Posts Tagged ‘sex’
How Mature
Recently in the UK news there was an article stating that a head teacher would report parents to the local authorities if they discovered any of the children in the school were playing mature rated games, citing that the parents would be accused of “neglect.” While I feel accusing parents of being neglectful is not entirely fair it does pose the question: just how mature are games these days? This article is going to cover my own experiences of mature rated games as I grew up and how I feel about the subject now. [Editor’s Note: Fred wrote an article in the past dissecting mature rated games in the US, that perspective is here.]
Dropping the Ban Hammer
Have you ever eagerly anticipated the release of a game only to find out it isn’t coming to the United States? Imagine if the reasoning wasn’t due to licensing issues or internal policies by the ESRB and console developers. Aside from Rapelay, a game I can barely give credit as a video game and was never intended to see a release anyway, I’ve never heard of a game that isn’t welcome in the US. It’s one of those great freedoms that we take completely for granted in this country – we don’t have our media banned or censored federally. This isn’t to say content isn’t stripped down, many of us remember Manhunt 2 getting an AO rating that rendered it unable to release on its intended platforms (PS2 and Wii). As a result, developer Rockstar released a “toned down” version that was approved with an M rating and saw retail release. The difference between this situation and the situation in other countries is that the industry self polices and decides what is allowed and what is not. Currently the major console manufacturers refuse to release AO titles, but that doesn’t restrict a developer from releasing on PC or an available platform. In some other countries, you’re given a stringent refusal to release your product after you’ve created it.
