Video Games Age ratings...

[Cykotic]

Really? Hasn't this already been tried and failed? When I was younger, I used to get my hands on some pretty violent games (i think i managed to get a copy of Thrill Kill on the PSOne) and never once was I asked for proof of age. It failed this, and I think it will fail now... law or not. If a kid wants to play a game with violence or sex or whatever, they will play it and there isn't a thing that can be done to stop them. My wife's nephew is an avid Call of Duty player, but his mum won't let him play it because she thinks it's violent. His response: Go to his cousin's house and play it there.

[AcesandEights]

It may have an impact, but it won't work to any large degree, because parents love to buy their kids what ever their little hellions want, and you just can't legislate and enforce parenting to that degree (yet ).

[shootemindehead]

It works already to a larger degree than most people think and the main factor is down to parenting. A chap I knew wouldn't allow his son to play 'Modern Warfare', because of the violence (actually, it was because of the wife more than likely) so the kid didn't get to play 'Modern Warfare', until he was deemed fit to view. Upon which time he felt it was rather "meh". In any case, a lot of the time parents are actually vetting what their kids see and play, because a lot of the time the parents of these children are veterans of games themselves and have a far better degree of "education" (as in games/films education) than our parents ever had. Problem is, that some games aren't as "judgable" for parents, in the way that films are. 'Dead Space' for instance, I would let a kid near for love, nor money. But, if there wasn't the box lying around, one wouldn't be aware of it's age rating, never mind its actual content, which was vicious.

[MinionZombie]

Ah yes, the switch-over from the BBFC rating video games (they'll continue to rate the video content of games, btw) to the PEGI system. We've had a weird combination of the two for years now, and this switch over has been a long-time coming (no doubt from bureaucracy and silly nonsense like that). Anyway, it's supposed to be an improvement. However, the BBFC ratings were still law, and it was (and still is) illegal to sell games (just like movies) to those below-the-age of the content being purchased. That was true when I was a kid for crying out loud! I remember the days before games had ratings (when I was able to purchase Mortal Kombat or Robocop vs. Terminator for the Sega Mega Drive, for example). Then they introduced ratings a little bit, and now it's the norm. Naturally, it comes down to the parents in the end - they'll be the 'end users' if you will of this law, by either enforcing it or ignoring it - by either refusing to buy their kid a game they're too young for, or buying it for them regardless/turning a blind eye to them playing such games at the homes of other people. I remember when I was just in high school, and my Mum wouldn't let me watch Poltergeist or A Nightmare on Elm Street - so I saw the latter over at a mate's house (and the grossest portion of the former, which I didn't see in-full until just recently). However, I was allowed to watch Alien when I was 9 years old, because it was "sci-fi" and not horror. Likewise, both 1980s The Fly movies were okay, as was both Terminator movies, and an array of action movies and so on (I do recall my Dad once saying about Backdraft that he wanted me to "fast forward through a sexy bit" ... which I never did, not that you saw anything there anyway, I saw more in Max Power magazine - a car culture magazine - with all us lads huddled around an issue at school during lunch break, hehe). However, for me, flat-out horror movies weren't allowed initially. Then I snuck in a few here and there (I watched Halloween with the sound waaaaaaaay down and the door closed with my finger hovering over the stop button, so I was watching them before I was technically allowed) ... but of course, at age 9, my Dad laid out the difference between what was in a movie, and what was real life. His way of explaining it was good, but kinda funny too ... remember the guy in The Fly II who gets crushed by the elevator? Well, my Dad said - to knock the difference between reality and fiction into my noggin - was saying that in real life, someone at the company would have to inform the wife and children of that man that he'd been killed, and all that which would happen afterwards). I brushed it off in a child's way of "yeah, I know that already", as I'm sure many have, but even still it was a good thing to point out. In terms of videogames, my folks only know anything of them (a limited field of knowledge) because of stuff that I've told them about videogames, and shown them etc. My Dad bought me Carmageddon (the uncensored version) and Duke Nukem 3D for example ... meanwhile a friend of mine wasn't allowed to play the latter at all, and was reprimanded more than once when he was caught playing the demo of it. Me on the other hand, I was fine to play this stuff. I wasn't really supervised, but they knew I was mature about it anyway ... even though I did spend a lot of money at the strip club in Duke Nukem 3D telling the lovely lasses to "shake it baby" over and over, hahaha. So yes - the parents must take responsibility if they're fussed about it, but many parents are still a bit unknowledgeable about videogames. It'll be less-and-less the case (same as with computers and the internet), but there's still an air of kids knowing way more than their folks - once that gap is closed, then it'll be less of a problem. As Byron says on there, the tools are there to be used, but nobody knows about them - education is the key thing in this situation, even though surely with BBFC ratings beforehand it was illegal to sell and 18 game to a 12 year old, just like a movie. If shopkeepers suspect it's being bought for the kid, again, it's their responsibility to sell it or not. Carmageddon and Duke Nukem 3D were both bought by my Dad, with me standing right there next to him looking eager to play the game, haha, but that was back in the mid 1990s. Videogames were still relatively niche then - the PS1 had only just come out, and gaming was very different to how it is now. The games industry and the government can't parents your kids for you, and they can't do everything for you - not only is it entirely impossible on a practical level, it would also be the makings of a dictatorship combined with Idiocracy-of-sorts where everyone just switches off and says "the gub'munt'll do'et fur me" ... feckin' eejits. Their part is done (and the only real change here is pushing information in a bid for educating adults who know sod all about games to coincide with the switch to PEGI from BBFC for games ratings), so now if parents are actually bothered, then they have to pull their finger out, and even if they don't mind their kids playing these games (perhaps even play with them), they still must be responsible and clearly define the difference between reality and fiction, as well as actions and consequences, and right and wrong. I've slaughtered thousands of 'videogame people' in games (likewise in movies, and indeed, books), but the notion of killing a real person is - quite rightly, and quite naturally - repulsive to me. That's called being well adjusted, but also being able to enjoy (and understand, and contextualise) graphic entertainment.

[Cykotic]

I'm just waiting for the "Well, video games violence influences real life violence" folks to come out of the woodwork... you know it's gonna happen eventually.

[MinionZombie]

I'm just waiting for the "Well, video games violence influences real life violence" folks to come out of the woodwork... you know it's gonna happen eventually. Like Keith Vaz, for instance? That dozy twonk is always at it. I remember when Modern Warfare 2 came out, and the Culture Show actually did a piece on it, and had people in discussing it, and good lord, the saggy old farts on that panel made themselves look like fools. There was only one guy who was impressed by the game - and clearly that's from someone who hadn't paid any attention to games, and was quite enamoured with the whole control scheme (e.g. left and right trigger to pull yourself up an ice cliff). Meanwhile, IIRC, Paul Morley, that pontificating prat, hated the game but had no genuine reason to - it was a clear case of not only lack of education, but total snobbery. Then there was a woman who knew nothing of games - and indeed fretted about underage kids playing adult games - but she didn't know how to play games, so she had her underage son play it so she could watch (and, again IIRC, had him gun down the people in the Russian airport) ... ... bit of a dozy hypocrite then, but also uninformed, as I can't recall her pointing out that the player not only has the choice to not shoot the civilians in that level, but they have the option to not play the level at all. It's that sort of uninformed pontificating that continues to harbour the bad rep that videogames get - however, with videogames becoming nothing but more and more successful and widely played, they snobbish and ill-informed dinosaurs will go by the wayside entirely with time. They've been on the back foot for years as it is, and consistently proved to be wrong.

[Cykotic]

I still remember all the crap that came along when the first Grand Theft Auto was released... "It will teach you to murder and break into cars"... MY ARSE!

[MinionZombie]

I still remember all the crap that came along when the first Grand Theft Auto was released... "It will teach you to murder and break into cars"... MY ARSE! I know! There's so much detail and so many steps left out in these games - if they were to be "instruction manuals to murder" then they're not doing a very good job, because it's totally unrealistic - AS IT SHOULD BE. There's a big difference between zeros and ones, pixels etc, and real-life living human beings - as long as the distinction is clear to a child/teen, and they're a well-adjusted kid, then there's no real problem. Indeed with horror movies, you often become part of a wider community - you get passionate about film, it becomes a communal thing both in-person and online. It almost becomes a religion in a way - folks attending conventions, following their heroes etc. You're better off following your horror movie icons as heroes than you are a ruddy footballer. That's the irony really with horror movies - they're apparently so bad for you (coming from the mouths of those not-in-the-know, and those who refuse to educate themselves and appreciate other forms of art and entertainment for other tastes), and yet you hear time-after-time that 99% of the people at these conventions (fans and stars alike) are some of the nicest and sweetest people on the planet. Besides, if games and movies really made killers, we'd be over-run with them ... and yet we aren't, gee, I wonder why?!

[Tricky]

If they were really serious about it they'd ban the companies from making such games in the first place or ban shops/websites from importing and selling them, but as with smoking and drinking they raise far too much tax money to go that far so they like to be seen to be doing something while really doing nothing.

[Cykotic]

If they were really serious about it they'd ban the companies from making such games in the first place or ban shops/websites from importing and selling them, but as with smoking and drinking they raise far too much tax money to go that far so they like to be seen to be doing something while really doing nothing. Last time I checked, games were making more than hollywood!

[MinionZombie]

Last time I checked, games were making more than hollywood! Yep, I read that too. Not surprising with a new game costing £40, mind you. Then again, I paid £40 for GTA IV, and got 200 hours out of it.

[Cykotic]

Yep, I read that too. Not surprising with a new game costing £40, mind you. Then again, I paid £40 for GTA IV, and got 200 hours out of it. Thank god for pre-owned games!

[MinionZombie]

Thank god for pre-owned games! I've sold on a lot of my Xbox360 games in the last couple of months, something which I'd not bothered to do before, and got a good sum for them too (e.g. on GTA IV, I managed to get £11 for it) ... however I haven't bought a pre-owned game in years. I bought a few back in 2007/2008, but what I often do now is buy brand new, but wait for them to come down in price ... then you build up a bit of a backlog, so you can work through those at low prices and put new ones on that list, and then by the time you get around to them, they too will be cheap. Some guys I just won't buy for anything more than a tenner, frankly. Indeed, most games I've bought (with the exception of Saints Row 3 as a pre-order) in the last year have been in the £5 to £15 range.