The justices agreed on Monday to rule on whether the government should ban the sale of violent games to minors and fine stores $1,000 each time they fail to comply. At issue is a California law, passed in 2005 but struck down by lower courts, that defines violent games as works that depict "killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being," in a way that's offensive, appeals to morbid interests, and otherwise lacks artistic merit.
Supreme Court Will Take on Violent Video Games, Finally - PCWorld
I love the idea of not turning kids into serial killers but an even more important development is in the target audience. I use to play lots of games but for some reason the lack of skills required makes most games unfunny. (I'm looking at you wow addicts) By restricting access to adults the games may have more demanding ingredients and actually require frontal lobe activity rather than the industrial standard of lizard niveau brain activity aka single click kill, defend, obtain. Starcraft 2 does look challenging, of course this is yet another war simulator but at least the gamer gets to develop his brainz.