As I was playing my way into Fear 2 on the Xbox 360 recently, I noticed that the game was filled with profanity and it got me to thinking about how times have changed. A mere forty-some years ago, Alfred Hitckcock could scare the manure out of everyone without a single coarse word ever being uttered.

These days, profanity is everywhere. And it works as a real appetite suppressant against any types of games that use it, personally. I like scary games, for example, and love to be creeped out; but I don’t need to hear, or want to hear, some character hollering G——n every couple minutes.

The problem is, this profusion of profanity is not popping up as a suspense-builder these days, so much as a crutch for developers who can’t seem to scare anyone without the coarse language. What I wouldn’t give to see an Alfred Hitchcock of videogames come along and scare people without relying on the “easy intensity” of rough language.