Following the revelation of Manhunt 2‘s AO rating from the ESRB, Kotaku contacted Rockstar for comment. It seems that the rating wasn’t what they were expecting either.
“This is completely unexpected to the whole team. We love the horror genre. We thought we could do something interesting and entertaining with it in the video game medium. When we had this first Manhunt game, there wasn’t this reaction. We thought [Manhunt 2] was consistent with a mature rating.”
The rating can still be changed if Rockstar chooses to appeal the decision, or to alter the game’s content to fit better in line with Mature-rating guidelines. Rockstar isn’t sure what it will do yet, as the spokesman responded to Kotaku about altering the game content by saying, “We have to explore all of the options. I think it’s too early to go into all of that right now.”
