PEGI/ESRB and Amateur game ratings

[Helm]

If you make a game that's for adults, what's the problem with saying "it's for adults"?

Because it's condescending? Who is an adult? I saw Videodrome when I was 15. And it scarred me, I thought 'that is too much! This movie is too much! I LOVE THIS MOVIE'. People should make up their own minds if they want to play something or not without such warnings. Robbing art of it's bite is such a wrong thing to do. And if it's the issue with someone being a minor, don't do the parenting in place of the parents.

[CaptainBinky]

don't do the parenting in place of the parents.

I'm not. I'm merely informing them that they may need to check that this game is suitable for their children. That's helping.

Anyway, I think the upshot of all of this is that we can agree to disagree on this one.

[Misj']

While I understand - and appreciate - the concept of an 'unofficial' rating system for games (amateur, non-amateur, who cares? - as long as they use it right? Ã,  ), there are some remarks I would like to add to the discussion.

For a change I think that the Dutch rating system for movies http://www.kijkwijzer.nl/ (click the British flag for an English translation) is quite elegant. Ã, An overview and account of the various principles underlying Kijkwijzer can be read in this PDF http://www.kijkwijzer.nl/upload/download_pc/24.pdf.

First of all, the icons used are actually quite nice and simple:


Top (from left to right):
* Not harmful/All Ages
* Watch out with children under 6
* Watch out with children under 12
* Watch out with children under 16

Bottom (from left to right):

* Violence
* Fear
* Sex
* Discrimination
* Drugs- and alcohol abuse
* Coarse Language
Thanks to Ishmael for pointing it out (maybe I shouldn't write (copy-paste) posts in the last few minutes before I went home from work...Ã,  ). Correction:

* Violence
* Sex
* Fear
* Drugs- and alcohol abuse
* Discrimination
* Coarse Language


Sure, there is no distinction between sex and nudity but do we really need that?

There's also no gradient in the icons used. There's either coarse language or not. That doesn't mean that you have to add that icon if you use the word 'smeg' one time throughout your game. It's rather an indication of your games general 'atmosphere'. To get an idea of how it works, just go to: http://www.kijkwijzer.nl/classificaties.php and enter your favourite movie in 'zoekwoord'.

So you might have a game that has none of these warnings, and you could just show the 'AL' icon, and everyone would know that the game is safe. But I really don't like to adding eight icons (not taking into account any icons that could be used to clarity the genre, like those stickers they use(d) in libraries) on my opening-screen. Furthermore, the advantage of using a two-colour-scheme is that you could allow the user the right to chance these colours to match the scheme used in the game/website. They are easily adaptable if you have a download on your website (in .EPS or .AI preferably).

Anyway, summarizing what I said above:
* Use simple 2-colour (vector based) icons.
* Don't use a gradient-system but rather a boolean-system (yes or no).
* Allow the adaptation of colours (but not shape!) to match the scheme of the medium.

Misj'

[Alynn]

Ok.... This is getting silly...

We aren't doing the parenting for the parent... We aren't being concencending to anyone we are saying...

THIS GAME HAS SEX, VIOLENCE, AND FRIGHTENING IMAGES
And you can Download it here

I'd rather let them know up front before they just say, oh this sounds interesting, they down load it, and suddenly the tenticle penis alien is raping the schoolgirl and they say "I didn't want to play this!!!"

We aren't saying you shouldn't play this... we aren't saying that anyone that isn't this age shouldn't be play it. All we are saying this is what this game has in it. We give the parent a tool to help them decide for themselves if that game is appropriate for their children BEFORE it is downloaded and seen. We believ that the person downloading the game is responsible enough to handle the content within.

And in fact WE aren't saying it about anyones game but the ones we make, host, or rate... AND ONLY IF WE CHOOSE TO DO SO.

If you still don't see what we are doing, and no I don't mean agree, I mean actually understand what I and the EAGMA are trying to accomplish, then I don't know how to make it anymore clear.

If you just don't agree, then you don't agree, I'm not going to try to convince you it's a good thing. Hell I don't eve know if it's a "good" thing, but it's an idea I had and an Idea I would like to see take off, so I am persuing it.

[Ishmael]

Bottom (from left to right):
* Violence
* Fear
* Sex
* Discrimination
* Drugs- and alcohol abuse
* Coarse Language

So spider means sex, and syringe means discrimination?

This just confirms my impression of the Dutch even more.

[Helm]

'd rather let them know up front before they just say, oh this sounds interesting, they down load it, and suddenly the tenticle penis alien is raping the schoolgirl and they say "I didn't want to play this!!!"

Why?

[Erenan]

Because he doesn't want people to play it who don't want to play it because he respects their desire not to play it?

[Alynn]

Because if I was offended by some sort of content, it doesn't matter what the content is, but I'm offended by it. And someone let me know before I downloaded something (which takes time, and in some cases costs them bandwith or money (depending on the ISP)), Ã, that particular type of content is in their game before hand, I would appreciate them taking the time to let me know and saves me the time of having to download something that I wouldn't enjoy playing to begin with, and lets me move on to other games.

I thought about starting this because this is something I'd like to see, because it is something that I would appreciate, and quite possibly others would appreciate as well. So I decided to start it. Ã, That's the long and the short of it. I think it would be nice to have.

[earlwood]

This reminds me very much of Frank Zappa's statement to congress and donnybrook with the PMRC.

On another note, this whole rating system idea, it seems to be very unnesessary.  Before you download something, especially on the internet, you propably have a general idea of what's going to happen in the media presented to you.  How often do you find a blank, undescriptive link to an executable and think, "Boy, I'd like to try this!"  Look around for a brief summary, or a screenshot, or even the title for crying out loud,  I know what I was getting when I downloaded '5 days a stranger' or 'Alien Rape Escape'.  If people go around downloading random things with no knowledge of what it might be, I'm all for it having explicit images of the Pope donkey punching several gay men with tatoos of "bad words" all along thier bodies while orphans shoot up drugs and have Mexican knife fights.

In the long run, this rating system is a nice pipe dream, but in the end it will just show that parents will care, just as long as they don't have to try really hard and shiny rating doodads keep thier attention (for a short period of time anyway).

[Helm]

What earlwood said, really.

[Ghormak]

Yes.

Here, Helm and earlwood. You can have my 2 cents.

[Misj']

So spider means sex, and syringe means discrimination?

This just confirms my impression of the Dutch even more.

My excuse is that I was tired from work when I wrote it...Ã, 

thanks for pointing it out, I corrected it in the original post...Ã, 

---------- back to the topic ----------

The reason for a rating system has nothing to do with censoring. Except of cause you are ashamed to show that you have made a game in which there are acts of sex, and thus wouldn't do it if people knew. Well, then don't. If you do, you might as well tell. Or is anyone here affirmations that they will remove scenes to gain the PG rating?

Does it have to do with knowing what you will get? - Well partly...Sure, I hardly ever press random links. But on the other hand, when I go to the movies, or rent a DVD I rarely watch the trailer, read the summary, or the back of the box. Why? - Because frankly I want to be surprised. If you watch 'the Island', and you know beforehand that those people are ***** (censored not to spoil anything ) you will miss the best part of the movie. I think the same way about games. I care more about the screenshots and the GUI (playability) than about what I will truly get. I like to be surprised. But that really doesn't mean I'm interested in whatever earlwood said.

Is it for the protection of our children? - Well, I don't have any, but that doesn't mean yours don't need protection. But will they be protected? - No, probably not, since the download is free anyway. And the chance of them deciding NOT to download a game containing sex, violence, drugs, and the discrimination of the English is relatively small. But if the parents download a game for their kid maybe they will have some reference.

Anyway...I think a rating system is a good thing. I agree with Alynn and CaptainBinky. And if nothing else, it will add a sense of professionalism to the game. Furthermore, I haven't read any good argument why such a rating should not exist, which the exception of people being afraid of whatever.

[Helm]

Anyway...I think a rating system is a good thing. I agree with Alynn and CaptainBinky. And if nothing else, it will add a sense of professionalism to the game.

This is exactly the sort of "professionalism" we need to steer in opposite of, in terms both of concept and ambition. We are not professionals. We should be filling the niche that professionals are not. It's one thing to make boxes for your games because boxes are awesome, one thing to found 'design studios' where only one or two people are making the game (come on, we've all done it) and quite, quite another to adopt self-imposed rating systems just so we seem more like the big boys.

Have people forgotten how ratings in art originally came to be? They were imposed by idiots!

Generalization (i.e "there is sex in this" "there is violence in this") is the death of art. I can put Citizen Kane, or the Oddysey in terms of ratings, who does this help?  Art lives in the particulars between the cracks of signifiers like that.

But we're not making art. We're making adventure games, right?

[Erenan]

I'm kind of torn on this. On the one hand, I do agree that these kinds of labels can potentially degrade art, and I do consider creating computer games to be an art (or a conglomeration of them; whatever...) to be taken seriously. But on the other hand, as an artist who takes himself and his art seriously, my primary interest is not in shocking people or stepping on anyone's toes, and if people don't want to see or hear certain things, I respect those feelings. So if by putting a little symbol on the box I can help someone out in that small way, then... well, I guess I'd have to weigh things. What's more important? The sanctity of my artwork, or the feelings of that other person, whether they are right to feel as they do or not?

I don't know. I don't know how much it would actually degrade the artwork to label it that way. I don't know whether it's actually better for people to get over their sensitivities than for others to do simple things like label their artwork to avoid wounding them.

Blah.

Helm, I'm curious about some tangential aspects of your philosophy, but I'm not sure this is really the place to discuss it. Actually, I think I need to go back and read this whole thread, but then I might send you a PM. Do you mind?

[earlwood]

I don't think anyone is afraid of the rating system, it's very probable that it will not evolve into some e-concership juggernaut, I'm not paranoid.  But come on, part of the beauty of being part of such a keen underground clique is not having to worry about this elusive hidden "peoples" that get the vapors at the drop of a hat, are emotionally scarred for life by pixels of the red persuation, and turn stark white if I was to show a little nip.


And to pretend it's for the common good is a bit outrages as well, in case you haven't noticed, we make Adventure Games, not exactly the number one search prerogative for children, Fundamentalist, and people of frail constitution.

[CaptainBinky]

I really don't see the issue. I can see how people might be anti-regulation groups, but the point of this one is that its rules would only apply to its members. Therefore only the people who support it are regulated by it. In which case it's completely irrelevent to everyone else.

Helm - are you this vehemently opposed to the ratings here at AGS?

[deadsuperhero]

I think, for younger kids, it's understandable.
If some little kid plays a game like Quest for Glory 4 1/2 on his brother's computer, then there should be some kind of warning on it. Doesn't have to be a sybol, it could be a warning in bright bold letters on a black screen saying "This game is not for kids."

[earlwood]

But the rating system only "works" on a commercial level.  Someone at ESRB has decided what's morally exceptable for everyone, and when a 10 year old kid wants to play something like F.E.A.R, a greasy kid in a vest will say, "Sorry, I cannot sell this to you." at which point the child gets his unattentive mother to buy to for him and the world is a much better place.

On the internet, especially on an amateur level, the rating system is a failure from the beginning.  Mostly because the the web is a faceless, ageless environment, I'm in a kid's chatroom, POOF! I'm an innocent 12 year old girl, I'm looking for raunchy backdoor action, BAM! I am a 68 year old war veteran, and so on.

[GarageGothic]

The point here isn't to censor anything or keep it away from certain people, which is as you say impossible on the internet. Rather it is to allow people to make informed decisions about the games they want to play (and possibly games they choose for others to play).

Believe it or not, but I've heard adult people say that they don't want to play this-or-that game because it's too gory. There was even some guy posting here who asked if my game was going to be scary, because he didn't like scary games! Does anyone but me recall a certain member of this forum - I won't name names - who was very upset about a scene in Flashbax of an old man masturbating? With just a few rating categories, these people would be prepared for what to expect from the game and could choose to play it or not.

And the rest of us can avoid wasting time on boring games without sex, violence and drugs...

[Misj']

This is exactly the sort of "professionalism" we need to steer in opposite of, in terms both of concept and ambition. We are not professionals.

Just because we're not professionals doesn't mean our games have to of a lower standard. It just means that we have to work a little harder on it.

We should be filling the niche that professionals are not.

You mean we should be making games people want to play? - Last time I checked that was excactly what 'the big boys' try to do. We're in the same niche: we want to make something other want to play and like. We have the same medium, the same audience, the same goal. Biologically we have the same niche (and yes, I am a biologist).

... and quite, quite another to adopt self-imposed rating systems just so we seem more like the big boys.

It has nothing to do with 'seem more like the big boys'. If you think that, than I'm sorry, but you have no idea what I'm talking about.

Generalization (i.e "there is sex in this" "there is violence in this") is the death of art.

I'll say it with the words of the late Douglas Adams: "I think the idea of art kills creativity."
You appear to think that this rating system puts things in little boxes killing art. Well, I happen to disagree with the fact that we make art, and that games are art. You can discuss long or short about that, but I happen to be proud of the fact that I don't make art. I'm creative. You want to make art, go ahead. But I have a different goal. And for that goal a rating system is not a limitation. Do you consider it a limitation that to 'art' (or creativity) to have AGS awards? - That's a rating. We have a quality remark regarding the visuals of the games. That's a rating. Did any of those ever cause the death of the art? - Or did they motivate, and be some kind of quality control?

But we're not making art. We're making adventure games, right?

I'm not making art no. I'm better than that...people actually like what I do.

But no, I don't want this discussion to be about games being art or not. People have discussed about that far too long, and all it showed was that people have a misconseption about art.

My appologies if I sound all too annoyed. But Helm, your posts have a very negative ring to it, and I feel personally affected by that negativeness. I have no intention of attacking you, and I assume that neither have you. However, I would like you to look out side of the box you're currently in. And therefor, I would like you to humor me, and give me two arguments in favour of a general rating system for ((non)amateur) games which describes the kind of general content one can expect in such a game. If you do that for me, than I'll try and think of two (equally valid) arguments to support your case, why such a system should never see the light.