Over at the Law of the Game, attorney Mark Methenitis dishes on the ESRB process.

Specifically, Methinitis expresses surprise that games aren’t played through before a rating is assigned:

Game publishers send in a DVD of selected scenes and a lot of paperwork to get the game rated… The point being that the ratings board never plays the games. Yes, you read that right. The people who rate video games do not play the game they are rating. It would be the equivalent of basing movie ratings on a form and a trailer. Context would be wholly absent.

This debate surfaces periodically. It’s even made its way to floor of the U.S. Senate, where presidential hopeful Sam Brownback (R-KS) has introduced the Truth in Video Game Ratings Act. More from Methinitis:

I can see the logic the ESRB is using. First, playing the games would require a release candidate, which could delay the process. Second, it would take their “trained reviewers” much longer to play through the games in full… Third, and finally, it’s entirely possible that some… of the reviewers may not be able to complete the games at all…

On the other hand, I get the impression that ratings for media content are more accurate when the reviewer takes the content in context and on the whole, rather than seeing mere snippets. Perhaps the better approach is to have the ESRB hire “designated gamers,” and have the reviewers watch the game being played for some period of time…