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ESRB pulls Rockstar’s rating

After weeks of shenanigans, ridiculously misplaced political involvement, inane commentary from traditional news media which knows nothing of the subject, and more misinformation than one story really needs, the ESRB has formally pulled the M rating of Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. They have given two options: completely remove the "explicit content", resubmit it for review, and skate off with a new M rating, or rebrand the game as Adults Only, watch as retailers pull it from shelves, and sales drop due to a mod.

I've been trying my best not to report on this because it's dumb. The whole situation is just completely dumb. I don't like to talk about dumb things, especially once the news media jumps all over it. To date, I can't recall a single thing remotely relating to a videogame which traditional news media has been able to adequately take time to understand and fairly report on. So lets clear up some disinformation. To start with, there are two mods. There's "Hot Coffee" and there's "SACensor". Both unlock the now infamous sex minigame, but Hot Coffee unlocks it and strips everyone down as far as they go, which doesn't actually make anyone nude, just incredibly skimpy. SACensor just opens the game, which shows you what Rockstar left in the game: fully clothed grinding.

This is what is being argued about. Fully clothed videogame grinding or slightly-less-clothed videogame grinding. SOMEHOW, having this content not even immediately in the game makes it worthy of the AO death-rating.

Now, from the ESRB's standpoint, they have a right to be pissed. The ESRB is supposed to base their rating on what's on the disc. If it's on the disc it has to be reviewed so it can contribute to the rating. This is content on the disc, it didn't get reviewed, so now it has to be completely pulled or re-reviewed. But then you add in the attention from political figures and bandwagoning pundits with an agenda. Pretty much anyone ready to take down the industry for warping our children just can't wait to hear about what horrible new thing is in GTA, because it's such an easy target. Yes it's a violent, sexual, graphic game [sometimes two at the same time!], but it's also rated M. That means if you're under 17 you probably shouldn't have the game ANYWAYS. This often doesn't stop idiotic absentee parents from just giving ten year old little Jimmy whatever game he wants. And sometimes retailers don't card you! Shock and horror!

But unlike sane countries, like the UK, where if you as a retailer sell someone underage an 18+ game, that's a felony and you get fined huge amounts, here we see this as a failing of the rating board and the developer. That's obviously where the blame should go! Of course! Not at the 47 other levels between the developer and the consumer, where the system that is currently in place could be, you know, actually enforced rather than blatantly ignored.

So the pundits have pressured the ESRB and thereby Rockstar into acting. Dropping everything to fix something that shouldn't be an issue. Money lost for parent companies, for Rockstar themselves, for retailers, for everyone. And it goes down on the record that if you leave potentially objectionable content on your disc, they might bitch and moan again, and you'll lose too. But will the pundits actually go hunting, or will they just go after games they know exist, you know, the two games that exist in the world: "GTA" and "DOOM".

What about all the other games with explicit sexual content? Or as the case may be, things idiots may consider "explicit sexual content". How about God of War? God of War has not only more realistic gore than GTA:SA, but it also has an honest to goodness sex minigame with real full frontal nudity right within the first hour of the game. You don't have to download a patch, you don't have to unlock hidden secret content, it's RIGHT THERE and it's more explicit than that which exists in GTA:SA. Has anyone said word-one about this? Of course not! And it has the exact same rating as GTA:SA.

Let's stretch this to something more like The Sims. Massive huge billion dollar game. If you strip down your sim, or have them go take a shower, or anything else, you get a nude sim with a big blurry box over them. Now, if you're an enterprising internet person on the internet, you can go right out and get a blurryness removal hack. Should Maxis and/or EA have to pull copies of The Sims? Rebadge it from T to AO for EXPLICIT NUDITY!11!1! ?

Of course not, because that would be dumb.

So what's the real solution? How are we supposed to protect the children from horrible mind-destroying videogames? How do we still keep it fair and sane? Here's what I suggest:

1. Developers: Don't be stupid. Don't try to hide your stuff. Show the ESRB all your content or pull it completely. Also go examine God of War. The ESRB says that's only "M", that means you can get away with a TON and still only get an M. Just don't try to cover it up.
2. ESRB: Don't let yourselves get bossed around by pundits. Please. When you roll over it makes them feel right.
3. Politicians: Don't take the fight to developers, take the fight to retailers. A system exists, the system is quite good, give the ESRB ratings teeth by setting up fines for if a retailer sells M-rated games to a minor.
4. Parents: You're PARENTS. That means taking RESPONSIBILITY. If you don't want your 10 year old kid playing an M-rated game, don't let them! If you see them playing one that you didn't buy, find out how they got it! If the ESRB gets some teeth, that means someone dropped the ball and should be fined severely.
5. Pundits (especially my good friend Jack Thompson): Please die. Soon. Leave us alone and go play in traffic or something.

And that's all I have to say about that.

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