Kotaku
Senator Hillary Clinton is calling for a federal investigation into the GTA Hot Coffee mod.
The New York Times is reporting that Clinton wrote a letter to the Federal Trade Commission, expressing concerns over the reports of the digital sex that the mod allows gamers to have.
Clinton is asking the FTC to figure out the source of the Hot Coffee mod, which allows gamers to play sex minigames in the PC version of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
Clinton also asked the FTC to determine if the Electronic Software Review Board made a mistake when they gave the game a Mature rating instead of an Adults Only rating.
The senator took the opportunity to lambast what she called the ineffectual enforcement of the ratings system, saying that 50 percent of boys ages 7 to 14 were able to buy M-rated video games.
Parents who rely on the ratings to make decisions to shield their children from influences that they believe could be harmful should be informed right away if the system is broken.
Rockstar has said that hackers created the program that allows players of the recent Grand Theft game to make its characters engage in sex, the New York Times reports.
Responding to Clinton, Rodney Walker, a Rockstar spokesman, said: We support any effort to empower parents to control what their kids consume, but we also want to strike a balance so that the average video game player, who is not a child, is able to continue to play the games that they enjoy.
Patricia Vance, president of the Entertainment Software Rating Board, defended the industry s rating system.
Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas was rated Mature, for ages 17 and older, with five content descriptors: intense violence, blood and gore, strong sexual content, strong language and use of drugs, she said. It s hard to call that inaccurate. It s been appropriately rated.
Clinton Urges Inquiry [NYT]
