Game developer Rockstar has placed the blame for young children playing some of its more violent games squarely on the shoulders of parents, who it claims should be more wary of what their children are playing.

Rockstar has had no trouble with controversy in the past...

Rockstar has long been the centre of controversy, with practically every release from the company drawing the media’s eye in one way or another. Indeed, since the Hot Coffee scandal that hit shortly after the launch of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, and not too long afterwards the decision not to release Manhunt 2, largely because of the sheer wanton violence of the content. Now though, it seems that Rockstar might be getting a little sick and tired of the controversy, with the negative response to its latest release, Red Dead Redemption, seeing the company shift responsibility to parents.

In an interview with the BBC’s Newsbeat, Rockstar’s Lazlow Jones, perhaps best known for voicing the GTA series’ radio-based Lazlow, responded when asked, “How do you feel about accusations that games such as yours are responsible for more violence among young people?” to say that,

“Our games are not designed for young people. If you’re a parent and buy one of our games for your child, you’re a terrible parent. We design games for adults because we’re adults. There’s a lot of kids games out there that we’re not interested in playing. Just like you enjoy watching movies and TV shows iwht adult themes and language and violence that’s the kind of thing we seek to produce.”

While the sentiment is one that’s been there on Rockstar’s side for quite some time, it’s still hard to shake the feeling that it’s strange to see Rockstar staff referring to anyone as a “terrible parent.”

Still, if it manages to stave off further outcry against its content, perhaps it will have been worthwhile for Rockstar. Regardless, it’s a lot better than the news from last week that Rockstar had been selling cracked copies of its own games over digital distribution service, Steam.