Former 1Up Editor John Davison has moved onto a start-up company (that he started up) called What They Like, which is set up to give parents an idea of what their kids are engrossed in across a variety of entertainment mediums. Their first project, What They Play is centric on video games and showing off the themes and content of everything from Ben 10 to Gears of War. It’s an excellent bridge for non-gamer parents to better understand what their children may be into, without the sensationalism attached to a lot of major news broadcasters.

One of the benefits of reaching out to parents is the fact that it also lets gamers get a better understanding of what they think about the gaming industry, and just how important knowing what they play really is. The polls that have been released on the site starting in April this year have been a popular topic of discussion among many gaming blogs and news sites. Their first poll demonstrated that parents felt that sex and two men kissing was more objectionable in a game than a graphically severed head or swearing. However, it seems the results of their latest poll demonstrates that parents feel that drinking alcohol and watching pornography worry parents less than the fact that they could play GTA IV at a sleepover.

There is a bit of insight offered on their staff blog about the results of this poll, and they do reveal a few concerns. There is still a major gap and a fear that most parents have with the unknown about games and the general things that are portrayed in most media outlets. Although smoking marijuana was a much higher concern (no pun intended) for parents, as it took almost 50% of the results. However, considering how worrisome some parents become over the subject of alcohol and pornographic material, it says a lot about the fear that the GTA series seem to bring along with it, and gaming in general.

GTA IV continues to grab a lot of major press even though the game might not be on as heavy rotation as the first month of release for most gamers. Having just recently been put at the top of Thailand’s 10 most dangerous games list following a murder in which the murderer citing the game as his inspiration, it seems that the sentiment “GTA made me do it.” is becoming a better way to tow the party line in law. With another criminal saying that he learned to make Molotov cocktails from the series (a recipe that has yet to be found in the game so far) in the United States after being caught for the arson spree. The results of the poll seem to indicate that this kind of message is making its way to parents, and without a little bit of balance it would scare anyone.

There is a generational gap when it comes to video games. Most parents don’t follow the popular culture of their child’s generation with much more than concerned interest, so the rise of the gaming culture among the increasingly young, and the fact that this generation of gaming has brought us much closer to photo realism than has ever been achieved in a VR space makes parents all the more nervous. It’s a budding industry which has mass appeal and very strong marketing geared towards the fun, the experience and visual displays, all things which most entertainment consuming youths would tumble over themselves for. As long as games continue to push the level of acceptability in terms of the social norms for their content, they will grab this sort of criticism and fear. Whilst comparisons to movies and books may be valid, those industries have had their time to absorb into a mainstream culture over multiple generations and also offer a different experience to that of games.

Not debating the concept of violence in games and its casualty in terms of real world scenarios, this is an issue that needs websites like What They Play to help parents understand more about the games. We’d all like to encourage parents to spend more time with the games and pay attention to the ratings, but it is a daunting task for most parents, akin to asking them to read the ratings and summaries for every show on television. Kids are mostly going to be on a faster pace than gaming-unaware parents, and it’s important to give them channels for education rather than just relying on the rating system for a medium that stretches a bit past the Es, Ts and Ms.