Every so often, there's a debate about adult content in video games. A few years ago, the mild sex scene from Mass Effect was exaggerated in the media; a few years before that, the sex, violence, and general depravity in Grand Theft Auto games had everyone talking; and all the way back in the early 1990s, my parents refused to let me play Mortal Kombat. Now, there's the Bulletstorm furor, and there's even a pending Supreme Court case about whether a state can ban the sale of violent games to minors without infringing on the First Amendment. It seems likely the ban will be struck down, given the way the justices interrogated the lawyers who defended it.

To be clear, I believe that videogame developers have a constitutional right to tell violent stories, I think the ESRB ratings system is an adequate tool for parents who want to police their kids' videogame use, and I'm not at all convinced that violent videogames make children antisocial. Some studies do show that kids who play violent videogames tend to act out more, but it's impossible to tell whether videogames actually cause kids to become violent, or whether kids who already have violent tendencies gravitate toward violent videogames.

That said, is there too much gore in some games? Yes, there is, and some developers should tone it down -- not because they don't have the right to make their games as bloody as they want, but because they should have more respect for their audience.

There are three reasons a developer might choose to make a game bloody. The first is to enhance realism, the second is to explore over-the-top violence in an artistic way (much as Quentin Tarantino does in his films), and the third is simply to appeal to the base instincts of gamers. It's debatable which games fall into which categories, but developers should try to stay away from the third one, or at least the more extreme examples of it.

For an example of realism in games, look at the Call of Duty series. To be sure, the combat as a whole isn't realistic; in a real firefight, health doesn't regenerate, there are no checkpoints, grenades don't warn you before exploding, and it's rare for a single person to gun down hundreds of enemies without dying himself. But the violence is certainly true to life in some ways, with gunshots that ring out from everywhere, cries of pain from dying enemies, and animations that faithfully recreate the human suffering of war. Would I tone down Call of Duty if I could? Absolutely not.

For a Tarantino-esque representation of violence, look to No More Heroes. The game is well-designed visually, and it's set in the world of a man who's obsessed with comic books. Yes, cartoonish amounts of blood erupt when you slice through an enemy with your Light Saber, but it's clear that this is a representation of an imaginary world. If anything, the over-the-top antics satirize comic books' obsession with violence.

Other games, however, depict graphic violence simply because the developers think their fans relish blood and gore. This calculation isn't entirely off base; even I get a kick out brutally murdering one digital monster after another. But at some point, blood becomes the game's primary selling point -- and at that point, I start to feel insulted as a gamer.

The best example of this I can remember was Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad, which I reviewed for CCC in 2009. The game places you in control of one of two half-naked girls, and has you slaughter countless zombies, none of which require much strategy to kill, but all of which gush fountains of gore whenever your sword touches them. From the very first minutes of gameplay, it's clear that the goal of this title is to titillate, not to inform or even to entertain.

Which brings us to Bulletstorm, the latest game to earn criticism for its violent content. I'm a huge fan of the game's designer, Cliff Bleszinski, especially his work on Gears of War and Shadow Complex. So, I trust that Bulletstorm's ridiculous blood-and-guts ethic won't be the only thing it has going for it. As I explained in my preview of Bulletstorm, I'm expecting great graphics, fun gameplay, and a certain artfulness to the more crass elements.

But the crass elements are really, really crass. The ESRB's summary of the game speaks volumes:

"Injured enemies emit large sprays of blood that stain the ground and surrounding walls. Specialty kills (i.e., Skillshots) represent the most intense instances of violence: enemies can be dismembered with explosives; impaled on spikes; and drilled into walls, resulting in body parts breaking into pieces. During the course of the game, players can consume alcohol and kill enemies in order to receive an Intoxicated Skillshot; the screen turns blurry during these sequences. The dialogue contains numerous jokes and comments that reference sexual acts, venereal diseases, and having sex with one's mother (e.g., "Guess I know where the ol' gal got that limp."). The names of some Skillshots are infused with sexual innuendo (e.g., Gag Reflex, Rear Entry, Drilldo, Mile High Club); one Skillshot (i.e., Fire in the Hole) allows players to shoot at enemies' exposed buttocks. Language such as "f**k," "sh*t," "p*ssy," and "c*ck" can be heard in dialogue."

It's quite a stretch to call these aspects of the game "artistic"; rather, they're an attempt to capitalize on the fact that the average young male's mind is a cesspool. (I should know.)

Will this desensitize some kid to violence and cause him to go on a shooting spree, screaming sexual slurs the whole time? Almost certainly not. But neither will it teach him anything about art, killing, or war. It is, in other words, violence for the sake of violence, a completely valueless exercise in plumbing the depths of the human psyche.

Again, videogame designers have no obligation to rise above their fans' baser instincts. In fact, they have a right to make whatever games they want, and I wouldn't take away that right even if I could. But we also have the right, as fans, to demand more from our entertainment than some developers have been giving us.

By Robert VerBruggen
CCC Freelance Writer

*The views expressed within this article are solely the opinion of the author and do not express the views held by Cheat Code Central.*