Like most of you I love Gears of War and am anxiously awaiting its sequel with dreams of Marcus and the team chain sawing their merry way through hordes of locusts. So it is with little surprise that a certain news item caught my eye this afternoon. “Gears 2 given violence filter” brings back horrible memories of green goo spouting out of Liu Kang as Scorpions spear plunges into his chest on the SNES. Upon further investigation its not quite as bad as I thought it could be.

In an effort to make the M-rated game more child friendly the developers have included a setting where you can turn the blood effects into sparks, as well as, clean up Marcus’ eternally foul language. While I will definitely not use this feature, its nice to know its there… you know… for the kids.