Videogame Rating Council: Difference between revisions

The '''Videogame Rating Council''' ('''VRC''') was introduced by [[Sega of America]] in [[1993]] to rate all [[video games]] that were released for sale in the [[United States of America]] on the [[Sega Genesis]], [[Sega Game Gear]], and [[Sega CD]] and rarely, some computer games. The rating had to clearly appear on the front of the box and on all the advertisements for the video game. The three different ratings were as follows:

The first company to take advantage of Sega's moral liberal polices was the company [[Razor Soft]]. In 1990 they released the 1988 computer game ''[[Techno cop]]'' for the Sega Genesis. In the game you played a cop waging a one-man war against crime. Bits of what was intended to be red blood would come out when you shot criminals and civilians (some of which were children). The game had limited commercial success, but Razor Soft would continue use mature themes in video games.

In 1991 they released a second computer game called ''[[Stormlord]]'' for the Sega Genesis. In the game you played a knight out on a quest to rescue female fairies who were imprisoned by an evil queen. In the computer version the fairies were nude, but Sega forced Razor Soft to give the fairies clothing when the game was released for the Sega Genesis. Like the game ''Technocop'', ''Stormlord'' had limited commercial success and the implied nudity was panned as a cheap gimmick to cover up mediocre games.

That same year [[Tengen (company)|Tengen]] released the popular arcade game ''[[Pit Fighter]]'' for the Sega Genesis. The fighting game's characters were created by digital filming. The character looked realistic and the game was a preview of what [[Midway Games]] would perfect with its ''Mortal Kombat'' arcade game. ''Pit Fighter'' had limited success because while it fighting looked more realistic than anyone had ever seen before on the Genesis, the animation was choppy and control did not provide you with many fighting moves. [[Activision]] would try and create a popular fighting game when it released ''[[Mondu's Fight Palace]]'' for the Sega Genesis. ''Mondu's Fight Palace'' created characters through the traditional means of animation, but the game's alien characters had a certain subtle mature allure. One of the characters was a female punk that would attack with her mohawk hair.

These games represented a small trickle of pre-VRC. games for the Sega Genesis. Most games were suitable for all audiences and most of these more mature games had limited commercial success because the blood or partial nudity was treated as a gimmick. Yet, two Sega Genesis games in 1992 created a national debate over the content of video and compelled Sega to develop the Videogame Rating Council.

In [[1993]] [[Konami]] released the popular arcade game ''Lethal Enforcers'' for the Sega Genesis and Sega CD. In the first person game you shot at digitally created images of criminals. The game worked with an optional, blue toy gun that you could buy and shot at the game's criminals with, as opposed to simply using the regular controller. Lethal Enforcers was part of a series of first person shooting games that came out for the Sega Genesis and Sega CD in the early 1990's.

The major difference in each game was the setting and the introduction of games on a [[compact disc]] (CD). A CD could store much more memory then a cartridge and thus replaced the digitally created characters with streaming, full motion video. In 1993 [[American Laser Games]] brought ''[[Mad Dog McCree]]'' to the Sega systems set in the world of the Old West. In 1994 ''[[Who Shot Johnny Rock?]]'' changed the setting to the era of 1920's American gangsters, while ''[[Drug Wars]]'' was set in the contemporary environment of our [[Drug Enforcement Agency]]'s [[War on Drugs]].

Games such as ''Lethal Enforcers'' restricted game play to shooting digitally created criminals, zombies and aliens. Yet, in 1992 [[Digital Pictures]] would release a second type of full-motion video game based on voyeurism.

The premise of ''[[Night Trap]]'' was borrowed from [[slasher film]]s. Sometime in the 1980's, a group of attractive, college co-eds drive up to a lakehouse for a weekend slumber party only to find out that their friendly hosts -- the Martin family -- are Yuppie Vampires and that house is invaded by the "Augers." Your mission is to watch the events going on in the rooms, the low budget special effects and vampire violence to trap the Augers, save the college girls and their kid brother. The game has a timer running and you must figure out when you have to switch the cameras to trap an Auger, save one of your special forces soldiers -- including Kelli ([[Dana Plato]])-- or listen to when the Martin family decided to change the security code. Once you memorized what camera you needed to view at what time, the game became a simple mad rush to switch between cameras leaving little time to watch the story unfold. Needless to say ''Night Trap'' has not aged well as full motion video games quickly became an "interactive" fad that died quickly.

Yet, in 1992 ''Night Trap'''s extensive full motion video was groundbreaking and while the game's content was within the boundary of a [[PG-13]] rating, the fact that it had scenes with red liquid in jars and another scene with a female in a nightgown hinted at what full motion video could do in the future. Sega gave ''Night Trap'' a MA-17 label and the video game industry soon forgot about full motion video games because consumers grew weary of playing games that were either a format of a first person perspective shooting game or a format of switching between cameras in a house or hotel.  

Sega phased out the Videogame Rating Council in 1994 when the entire American video game industry agreed to follow the independent [[Entertainment Software Rating Board]]. The old Sega ratings can still be found on video games and advertisements that appeared from 1993 - 1994.

However, Sega of America never explained the qualifications for a game getting a particular rating and thus there seemed to be inconsistancies. For example, the Sega CD editions of two computer games; ''Rise of the Dragon'' and ''[[Snatcher]]'' both got the MA-17 label and it was assumed that it was because of the violence, profanity, and sexual innuendos that existed, but Sega never explained. Another example, would be the fact that the Sega Genesis version of ''Mortal Kombat'' was given a MA-13 label, while the Sega CD version of the game was given a MA-17 label, with the only major content difference between the two games was that you needed to enter in a secret code in order for all the blood and graphic violence to be seen in the Sega Genesis edition. In the Sega CD edition you had to enter in a secret code which would actually tone down the blood and graphic violence.