The Entertainment Software Rating Board claims that its role is “to increase awareness and use of the rating system so that parents can make informed computer and video game purchase decisions.” But nowhere on their website does it state that they now have to right to bully videogame websites into censoring games that it finds too violent/realistic for the masses.
But this is exactly what the ESRB has done with God of War 3, Sony Computer Entertainment’s upcoming PS3 title from Santa Monica Studios. The footage has been edited with an image that attempts to cover the ‘overly violent’ segments, which are when Kratos yanks out a cyclops’s eyeball and rips off the head of Helios, the Sun God.
What makes this action so embarressing for the ESRB is that Kratos goes on a 6-minute killing spree, yet they only censored these two small segments. And on top of that, couldn’t figure out when and what to censor. At one point, they’re even completely fine with showing Helios’s dead body AND severed head. Check out the screengrabs below to see exactly what they did, or watch the censored developer walkthrough video itself.
[Source]
