I’ve discussed my distaste for government intervention with the video game industry before. I can’t say I’m surprised, with elections coming up, that there’s a bill proposed to force the ESRB to play the games they rate all the way through:

Both pieces aim for the same objective : forcing third-party agencies (like the ESRB) to fully complete a game before a rating score can be awarded.

The bill would give the FTC full powers to levy the requirement on any ratings agency, and issue penalties if compliance is not forthcoming.

“The current video game ratings system needs improvement,” says Senator Brownback “because reviewers do not see the full content of games and don’t even play the games they are supposed to rate. For video game ratings to be meaningful and worthy of a parent’s trust, the game ratings must be more objective and accurate.”

There are two distinct ways of looking at this legislation, and neither of them are good. It’s altogether possible that the bill’s drafters simply don’t understand that modern video games aren’t like movies; it’s next-to-impossible for one person to see the entire game, especially in the case of more open-ended games like Oblivion or Saint’s Row (though it’s very easy, upon playing both games, to see that they’re not really for little kids).

The other possibility is the one that’s seen in Penny Arcade’s comic for October 2nd. By setting standards that sound reasonable to non-gamers (especially to non-gaming parents who would prefer to put all parental responsibility on the heads of a third party (the ESRB) rather than actually, you know, parenting), but which are actually impossible standards to meet, this could very easily be a play to make big government just a little bit bigger and more intrusive.

Either way, it’s clear that this bill, as it’s currently understood, is completely unworkable.