Have games gone too far?

Beer Pong, that favorite pastime of college fraternities and illicit high-school parties, won't be appearing on the Nintendo Wii any time soon.

Or, not under that name, anyway. Although a Wii release depicting the popular drinking game was recently awarded a T (for Teen) certificate by the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB), Connecticut attorney general Richard Blumenthal wasn't impressed, calling the decision -- which would allow 13-year-old children to buy the game -- a mistake.

In response, the game's maker, a Las Vegas-based firm called JV Games Ltd., changed the game's name from "Beer Pong" to "Pong Toss" and will eliminate all other references to alcohol. Meanwhile, ESRB president Patricia Vance defended Beer Pong's rating to the Associated Press, saying that alcohol played a minimal role in the game and no one was shown drinking beer.

Another of the year's upcoming releases, Fallout 3, was just denied an age certificate altogether -- effectively banned, in other words -- in Australia. A Mad Max-style sci-fi role-playing game set in a post-apocalyptic representation of the Washington, D.C. area, Fallout 3 is replete with exploding heads, severed limbs, flying eyeballs, and pocket-sized nukes -- although in a tongue-in-cheek style that's not so very different to that featured in lots of horror movies.

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Fallout 3's developer, Bethesda (who game fans will know from their recent hit Elder Scrolls: Oblivion) reportedly plans to re-edit the game for the down-under audience in the hope that Aussie authorities will reconsider. Devoted Fallout fans, of which there are many, are already laying plans to import unadulterated versions of the game from countries like the US.

Although the ESRB has no legal power to ban games in the USA altogether, it can -- and sometimes does -- issue an "Adults Only" rating, which effectively bans games from mainstream retail outlets totally. Manhunt 2, a "murder simulator" from often-controversial developer Rockstar, fell foul of the rating last year, causing the game to be delayed while it was toned down. Although it subsequently received an M (for Mature) rating in the US, it wasn't so lucky in the UK, where after much legal wrangling it was finally released some five months behind schedule, or in Australia, where it remains banned.

Will this new scrutiny on mature content cause game developers to ease off? If the buzz surrounding one of this year's biggest Xbox 360 games, Gears of War 2, is anything to go by, that's far from the truth. Gears' designer, Cliff Bleszinski, caused a storm after a May press conference revealed the original game's chainsaw kills will be souped up -- and include the ability to chop enemies in half.

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