Thoughts on "Truth in Video Game Rating Act"
Back from Peru, and digging out through a ton of email. You don't want to know how much, but I'll give you a hint and say it was in the middle four digits. 
Yep, all in two weeks.
Anyway, saw a post on Evil Avatar linking to Game Politics. It discusses a proposal from Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS) to improve the ESRB rating system. In particular, the concept is that reviewers would have to play through the entire game before assigning a rating. To quote:
Brownback’s Truth in Video Game Rating Act (S.3935) would appear to be the Senate version of a House bill of the same name proposed by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL).
“The current video game ratings system needs improvement,” Brownback said, “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.”
Brownback’s measure would mandate the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to administer the requirement for a complete play-through before rating.
“Game reviewers must have access to the entire game for their ratings to accurately reflect a game’s content,” Brownback added.
I actually think this is a good step in the right direction. There's certainly value to reviewers having experienced the entire game and not having to depend on selected (and potentially targeted) assets to make their decision. I've actually believed for a while that government regulation of the game rating system is coming and could actually be beneficial. Unfortunately, it also appears that the current proposed bill has the usual "don't get the games industry" flaws that would need to be addressed.
(I should say that this isn't a ding against Mr. Brownback - I actually think he's on the right track here. It's more a comment on the fact that the current generation of politicians didn't grow up with games and just don't get them - in many ways, video games are seen as the new Rock & Roll, corrupting American youth and contributing to the general downfall of society. This is self-correcting as "our generation" gets older and becomes those same politicians... in the meanwhile, we just need to help educate them. Kudos to John Stewart for helping fight that battle!)
It's worth stating that we don't have the complete text of the bill yet - so keep that in mind as you read the possible holes I see.
The first is simply that a video game isn't necessarily the same, linear experience as a movie. As such, it's just not reasonable to expect an MMO or even a huge RPG such as Oblivion to be completely played through (ie, all content experienced) before being given a rating. This is just a simple reality, and the bill's text will obviously need to take this into account. My hope is that this is sufficiently obvious such that it's already being considered - but we shall see.
The second is that it appears the bill doesn't understand the difference between content available to players in game vs. "debug" content that may never be accessible in any way to a player other than via game modification devices. There's nothing wrong with having a "nude" avatar model in the game engine if the game always clothes that avatar before displaying it. Users (and reviewers) would never see the corrupt evil that is nudity (note sarcasm), and the world would continue to turn. However, it appears the bill doesn't understand that it's possible for "hackers" (call them what you will) to do all sorts of things to game code once it's outside the hands of the developer and publisher. That's a huge gaping hole that needs to be addressed.
I look forward to seeing the final bill text - here's hoping it goes in the right direction! If not, I'm sure the Daily Show will have a blast with it. 