Your thoughts on the ESRB Game System

[youthism_is_me]

Often games are rated E and T and M but,sometimes dont have much of a difference in the content . I do know that E+10 was made to bridge T Rated games. This helps them sell more .But the rateing system is messed up . I recently played a Ds game that was rate E for comic violence , In the game one person said " ill see you in H_ _ _ you Bast_ _ _ d " I am no parent but I would think If you have kids this would be a lie a little to hard to ignore .

[jango]

Aye there's some often interesting ratings given to games .. some are very marginal, but oddly some vary a lot from one country to the next too. Somebody recently mentioned that Left 4 Dead 2 was released in one country without ANY gore or blood .. seriously? A zombie game with no gore or blood? It must look totally stupid running around gently rubbing a chainsaw on some zombie's face, and watching them fall over.

Bizarre ...

[youthism_is_me]

Yes but sometimes they don't say the game has blood in it . Then you start it up and find that its a lie . Game rateings have no set standard for what is allowed in games . Its kinda up in the air . If its really bloody then it says blood and sometimes if it has a little blood it says blood. Kingdom hearts 2 is rated for blood . Go figure

[jango]

Game rateings have no set standard for what is allowed in games

Not sure if that's accurate. I bet like most 'rating' organisations they have quite stringent guidelines .. but as with most things there's always something that slips the net. Personally I think they do their best, but with anything like this there's never a happy balance .. and you can't apply the same rules for the same thting around the world .. it's just not possible.

[youthism_is_me]

I did a research paper on this . They go by how strong the content (e.g the language , violence , blood ) if its strong they will mention but if its weak sometimes they do sometimes they dont .

[jango]

exactly, but there's very few organisations that don't have guidelines these days .. litigation took care of that

[youthism_is_me]

ESRB is the only people who rate games in america . Atleast the retail games . The game makers bring them a game they do a quick overlook . And stamp on a rateing.

[jango]

Indeed .. but america is only one country and culture in the world :)

[EpsilonX]

I played Legend of Dragoon a lot when I was younger, and the game was rated T for blood and violence.

the game had 1 scene, where a dude leans over, and 2 drops of blood drip down and go on the floor. Other than that, no blood. at all. yet the party has no problem saying hell, damn, or b-tard. now i know those words aren't that bad, but why mention blood when there is virtually no blood, but not mention language at all?

and Halo, that game could EASILY be rated T. why on earth is it rated M?? People use an approach where they put in way more gore and stuff than they really want in the game, and then tone it down a bit to get the rating that they want. They do it for movies too. the saw series, they add so much more blood and gore than in the R rated versions, just so when they cut it out so it has the amount of killing that they want, it seems more acceptable. The ESRB (and the people who rate films as well) need to be more strict about their ratings.

and besides, a lot of parents don't even care. they just show their id and get games for their kids. i heard a story where a dude bought GTA for his really young son and the cashier was like "you know that game is rated M for a reason, right?" and he said "what else is he supposed to play?"

[thedeparted]

It never bothered me, when i was too young to buy M/T games my parents would buy them and now i'm old enough it doesn't. A almost never gets used unless it's for a decent reason aka Manhunt 2 getting it for being able to cook a cat in a microwave. So that doesn't bother me. It could be way worse like countries like Australia and Germany where many our M games are either torn apart to make then friendly or our right banned

[Charlotte]

well they do they best.
some games like GTA for example, everyone played it including childs although it's rated as 'M'.
and most parent thing for their children who play video games, fun and enjoyable is the main aspect.
they didn't care much about the rating.

[youthism_is_me]

I dont want my kids , when i have any to be shooting down prostitutes . Or stealing real or not . Its all about your beliefs . I belive things like that dont go in games.