Extremetech.com runs through the known features of Windows next OS, and looks at Microsoft's emphasis on games this time around.As they sat down to design the new OS, the company looked at exactly what people spend most of their time doing on Windows PC's. As it turned out, 35.5% is spent browsing the Web and surprisingly, the number two activity at 18% is gaming.
So in Vista, Games will get its own listing alongside Computer, Pictures, Music and Documents in the Start menu.
Clicking it opens the new Games Explorer, which will act much like Windows Media Player by displaying the box art for your installed games, as well as data like publisher, title and ESRB rating:
The Games Explorer is also where you'll go to set parental controls for games. You can limit each user account to only playing games with a certain ESRB rating, but you can get a lot more granular if you wish. You may want to let your child play games with brief nudity, but not realistic blood and gore, for instance. There's a long list of descriptors that fit in with the ESRB content descriptors that accompany the ratings. When a game is locked out, you won't get any information other than its title, and even the box art is hidden.
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