Where Politics And Video Games Collide

Some software makers made great games that pushed the edge of the envelope in creativity and storytelling. Others, once again, dredged the well of poor taste, with titles like Rockstar’s Manhunt 2 and Eidos Interactive’s Kane & Lynch: Dead Men.

Hey, NIMF, here's a hint: There will always be someone that makes something that is in poor taste. Movies, books, TV shows, games, etc.

That doesn't mean that everyone else should get blamed for it.

Some game makers also found creative new ways to market adult games on kids, a disgustingly familiar practice over the years. Too few game makers disclose when illegal versions of their games are stolen from their facilities and leaked on the Internet.

So, translation, Rockstar did their usual controversy sells thing, and you consider that marketing to children? Or do you consider someone pirating early versions of the game to be marketing to children instead/as well? As for not disclosed, please, quit lying through your teeth. Any game that gets leaked to the internet pre-release is going to get reported on. Game makers aren't the first ones to report it, because guess what? They don't know that someone's got a copy they're going to put on the internet until after it's happened.

The Manhunt 2 rating debacle shows that the ESRB needs to change its procedures to close a gaping loophole that some game publishers are all too eager to slip though. The ESRB rating should be based on all of a game’s content and code, locked or unlocked, blurred or unblurred. A game’s rating will be meaningless unless serious steps are taken to prevent games from being unlocked.

That's not a gaping loophole. First of all Manhunt 2 was rated on all content, locked or unlocked, blurred or unblurred. The problem your fragile little minds are having trouble with is that it gets an M rating with or without the blur due to the stuff they already cut out. Second, by that logic Starcraft should receive an AO rating as I could make a mod for it that turned all units into gyrating penises, and replace all FMV cinematics with porn. Third spend some freaking time around some game mod communities. You'll learn in real short order how many people have fun taking apart games to see what makes them tick, and how difficult it is to stop people from doing so.

Libraries, schools, churches and other pubic institutions should follow the game’s rating and only allow games appropriate for the age of the youth. By promoting M-rated games, they are undercutting the ESRB’s rating system and undermining parental credibility and authority.

Or they could continue to do what they're doing, and trust the maturity of older teens, and trust their parents to know what their kids can handle.

Yeesh, as always, their "Report Card" is a bunch of completely arbitrary crap.