A federal appeals court panel has struck down a law that restricted children's access to violent video games, giving the software the same free-speech protection as that for works of art.

A panel of the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Tuesday that a St. Louis County, Mo., ordinance that bans the rentals or sales of graphically violent video games to minors violates free-speech rights. In doing so, the panel reversed a ruling by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and ordered the lower court to craft an injunction that would prohibit the ordinance from taking effect.

In Tuesday's ruling, the panel decided that if the paintings of Jackson Pollock, the music of Arnold Schoenberg and the Jabberwocky verse of Lewis Carroll are protected by the First Amendment, then video games should be, too.

"We see no reason why the pictures, graphic design, concept art, sounds, music, stories and narrative present in video games are not entitled to similar protection," the judges wrote. "The mere fact that they appear in a novel medium is of no legal consequence."