you know, with games like this getting harder and harder to get, i can see the violence rising because people can't get their hands on the video games.

Good thing I'm an adult.

I don't know, I think it's just irresponsible journalism on the gaming media's part to ignore the drastic rise in hockey-masked-stealth-assassinations-via-directive-from-whispery-earpiece crime the release of the first Manhunt caused in United States. You can't argue with statistics.

BTW: don't appreciate the insinuation that the game doesn't deserve it's AO rating. Little to no information about the game, it's content, and it's controls have been released to the public, so it very well could require a rating above M. The fact that R* hasn't responded yet, and have known for days, I don't see this as being overrated.

kids are pussies

Doesn't having an AO rating mean you should be 18 instead of 17 for Mature games? Apparently in one year you will be able to handle the new level of sex and violence or something.

Anyway I have to agree with DeusPayne here, we really have no idea what the game is like. I would think its better that it is rated AO instead of having some family groups protest because the rating is too low for what the game has. An AO will give a clearer message that your kids should not buy this game. That and didn't the first Manhunt suck anyway?

you do know this game allowed you to reenact ripping out a dudes testicles with pliers and rip out a part of there spine somehow attached to the testicles? or, also, how about how it allows you take a saw and saw up between the crotch and butt (the gooch, as jackass taught me) up into the abdomen? Or how about throwing a dude into a circuit board until his head explodes? Just thought you guys might like to know.

So?

Sounds tasteless and horrible to me, but it should be MY decision if I want to play it or not, not somebody else's.

I guess it's not all bad though. Before now, I haven't really been paying the game much attention, but now I'm pretty sure I'm buying it whenever it releases.

maybe if enough people buy it, retail chains will see it's popular and start stocking it in shelves?

@TheFuckIsJimSterling

Well, in America, it IS our choice, Jim. Isn't that what this comment thread is about? I'm sorry that it got banned over there, but we do still have the choice of whether or not to play it, over here.

Has anyone considered that this may all be an elaborate marketing campaign initiated by Rockstar.

From my understanding the rating boards do not actually play the games (go figure) but create their ratings based on developer submitted videos of gameplay. is it possible that Rockstar just submitted some really bad stuff which they will later 'withdraw' from the final retail version? Or has my faith in the BBFC been utterly destroyed forever?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06b9sMyLsHY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEbElh8HIdI&mode=related&search=
i did come across a video from the punisher where he puts a goy onto a bench saw and proceds to push the guy crotch first

Well this makes me angry. I'm 17 so I was thinking I'd pick it up. Now I can't. And I know my parents wouldn't pick it up for me.

Gg, ESRB. Gg.

Who would've thought the second AO game on a console EVER would be on the wii?

...sweetheart, I ask no more than this, a kiss to build a dream on....

That's what the image reminded me of heh (only the hardcore will know this reference).

I think the AO rating should be used more liberally, and not looked at as such a negative. Yes, the game deals with extremely mature themes. No, I don't think minors should be allowed to purchase this. Why is the AO rating such a retail deathbed? The difference between M and AO's age limit is one year.

It strikes me as odd is all, the game is meant for adults, and thusly, is given an Adult rating. It isn't like you are strangling people out...with cocks.

Im sure that this will be the best selling AO title ever. That is if R* doensnt decide to cut out the "good stuff" to get an M rating. If this game sells well (100k) at an AO rating I hope that will encourage developers to make more adult games, not just the blood 'n guts kind.

This will only help Rockstar Trevor. Americans love their controversy. It's why so many masochistically watch Fox News...and believe every word they say as doctrine.

Rockstar will do just fine. Real gamers don't shop at Wal Mart anyway.

But Best Buy and GameStop also have policies that have them not carrying AO titles.

Although I would suspect that certain wheels are in motion to change policies at at least ONE of those chains. Probably the one that can make money on the game twice via the preowned market.

Hot damn, this is certaintly going to be an interesting ride.

While I do live in the US so I can play Manhunt 2, this is a step in the wrong direction. I never did quite understand the difference between movies rated R and movies rated NC-17 anyways. If parents were smart, they'd understand the rating system in the first place. No game, no matter what happens in it, should be banned anywhere, except by parents of underage kids in their own homes.

Something needs to happen to get the word out and educate these people. Not all video games are for kids. Some are for adults. There is no need to play big brother and protect the ignorant parents.

It's a fucking video game. Srsly.

It's too bad that Manhunt had to be the one to get slapped with AO. No one's going to want to champion a one-trick pony like this.

If you want "anyone" to go and point at a game and say "murder simulator" this is that game. I could care less to play it because the appeal is something I've divested myself in countless times before, in much more compelling ways.

Can we at least have a game worth fighting over Rockstar? Or was this your goal?

I don't care either way. My copy of Manhunt 2 stays on the shelf for some other championing schlub to go belly up to. Give me a compelling cause that I support with my dollar and I'm there.

If Hitler got an unfair parking ticket levied against him, would you want to jump up and say, "Hey! Unfair parking ticket dude!"?

And to be perfectly honest, I think the ESRB is probably a lot more honest than the MPAA. The MPAA has this vague set of loose standards with no set checks to run through when they rate a movie.

While the ESRB will point out what you have done to earn your rating, the MPAA tells you "excessive violence" or "too much nudity" and leaves it at that.

Also given here is that with film, there's alternate takes and angles to provide breathing room with those ratinges. Whereas with a video game, since everything is prescripted actions, the ability to alter these actions is more time consuming to the process and less likely to be changed for the sake of the rating.

Rockstar had to have known what they were going to do, they got it, and now whatever happens from it, I'd say, buy it if you want, but judge it for the game, not for the controversy that surrounds it. If you do that, you've potentially wasted $50 on a mediocre game that could've been better spent on something worth your time.

Grand Theft Auto received an AO.

Grimspoon, same here but I am still on the fence between buying and renting. grrr stupid money.