Are video games really all sex and violence? Not according to the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB). It recently released its ratings numbers for 2007 and revealed that only 6% of titles received a Mature rating.

In fact, games in general got very acceptable ratings with 74% receiving an Everyone rating of some form. Another 20% of titles received the Teen rating. So, what does all of this mean to gamers?

For one, it means that mature games simply aren’t being made, despite the aging of the gaming audience. Whether this is due to fear of social backlash or limiting a game’s potential market is debatable. Still, this is hardly the future of games many pictured fifteen years ago after the success of Mortal Kombat and Doom.

At the same time, it is important to note that the Wii might help to skew these numbers slightly. Its mini-game collection heavy lineup certainly skews toward the low end of the rating side. For every Manhunt 2 there’s a million Carnival Games. In that way, the Wii might be what helps to save the image of gaming. While there is certainly desire and need within the medium for Halo 3 and Bioshock, there is also need for mass appeal titles to bring in new players. In the same way that the film business still needs PG films to bring in audiences and make them fans of film long before it can graduate them onto the more mature fare.

All of this would seem to point to something more insidious to some. As noted, gamers haven’t gotten older in general but the ratings remain heavy on the young side. For all those who crowed for some type of ratings system, it appears it has done exactly what they hoped. In the short term, at least, the maturation of video games has been stemmed.

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