The Entertainment Software Association has commended the efforts of Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo to bring parental controls to their next generation games consoles. The Association, which is in place to campaign for the protection of publishers, developers and retailers, has long been embroiled in battles to control access to violent video games from minors, including recently succeeding in obtaining a preliminary block on the Michigan violent videogames bill. It has emerged that all three next-generation consoles will ship with in-built parental controls, which the ESA sees as putting the power into the hands of parents, not governments, or retailers, or anyone else (like Microsoft...)
"The combination of these new controls, the existing ESRB rating system, and voluntary commitments by retailers not to sell Mature and Adult Only games to minors strikes the right balance between strong self-regulation and the ultimate responsibility of parents to take charge of the media their kids consume."