sweeney said. “But I expect the impact will likely be significantly deeper. I believe the independent development community would be severely impacted. Innovation, both from a creative and technological aspect, would also be stifled. The companies, brands and individuals that we should be embracing as the visionaries of this creative and collaborative industry will migrate their talents to a more expressive medium.”

Sweeney believes that job loss and less videogames is only the tip of the iceberg, and that the real impact will be the fact that auteurs will move to producing work in mediums that wouldn’t be so restrictive.

The Supreme Court is set to hear arguments in the Schwarzenegger vs EMA case on November 2nd. I, like many of you, anxiously await the results of those proceedings and how it will affect not only the hobby that I love but my very livelihood.

This is serious, guys.

Source: Industry Gamers