Why an 18 rating?

[Semaj]

I have played this game for over several hours and assumed it would be a 16+ rated game...
...but I was wrong!

Most of the blood is black and fades away very quickly, and the head decapitations are not very brutal compared to many 16+ rated titles.

It strikes me as odd that the game is targeted at adults but is far less violent than expected.

It does not affect the gameplay (I like this game a lot) but compared to games like GTAIV, Assassins Creed Black Flag, Metal Gear etc it is really tame :/

[BurningTofu]

Just google ESRB. They list the criteria for why it is rated for 18. Whether it is tame or not, that is a subjected perspective. What it is established is the guideline by ESRB.

[permeus]

in the opening CG of the game you see a woman get her throat cut while we as gamers may not be to squeamish about this the old men putting the ratings on games and films find stuff like this horrifying.

[Semaj]

Originally posted by BurningTofu:

Just google ESRB. They list the criteria for why it is rated for 18. Whether it is tame or not, that is a subjected perspective. What it is established is the guideline by ESRB.

Based on what they said it feels like they gave it an 18 rating just to attrat a mature audiance.

As I said, most of the blood is actually black, you don't actually kill humans, only orcs etc...

An odd one, compared to most of the 18 rated games via ESRB the game is quite tame, should be a 16+ in my opinion.

The intro is not even that bad, the Witcher 2 for example is an 18 rated RPG game with somewhat similar combat, but much more brutal, bloody and the entire game is way more explicit :/

It feels like games these days slap on an 18+ just to make it look edgy.