That Byron Rappor…

Ok, so chances are if you live in the UK you’ll be familiar with the Byron report – Gordybrown heard about these ‘games’, and decided that the only course of action was to hire an expert to have a poke about and see if: games make kids evil/ the internet will rape you/ Those prosecuted by the RSPCA consistently own a copy of Viva Pinata.

Of course, in the British government’s big book of words the term ‘expert’ is unsurprisingly translated into ‘reasonably attractive celebrity psychologist’ – which is most likely why the gaming community have responded by smugly smiling knowingly at each other and poking holes at the whole affair.

At the end of the day though, for someone who clearly doesn’t really know what she’s on about she hasn’t done too bad a job… Your average punter really does get confused by the doubled up BBFC and PEGI ratings on the boxes. While they’ve still got a way to go before they’re going to earn any kudos from gamers themselves, having one clear message about suitability is by all accounts a good thing.

Watching or playing violent media doesn’t turn people into evil killing machines, but it’s hard to argue that weird stories that pop up from time to time would’ve never seen the light of day if parents actually spent some time keeping an eye on what their kids are immersing themselves into… I mean seriously, ideas like this don’t just come from nowhere…

So what do you think about the report? Isn’t the artwork awesome?