Playboy Screensaver? wtf?

Which title would be the dirtiest of the dirtiest?

It seems like AO = Strong Sexual Content.

So basically AO is for sex games, Indigo Prophecy (WTF?), forcibly rerated games and Manhunt?

ESRB needs to sort themselves out and actually rate all their games properly. If there were a greater number of AO games in the marketplace then the Walmarts would have to stock them...

@leetdood:

Playboy Screensaver was a great game. Your goal was to choke the chicken before the picture on screen changed. It was tough since you usually had less than a minute to do it. It required a quick wrist and hand-eye coordination.

I started to think that the ESRB was giving games an AO rating if they had "teh boobiez" in them, but then I remembered God of War and God of War II. They had nudity in them multiple times, including a sexual minigame (though admittedly it was very abstract) and it only received an M rating.

I just don't understand where the line is between an M rating (essentially R for movies) and an AO rating (XXX rating). Even in movies it's not clear cut. It depends on a lot of subjective factors. What are the criteria for games?

If showing R rated movies like Saw and Captivity can be seen by 17-year-olds in standard theatres, why can't Manhunt 2 be played by those same 17-year-olds?

No idea if I'm mixing up labels, but over here in Germany, even games like Half-Life2, FarCry and many other "just-shooters" which have the least of horror/blood/gore material are "Adults-Only" 18+ games. They barely manage to reach that label, too.

There are titles literally banned in this country, you can not legally acquire them no matter what age you are. Gears of War is one of those, alongside Doom3, QuakeIV, FarCry [...].

Not that it'd be stopping anyone.

The funniest part about that Playboy Screensaver is that it was for the Macintosh.

I didn't realize that Princess Peach, wait..."Peach Princess", was so keen on making games for the mature audience. So that's what she's doing when she's not being kidnapped or being coy in her letter-writing.

Thrill Kill was never released, and the AO rating probably had something to do with it, even though they were aiming for blood and gore (and the fact it reportedly sucked).

@Sol-Badguy:

Water Closet- It's a Japanese hentai game of... certain fetishes

M-rated Indigo Prophecy had its sex scenes removed for American release, it was released as an AO-rated director's cut.

What, no links?

Wait, "All Nude Cyber" is AO? Thank god for the ESRB, I was about to get that for little Timmy!

I think it is good to have AO rated games. The M rating has been ignored by some parents. Maybe just get rid of M rating and make all adult games AO.

@adbmice:

Those darn Mac gamers! They get all the good stuff!

/all 4 of them
//totally kidding
///Macs have screensavers?

@d1sergo: Golden showers? lol

@possiblymalignant:

Macs had After Dark, the best screen saver program ever! Who could forget Flying Toasters!?! Classic!

they honestly need to make MUCH more adult rated games. I am tired of trying to import illusion soft games cause they don't support us americans.

@Catalyst:

I had the opprotunity to play thrill kill, and I can honestly say it was no more violent than god of war. It was a mediocre fighting game with characters that look something out of The Hills Have Eyes, and there was a fair ammonut of blood and loss of limbs and what not. Again, nothing we haven't seen in games that made it to store shelves such as God of War 1 and 2.

@jackal888: Maybe just get rid of M rating and make all adult games AO.

That will never happen, just like the MPAA will never get rid of the "R" rating and just go with "NC-17".

Honestly I'd love to see the AO rating used more, but there needs to be a company with the balls to try and break the stigma that is attached to it. If Take-Two wants to be that company, I'll support them all the way.

@baberg:
I just don't understand where the line is between an M rating (essentially R for movies) and an AO rating (XXX rating). Even in movies it's not clear cut. It depends on a lot of subjective factors. What are the criteria for games?

If showing R rated movies like Saw and Captivity can be seen by 17-year-olds in standard theatres, why can't Manhunt 2 be played by those same 17-year-olds?

Isn't AO more comparable to an NC-17 rated movie? "X" is no longer used, and I'm pretty sure "XXX" was always self-applied. NC-17 movies usually get fucked over by larger theater chains who refuse to show them, too.

@Edgey:

Oops, I didn't notice you comparing the actual content and not the ratings themselves. :(

I would LIKE to see more games that people want to play get an AO rating. Hopefully developers will fear the AO less seeing it as a badge of hardcore awesomeness rather than a death sentence. games about sex should be rated.... X

I'm glad to see that the ESRB has been a staunch opponent to blocky, pod-like nipples since its founding.

Wait... there is a uncut North American version of Indigo Prophecy? I own the PAL version when it came out first, and it was completely uncut =P

Also do you really need to list all those visual novels? Pretty much all of em are AO =P

@Edgey: Yes, you're right, the AO rating is really more analogous to the NC-17 rating for movies. I corrected myself in a later post :)

I'm starting to side with the ESRB in this one if they issued their rating without having to be prodded by the special interest group. If the ESRB says that a game is AO without outside influence, then I'm ok with that because the game maker has the ability to go back and re-work the game to make it closer to an M rating (just like a movie which gets NC-17 can go back and become an R version).

The first cut of Team America: World Police received an NC-17 rating. A scene was cut, and it was re-rated to R. The same thing could happen with video games, though admittedly it's not nearly as easy to "cut" certain aspects of a game. Maybe a longer lead-time is needed?

One mature game that really needs to be on this list, Conker's Bad Fur Day.

Well ive seen way more horrible things in the news in the tv and they where transmitted to all public, so put this game on a special status is kind of lame...

WET - The Sexy Empire?! How could that game be construed as AO?

Whenever I think of that, I only think of happy family fun, and certainly not a topless female version of darth vader... which now that I have written it down has caused my skin to crawl.

Chicks with full-body burn scars are hawt. There goes the skin again. I'm really creeping myself out today.

The Joy of Sex for CDi.
So there was another console AO game, interesting

@Duoae: I agree, if there were more AO games in the world, then the major consumer retailers (i.e. Target, Wal-Mart, etc.) would have to recognize them as a legitimate rating and would be ultimately forced to carry them. It simple economics, so to speak. I have a feeling they would overlook a rating if they were in danger of suffering a loss of the almighty dollar to a retailer that was carrying the AO title.

never got to play indigo prophecy, any good?

"Watercloset: The Forbidden Chamber"

Classy. Is this some kind of dungeon crawler?

Please, read and sign the petition that I have created, requesting that Take Two continue forward with their original vision of the game, while possibly releasing an M rated version afterwards. This will give us the opportunity to demonstrate to developers and publishers that there is indeed a market for AO-rated games.

[www.thepetitionsite.com]

@AndrewG009: I agree, if there were more AO games in the world, then the major consumer retailers (i.e. Target, Wal-Mart, etc.) would have to recognize them as a legitimate rating and would be ultimately forced to carry them.

Let's turn that around, shall we?

If there were more XXX/NC-17 movies in the world, then the major consumer retailers (i.e. Target, Wal-Mart, etc.) would have to recognize them as a legitimate rating and would be ultimately forced to carry them.

Hrm, no, that logic doesn't seem to stand up to scrutiny because there's millions of XXX and NC-17 rated movies, and last time I checked I couldn't buy them at Wal-Mart.

Hee Hee, I got 3 of those...

But where's Xchange 2 and 3? Did PP stop submitting them?

I have no idea what the criterion for these ratings are, but I can tell it sucks.

Slightly violent games like Halo get slapped with M ratings while gruesomely violent games like Alien Hominid (as "gruesome" as it can be with such cutesy artwork) get T ratings.

Thrill Kill had no real sexual content.

I guess the AO rating was the reason for it not being released?

Thrill Kill was pretty shitty, as people has stated before me. They did however take the game engine and replace The Imp, Dr. Faustus, Tormentor and so on and replace them with members of the Wu-tang clan. The game was released as Wu-Tang: Shaolin Style. [Which just happened to be even shittier! Especially if you played it with the aweful Wu-tang controller.]

Hah, I just learned some new stuff about Thrill Kill.

Aaron Celta, one of Thrill Kill's programmers, said in a Chatterbox Video Game Radio interview that:

- Thrill Kill was in development for four years. During the first half of its development, it was a two-on-two Mayan basketball game.

- He and the development team learned about the game's cancellation through a news posting in IGN.com.

- Even though the game was completed, Electronic Arts did not pay Paradox their final milestone payments, letting them keep the development hardware instead.

@d1sergo:

Not only that, but they painted a bikini on the texture of the main female character, so that when you see her in the shower, she's covered up like a good decent American.

Fuck you, ESRB. Fuck you with a ten foot long, spikey dildo.

@ryoshi: Rated AO for strong sexual violence.

I knew I've been missing out. Where's my credit card?

doesn't walmart also refuse to sell CD's with parental advisory stickers? As far as I know that is still their policy and music companies have to release edited versions in order to get them on the shelves there.

When I did the testing gig at EA they were very adamant that no discussions of Thrill Kill were allowed.

I gotta get these.

Um, GTA San Andreas was rated M......whys it on the list?

@aphexacid: It was rerated after the Hot Coffee scandal.

And apart from it, and maybe one or two others, every game on that list is pretty shit. So, if I had to draw conclusions, this rating should be called "Shit Game Alert" instead of "Adults Only".

Considering quite a few of these games have come out in australia (inc. the playboy mansion one), it should/might/probably/pretty please mean that Manhunt 2 will come out here as well...
...unless the previously mentioned games were censored when released in australia...

stop with the "AO = NC-17" crap, NC-17 movies have sex, sex, and more sex, that's the millions of titles you don't see at walmart. This game was rated AO becuase of the violence, which is a whole different issue. There should be a seperate AO rating, because I don't want Manhunt 2 in the same catergory as "All Nude Nikki"

@SanityMask: Yeah, it was freaking brilliant, even in the censored-down american release. Compelling storytelling, great voice acting, playable action sequences (more like Monkey Island's action sequences than Leisure Suit Larry's) and gorgeous ambiance throughout.

Why isn't 3D Rape Machine [www.penny-arcade.com] on the list?

How is it that a game can be rated AO just for having gambling in it. Aren't there other games that have gambling (or are focused around it) that ARENT AO? Someone care to clear this up for me?

The joy of sex?? well i find the title very clever =D lol

Weird...you'd think Custer's Revenge would have made the list.

i'm surprised there aren't more games on here. just about every fps should be on that list. the entire game is about violence. the fallout series, 'nuff said.

Gigertron - is 3D Rape Machine based on Battle Raper 2?

@Slashlen: But where's Xchange 2 and 3? Did PP stop submitting them?

They must have. Kind of a waste for them to submit their games. The world survived the release of Kana ~ Little Sister, I guess no parents unwittingly purchased it for little Timmy :D

So wait a minute, GTA:SA WITH hot coffee = M rating

Its discovered, and taken OUT of the game, and its then given an AO rating?

I'm missing the logic on that one

@aphexacid:
You got it backwords. Hot Coffee version was rated AO. Since it was formally released, it's on the list.

It got pulled and then released with a few other goodies (Sunday Driver or something) and with Hot Coffee data removed, getting an M rating.

Also, I've played Tokimeki Check in and X-Change. They SO don't deserve the AO rating. There's very little violence in them!

(That's sarcasm, people.)