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Games Entertainment

Rating Game Content Here and Abroad 38

Posted by Zonk from the not-good-for-small-eyes dept.
Gamespy has a piece on the game content rating systems across the globe. The article discusses both the actual systems used and the history of the choices made to shape them. From the article: "But the question now is: are these ratings effective? Most gamers would certainly agree that the ratings are accurate, and the majority of retailers do have rules against the sale of mature-rated games to children ... but it's always disheartening to see a mother buying GTA for her 10-year-old saying 'he'll just play it at his friend's house anyway.'"
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Rating Game Content Here and Abroad More

Rating Game Content Here and Abroad

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  • Parental Purchases (Score:5, Informative)

    by StingRay02 ( 640085 ) on Thursday September 22, 2005 @12:30PM (#13622879)
    but it's always disheartening to see a mother buying GTA for her 10-year-old saying 'he'll just play it at his friend's house anyway.

    This idea is really starting to annoy me. Having worked in retail, I rarely had anyone purchase GTA for a minor. A simple phrase like "You do know that this game is rated M for extreme violence and sexual content?" worked just about every time. And the only times parents would buy the game for kids is with the line "We've talked about it, and I think he can handle it." I've never, in 3 years, heard "He'll just play it at a friend's."

    • Re:Parental Purchases (Score:4, Informative)

      by Red Flayer ( 890720 ) on Thursday September 22, 2005 @12:35PM (#13622936) Journal
      "A simple phrase like "You do know that this game is rated M for extreme violence and sexual content?" worked just about every time."

      Did I just hear you discourage someone from spending money in my store?

      You're fired.

      Seriously though, this is the kind of example that people outside the gaming community need to hear -- that individuals at retail establishments are making an effort to prevent kids from buying age-inappropriate content.

      • Re:Parental Purchases (Score:5, Insightful)

        by StingRay02 ( 640085 ) on Thursday September 22, 2005 @12:58PM (#13623136)
        Did I just hear you discourage someone from spending money in my store?

        You're fired.

        While I appreciate the humor, it actually works out in the retailers favor to be up front with them. It makes them more likely to come back to me for their kid's next purchase, since they know they can trust me to be honest with them.

        And to any customer that asks me why I'd not want to make a $50 sale, I just tell 'em I don't want Jack Thompson suing me. They may not know who he is, but they understand lawsuits.

        • I'd have to agree. At the rental store I work at, our managers make an effort to tell us regularly to remind parents of ratings on games and videos. In turn our customers appreciate our feedback and come more often to rent videos and games. Even before the whole GTA: San Andreas incident, we were always telling parents that the game wouldn't be a suitable choice; afterall, if you're a parent renting a game for your child, they definitely aren't ready for it.
          • You're absolutely right, but I was trying (unsuccessfully) to make the point that that is how a lot of people who decide policy, but have no experience with purchasing games, view retailer response to ESRB ratings.

            They do not see that self-policing is in the best interest of the retailers, and so they feel they need to pass laws instead.
            • I saw your point, I just wanted to make it a little clearer, if only for my own benefit. I think, though, that politicians just like to exert their authority and police any behavior that their constituents allow them to police. They may even understand that self-policing is the best choice, but if their voters want regulation, then they get regulation.
              • Well, I don't think the action-reaction is always in that direction: that the voters want some regulation to start with, and the politicians just bow to the will of the masses. It would be nice to live in that kind of an ideal democracy, but, eh, do you really believe that's what's happening?

                See, the good part of democracy is that promising to solve a problem, any problem, is a good way to get elected. Doubly so if it's a major problem. And that's a good thing. It's what, at least theoretically, should keep
                • "The bad part of democracy is also just that: inventing a problem to solve, or blowing a minor one out of proportion, is a damn good way to get elected. "

                  Excactly. The larger negative, in this context, is that the problems that really need solving are sometimes ignored for manufactured crises.

                  Especially when the real problems are difficult ones to solve, or ones without a clear right/wrong answer.
    • I don't know, I've seen it lots of times and I've never even worked as retail.

      There was one occasion where I was at a game store, and some clueless parent was trying to buy GTA3 for her 12 year old because that's the game he asked for. Both me and the guy behind the desk actually spent 5 minutes describing the game and trying to convince her not to get it, but she bought it anyway, explaining that "oh, he knows better"

      So yeah. Ratings are great, but they don't do much against stupid parents.
      • I admit, twelve year olds still get their hands on GTA. In fact, once I saw a ten year old trying to buy Conker's Bad Fur Day. The cashier told the kid he had to have his parent buy it for him. The mother was seething when she came back to get it because she just didn't understand why she had to be the one to buy it. The cashier kept telling her it was because the came had incredibly adult content in it. That mother was the only one I've heard use the line "He plays it at his friend's houses." That wa
    • While you may have not heard of it, I have seen it happen way too often.

      I have a little brother (11), and even though my parents expressly forbid him to play any such games, he goes to a friends house to play them.

      I'm not saying that that's an excuse for bad parenting - which is what buying it for kids in the first place is, but some people do obviously buy it for their kids without knowing what is in it.
      • When I was little, my parents wouldn't let me play any games with blood in them, they wouldn't let me play Magic: the Gathering, and they wouldn't let me play Dungeons & Dragons. I hated their rules, but I still respected them. When I went to friends' houses, I didn't play games that had blood in them, or anything like that.
        If a kid breaks your rules, and you know he does, and you're fine with that, then that's a pretty pathetic relationship you have with your kid.
        Not to dis' your brother or anything, t
    • Hey, when I was ten I went out hunting (on my own) with a REAL gun killing REAL animals and taking them home to eat. I also drove cars and motorbikes on some 'wasteland' near where I lived. I'd take that 'M' rating with a 'liberal' pinch of salt, especially as violent crime seems to be dropping as games sales increase.

    • This idea is really starting to annoy me... I've never, in 3 years, heard "He'll just play it at a friend's."

      Rumors of rampant parental idiocy in our society are drastically overstated. People watch a little too much Jerry Springer or something. Basically when parents can be there, most of us sincerely try.

      (If you want to get at the whole raft of problems people have raising their kids responsibly, try figuring out ways in which to encourage businesses to give their workers "flex time" arrangements. The

  • The same soccer moms that eat every word Jack Thompson's ass spews out are the same ones saying "He'll just play it at a friend's house anyways."
    Seriously, I once saw a 9 year old girl trying to get her mother to buy her GTA when I was buying a game, and I was disgusted.
    The ratings are there for a reason. If the parents ignore the ratings, they should have no right to complain about their child.
    However, if the child finds another way to obtain the game, the seller should be the one under fire, not the produ

  • Please. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by trekstar25 ( 727712 ) on Thursday September 22, 2005 @12:55PM (#13623107) Homepage
    but it's always disheartening to see a mother buying GTA for her 10-year-old saying 'he'll just play it at his friend's house anyway.

    You know what? That's not the game industry's problem. The ESRB does an excellent job of telling consumers what to expect from a game. If kids are still playing these games, it's the parents' fault. And TFA agrees:

    It seems like no matter how many warnings you slap on the box, there will always be some parents willing to ignore them in order to appease their pleading youngsters. From that point on, the responsibility should lie solely with the parents who purchased the product -- and no amount of legislation upon the game industry can solve the social problem of poor parenting.
  • I recently went into a shop to purchase Knights of Honor and was absolutely disgusted to see a mother purchasing her son (around 7-8) 25 to Life. The employee informed her that it contained mature content and her response was, "So?". It's things like this that make me want to hold parents responsible when their child misbehaves. As much a child whining and screaming in public annoying me, I blame the parents for not doing anything about it. ShadowsHawk
  • ... but it's always disheartening to see a mother buying GTA for her 10-year-old saying 'he'll just play it at his friend's house anyway.

    It may be disheartening (for you), but that's the parents' perogative. If they want to buy it for their kids, at least they are making a choice in how to raise their children instead of requiring legislation to do it for them.

    For the record, I don't necessarily advocate buying "M" games for children, but it shouldn't be anyone's choice except the parents. That's why a rat
    • You believe only parents should be allowed to decide if M-rated content is suitable for their children, but also believe that enforcement of age limits is wrong. So... Just how bad is the teenage parenthood problem now? Wouldn't enforcing the age restriction keep the decision in the hands of parents by preventing the underage child from making the purchasing decision? Okay, so it's a bit of a nuisance for Timmy's mother when he wants to buy GTA and she still has to go and buy it for him even though she does
      • Correct. Kids ought to be able to buy what games they want, and ultimately this places the responsibility to "police" the children in the hands of the parents. And besides, kids want things more and think they're far cooler when they have them (and emulate them?) the more they are forbidden to have them (at least I know that's how I was/am). I'm glad you mentioned "that violent media doesn't necessarily beget violent children," because people who think kids + violent media = violent kids are infuriatingly i
    • I beleive in the rating system that is in place, though I do think it should not be necessary. Why can we not spend a little more time educating people and in general being better people to each other. Violence in games, in the US specifically, is out of hand, but only because we are a violent culture and we eat it up. I wish I had a solution that didn't include legislation, but beyond me being able to legally beat the piss out of stupid parents, I can't really think of a decent solution. I feel for the

  • LAAAZYYY! (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    "'he'll just play it at his friend's house anyway.'"

    How hard is it so tell the kid he is forbidden to play it, and to call and talk to that other mother? Freaking make a 5 minute phone call. Tell other parents about the game, tell them "it's your choice if your kid plays it but I don't want mind playing it".

  • Very narrow definition of "abroad" (Score:3, Interesting)

    by KDR_11k ( 778916 ) on Thursday September 22, 2005 @03:35PM (#13624563)
    The article is supposed to talk about the various rating systems out there but in the end it goes into details about the japanese system and describes the US system but when it comes to the rest of the world it's mostly done in two or three sentences. Almost as if they just knew something about the japanese system, wanted to write an article about rating systems and googled for five minutes for some rough information on the rest of the world and decided to describe the US system in detail as a filler (I thought "abroad" in this context means "non-US"?). I mean, hello, you have an entire article about the topic, why not go into details on the separate systems used in Europe or give examples of what games Singapore censores?

    By the way, for a self-proclaimed major news site they take rather badly to a slashdotting.
    • The pictures chosen suck as well. Why is a European Mortal Kombat II box in a section about US ratings (albeit around where MK is being discussed)? I like the bit where they imply the BBFC has only given 15 and 18 ratings to games[1], then show a game (Lethal Enforcers) with a PG rating. It's like they have a template that has an image in the middle, and they've thrown the first image that comes to hand into it, without any thought if the image is correct for that section of text.

      [1] Addmitedly most games t
      • I'm also annoyed that they didn't mention the legal implications of BBFC ratings on games; while ELSPA, and now PEGI, are at best informational, there's a degree of grunt behind the BBFC rating which encourages retailers to enforce the ratings, as well as covering them if a parent chooses to buy a game for their child and then complains.
  • Yeah I have also worked in retail and have witnessed lots of interaction between parents and children. I have said to co-workers so many times,and them to me as well, "my kids will not act/behave like that and I will have 1000 times more control over them then that parent does right now". I understand that with more parents working and not being around the kids it's harder to raise them but making the most of the time that they do have together and giving them bounds is key. These parents that let the

  • The article barely mentions the Finnish ratings.

    Finland uses game ratings that are exactly the same as the ratings for movies, and are handled by the same review board. However, if you want a rating for a movie, you have to either let them review it, or you automatically get 18+ rating (which is, by the way, why the Star Wreck movie got 18+ - it costs nothing to report it, while a review needs a fee). However, games ratings only need a declaration from the importer and no review, so there's a little bit l

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