national-institute-on-media-and-the-family posts

One of the most critical voices of the game industry, particularly of how games handle violent content, is closing its doors. The non-profit National Institute On Media and The Family has announced that due to lack of funding it will officially shut down by the end of the year.

Formed in the mid-1990s by psychologist Dr. David Walsh, the group was best known for its Video Game Report Card which it issued every year with backing from US lawmakers. The report card always gave failing grades to games which had lots of violent or adult content, even games that had gotten rave reviews from game critics. According to WCOO's web site, Dr Walsh stated that despite his group's shut down he feels that it had a positive effect on keeping certain games away from children. He states, "The fact that the retailers will no longer sell video games, adult video games to little kids, is something we take a great deal of pride in."

The National Institute on Media and the Family has attacked the game industry for years and has also issued their annual "report card" on both the industry and specific games. In the past they have generated a lot of publicity for their report card by holding press conferences in Washington DC with various national lawmakers also taking part.

However, the game industry has taken huge steps in the last few years to police itself through both its ESRB ratings system and enforcement of those ratings in retail stores. So this year's report card by the NIMF is very low key with just a media announcement and no press conference or senators around. Indeed, the actual report card on the industry has the industry getting almost straight "A"s (they got a B+ for ratings enforcement). So the organization is now focusing on getting parents involved in making sure they know what games their kids are playing.

The NIMF has also issued a list of games children should avoid playing. All of these games are rated "M" for Mature so the industry has already done its job in labeling them as not appropriate for kids. They include games released for the PC platform like Fallout 3, Left 4 Dead, Dead Space, Far Cry 2, Silent Hill Homecoming and Legendary (another game, Saints Row 2, is due for release on the PC this January).