The U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments Tuesday about the federal court’s decision to throw out California’s ban on violent games, marking the first time a case involving the interactive medium itself has gone before the Supreme Court, reports the Associated Press. It’s another sign that the $20 billion-a-year industry, long considered to be just child’s play, is now all grown up.
California’s measure would have regulated games more like pornography than movies, prohibiting the sale or rental of games that give players the option of “killing, maiming, dismembering, or sexually assaulting an image of a human being” to anyone under the age of 18. Only retailers would be punished with fines of up to $1,000 for each infraction. The federal court said the law violated minors’ constitutional rights under the First and Fourteenth amendments and the state lacked enough evidence to prove violent games cause physical and psychological harm to minors. Courts in six other states, including Michigan and Illinois, have reached similar conclusions, striking down parallel violent game bans. Under California’s law, only adults would be able to purchase games like “Postal 2,” the first-person shooter by developer Running With Scissors that features the ability to light unarmed bystanders on fire, and “Grand Theft Auto IV,” the popular third-person shoot-’em-up from Rockstar Games that allows gamers to portray carjacking, gun-toting gangsters…