“Manhunt 2″ to get AO rating again?

A group of United States lawmakers consisting of senators Sam Brownback(R-KS), Joe Lieberman(I-CT), Evan Bayh(D-IN), and Hillary Clinton(D-NY) are officially protesting ESRB’s decision to rate the extremely violent(so violent it earned a ban in the UK and Ireland) video game Manhunt 2 “M”, after the game’s developers stripped off some of the more violent bits(including a castration scene) that originally earned it an “AO”, or Adults Only rating, a rating which has been earned by only a single game before: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. At close examintation, the list of senators isn’t a surprise: Lieberman and Clinton have always been for video game censorship, Brownback is a major figure on the Christian Right, and Bayh will follow Clinton in her lead because he wants the vice presidential slot on the Democratic ticket next year.

What bothers me about this is that none of the senators seem to have done their research: Manhunt 2 is obviously violent. No one is disputing that. But the game developers cut out the most violent scenes from their title and were fairly rerated by ESRB. And I’d also like to point this out: have any of the senators played Manhunt 2? I doubt it. And besides, an “M” rating is essentially equivelent to an “R” rated movie, and yet there is no call from the Senate to rate Saw IV “NC-17″. Lawmakers today are out of touch with the forefront of technology, specifically video games and the Internet. For example, today I played a couple missions of Call of Duty 4. Just because I did does not mean I want to go out and shoot people. There is no video game on the market today that does not have at least three films more violent then it. And the vast, vast majority of games do not show the same amount of sex and nudity the average raunchy sex comedy does at the movies.

In the end, it boils down to the fact that lawmakers are out of touch with the public. Should a 10 year old be able to go into a store and buy Manhunt 2? Probably not. But that is why the current rating system is there. Sens. Lieberman, Brownback, Clinton, and Bayh need to rethink this after a careful review of the fact. Video game censorship is a growing issue today. And it is not going away, at least in the foreseeable future. This is Kolametal, signing off-hope you enjoyed!