Improving the Entertainment Software Rating Board

[GoombaStalker]

I was reading through an EGM article on the ESRB where the writer commented on changes to the rating system, and was wondering what changes you guys feel would be best to improve the rating system. I’ll quickly outline what was mentioned and then state my opinions..

-The rating categories are not flexible enough and nobody cares to support the Adults Only rating. Proposed solution was to have the Mature rating be the top of the scale, which is recommended to anyone 18 or older, and would include everything that was AO previously.
-There are only six full-time raters and they don’t even play the games they rate, just watch videos of other people playing them. Proposed solution was to have all raters play games from start to finish in completion and take notes along the way, as well as hire more raters so the pool is larger.
-Sequels and game series sometimes carry on the same rating as the previous game, where they should be judged individually.
-After the raters decide on a rating the officials would sometimes change the rating without feedback from the raters, where their work should be trusted that they are doing their job correctly and providing accurate ratings.

My opinion:

Maybe I haven’t paying attention but the fact that only six raters are coming up with these ratings was somewhat shocking to me, but I don’t think simply beefing up the crew with more raters is enough. Their backgrounds should be taken into account, more than just their gender, to ensure a diverse group of raters that will provide perspectives from many different angles. I’m talking about getting people with different cultural backgrounds from various countries, for applications such as.. what may be offensive to a parent from one cultural background may not be offensive to a parent from a different one.

The last part about the final rating getting modified by the officials bothers me the most but it’s nothing that I didn’t think was going on already. This part of the process is where the media and political crap gets it’s shot at making their decisions about what they think games should be rated.

Looking forward to hearing some more opinions on the subject..

[little-cheeze]

what is he on about

[Renzokuken]

I was shocked too when i read they only have six raters. Six! That's an obscenely low amount of people for a relatively important job. I think playing the game from start to finish isn't really the way to go. Playing the learning curve (Roughly 20-30 minutes) for any given game will tell you what the rest of it will feel like. Heh, what if they had to play out FFX or another long RPG? It'd take forever, and just back up all the other **** they need to do.

They just need more people. From diverse backgrounds and ages.

[GoombaStalker]

Yeah diversity is really where I think they lack. They did say of those six, 3 are men and 3 are women, so it looks like they made a half-ass try to diversity but it's not really enough. Someone else mentioned to me that it's very expensive to get your game rated by them, so if I was paying, I'd still want them to play my game more than 20-30 min of the learning curve (although you are right in that it is probably enough to get the feel of whether a game is mature content or not).

[Chris]

I personally agree with the Mature being on top. I have rarely seen Adults Only games.

But even then, the rating system is complete garbage. I used to play Conker's Bad Fur Day when I was 14! And the game was rated M, plus stores only sold it to people that were 18 or older (needed my sister's boyfriend to go in and pay for it with my money). It's only used by concerned parents that want to control the violence that thier children play, with some exceptions such as genres/themes they can trust (eg. Zelda. It was rated E in the early goings, then Twilight Princess was T. But many people still bought it for their 10 year olds for instance).

As for the people rating, they need to have them playing it themselves. You never know when you find a game that is rated Teen, but it should be E. Or its a game that was E, but should be M (hardly would happen, but it can).

[Emperor Pan I]

Diversity is bull****.

what should happen is the reviewwers should be gamers,/programmers and they review not just the game, but are able to look at some of the code and work done in the game. There is no way to review the entire game in a sitting, to get every little corner of data in the game. Therefore there needs to be an alternative, like quick video snapshots, and like I said pieces of artwork models etc. that can be used. Ratings aren't hard to give, they just shouldn't be given based on bias.

[CelestialBadger]

guys lets solve this problem once and for all

[Jesus Dies InTheEnd]

I <3 media.

Only six full-time raters.

Know what that means? There's probably dozens of raters, and the 6 full time ones only deal with the 'major' decisions.

Like the american court system. The six full-time guys are equivilent to the US Supreme Court, and everony else is equivilent to say the District Courts.

[Laharl]

1. Remove entertainment software rating board altogether, remove outdating and ignored rating system that is taking up precious time, and energy.

2. Profit.

[Chris]

Yeah, but you still need to deal with those nazism parents that want to control what games thier children get.

[Jesus Dies InTheEnd]

Originally Posted by Laharl

1. Remove entertainment software rating board altogether, remove outdating and ignored rating system that is taking up precious time, and energy.

2. Profit.

While we're at it, lets just get rid of the rating system for movies, as well as audio recordings.

Hey, you know what, lets just throw it all out the window. The TV rating system, Book rating (oh, it's there), Music, so on and so forth.

That would be a good idea wouldn't it?

[Roach Of Discord]

Originally Posted by Jesus Dies InTheEnd

While we're at it, lets just get rid of the rating system for movies, as well as audio recordings.

Hey, you know what, lets just throw it all out the window. The TV rating system, Book rating (oh, it's there), Music, so on and so forth.

That would be a good idea wouldn't it?

Yes, yes it would. Then it would actually FORCE parents to keep track of what their kids are doing/watching, rather than just lazily relying on the words of someone else..

[Chris]

You do realize he may have been sarcastic right?

But then again, parents are going to eventually fail in control. Swearing and violence is at schools now.

[Renzokuken]

Originally Posted by Roach Of Discord

Yes, yes it would. Then it would actually FORCE parents to keep track of what their kids are doing/watching, rather than just lazily relying on the words of someone else..

Yeah, cos most parents would do that.

[Roach Of Discord]

Originally Posted by Chris

You do realize he may have been sarcastic right?

But then again, parents are going to eventually fail in control. Swearing and violence is at schools now.

He was being completely sarcastic, I got that.

I was too, partially..atleast in a cynical way.

Renzo: Duh..

Most parents are completely lazy and do as little as possible. That was kind of my point.

[Chris]

Just checking. I knew you were as well.

But yeah, these days nothing much happens. As I said, it was invented so parents can choose the games wisely for thier kids.

But also, its flawed in itself, as I explained in my story. I still own the game and my N64 still works.

[Jesus Dies InTheEnd]

Again, lol at all of you thinking theres only 6.

Learn to read media spins please.

[Renzokuken]

Originally Posted by Jesus Dies InTheEnd

Again, lol at all of you thinking theres only 6.

Learn to read media spins please.

doaf!

[Wing Zero]

Lol old news. Theres a lot more then six. The ESRB works imo.

[Chris]

eC, E, E10, T, M, A

You were saying Wing?