ESRB's Deadly Premonition rating confirms PS3 release

8:00 AM on 11.12.2009   |   Jim Sterling

13 comments

We're pretty excited about Deadly Premonition, the $19.99 horror game coming out in 2010 courtesy of Ignition. Do we think it will be particularly good? No, we do not. In fact, we're kind of hoping it will be hilariously bad. The ESRB has recently rated the game, not only shedding light on some hilariously tasteless game details, but also confirming the title for PS3.

On of the most interesting details is the fact that you get to play a serial killer during one stage: "In one flashback sequence, players are able to control the villain (the Raincoat Killer) as he uses an axe to kill the townsfolk -- toxic gas has left them in a deranged state; the grainy black-and-white sequence depicts the townsfolk emitting red blood-spurts when hit, as their bodies disappear."

Modern Warfare 2's "No Russian" level has nothing on this!

Deadly Premonition was announced for Xbox 360, but not mentioned at all for PS3. While the ESRB may have made a mistake, the ratings board usually gets its platforms right, so I'd say a PS3 release is looking likely. Good news, because I'm sure everybody wants a piece of this game.

It only just hit me that I saw the first trailer for this in 2007. Amazing how games return from out of nowhere. Full ESRB rating after the jump.

This is an action-horror game in which players assume the role of a detective investigating a series of strange murders in a small town. Players examine crime scenes, interview townspeople and suspects, and occasionally use guns, knives, and metal pipes to battle zombie-like creatures. One humanoid-like monster (naked, but with no genitalia or nipples) crawls along walls and can be killed by using a submachine gun. In one flashback sequence, players are able to control the villain (the Raincoat Killer) as he uses an axe to kill the townsfolk—toxic gas has left them in a deranged state; the grainy black-and-white sequence depicts the townsfolk emitting red blood-spurts when hit, as their bodies disappear.

Graphic depictions are presented during investigations of crime scenes, where players sometimes discover the victims: a woman is found tied to a tree with her abdomen sliced open—blood surrounds the open wound (hair partially obscures her breasts); another woman is strung up by wires in a shower, covered with blood, and strangled by an elaborate trap; and a "profile"-montage depicts still-frame images of a struggle between killer and victim amid sounds of crying and desperate pleas (e.g., "stop, please . . . I swear . . . I won’t tell anyone . . ."). A couple of cutscenes are intense as well, depicting suicides via gunshots to the head. The dialogue contains mild sexual innuendo (e.g., a woman at a gas station says, "Let me know if you want me to pump it") and more direct commentary about sex: "She’ll scr*w anyone" and "Oh, I sleep with anyone I wish. Anyone I prefer to sleep with . . . I could sleep with you, if you’d like."