The Parents’ Television Council is most well-known for their mostly humorous TV reviews — come on, Aubree Bowling, you knew Family Guy was sleazy and CSI was gory, so you watched them each at least a second time this season… because you like having what’s left of your tattered innocence further assaulted? — but also rate and review console games.
I think the video-game reviewers do a better job of selecting their review subjects — instead of choosing easy straw men to beat on and going ballistic over the latest Grand Theft Auto installment, they choose games that are more likely to appeal to kids and highlight the games with the least violence.
I never thought I’d be arguing that the PTC didn’t go far enough, but I think they underestimate the graphic detail in Burnout 3 [no direct link, but visit the link above and scroll down or find for Burnout]. They laugh it off as cartoonish, but I think the graphics are more realistic than they give it credit for. Although I can easily enjoy the Road Rage mode with its fetishistic slow-mo closeups on you and your competitors’ shattered glass and shredded metal, the Crash mode, where you drive vehicles into busy traffic consisting of mundane, average-looking passenger and freight vehicles, gives me the creeps.
Although cars [beside your own] rarely explode or show fatal damage to the passenger compartments, I still feel a twinge of guilt when I play it [though I do play it]. I remind myself that this is a lot like crashing my toy cars in the sandbox or on the couch in the family room when I was a kid. Another friend, however, tells me he imagines packed buses, full oil tankers, families in the minivans and the whole nine. I guess that’s how he rolls.
Will this stop me from picking out Burnout Legends for the PSP? Not likely. But I won’t share them with the kids immediately any more than I will get them started with GTA.
0 Responses to “PTC Video Game Reviews”
Leave a Reply