Slashdot Mirror
Do Game Ratings Really Do Their Job?
Thanks to CNN Money for its article exploring whether videogame ratings are as relevant as they need to be, with particular reference to Manhunt, the gory Rockstar-developed stealth action game which sparked similar discussions at Slashdot earlier this week over its M (Mature), but not AO (Adults Only) rating. The ESRB ratings board officially commented: "The ratings and content descriptors printed on all game boxes, including Manhunt, tell consumers what to expect from the game and provide the detail parents need to make informed purchasing decisions", but the CNN writer argues: "By way of comparison, 'Deus Ex: Invisible War', which hits streets next week, is also rated M... it's a game I wouldn't mind seeing a 15-year old play, whereas any responsible adult would cringe if they saw a child or young teen playing 'Manhunt'."
Just something to think about - I never had video games like "Man Hunt" when I was a kid, I was busy playing Super Mario Brothers and Rad Racer. I do think I turned out fine.... but man, I think games like Man Hunt are disturbing to anyone, not just kids. I don't want to know what kind of 10 year would want to play that game.
The problem with video game ratings is that they are extremely difficult to enforce. With a movie, it's pretty easy to stick a drone at the entrance of the auditorium to ensure no one under 17 gets into an R rated movie. With games though, while they may restrict the sales to minors, all it takes is an older friend or clueless parent to pick up the latest Grand Theft Auto and hand it to a 7 year old.
Sure, the ratings may help for more conscious parents whom read the box before they buy, but for the majority of people out there, the ratings are useless. Same goes for ratings on DVD/videos- people either just don't look or don't care.
As is standard for this kind of discussion, I'll use a movie comparison. Both "Bound" and "The Matrix" were rated R by the MPAA. However, one (The Matrix) is far more likely to be acceptable to a parent for viewing by their 14-year-old than the other (Bound). The Matrix was rated R primarily for violence, secondarily for language with a relatively small amount of [non-sexual] nudity. Bound, on the other hand, was rated R primarily for violence and sexual content (specifically, the homosexual aspect) and secondarily for language. Thus we have two movies with the same rating that are going to be judged differently as to appropriateness by parents.
The same applies to the ESRB ratings. "Dead or Alive: Xtreme Beach Volleyball" was rated M primarily for its perceived sexual content/nudity while "Manhunt" received an M based on graphic violence. The former would be acceptable to any parent whose children would be permitted to peruse the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, while the latter would probably bother most parents of children under 16 (and probably many parents of children OVER 16).
I think the television ratings system is probably a better direction for video games in that it provides a much better breakdown of ratings (seven ratings plus descriptors) and it covers content which parents are less likely to view in full (few parents want to sit through a half-hour of Pokemon, and even fewer want to sit and watch their children play two hours of a video game).
So, I think the ESRB is doing its job within the framework that already exists (five ratings with only three that truly matter - E for Everyone, T for Teen and M for Mature). It's just that some people are expecting that simple framework to provide more information than it truly can. Adopting a system with a larger number of simple ratings based on a more complex decision-making process would probably provide the information in a way that would be more useful.
America, and by extension the ESRB, has an odd relationship with violence and sex. Violence is, by and large, seen as a viable solution to the problems of the world (usually violence). Sex, on the other hand, is a morally corrupt abhorration. While videogames, movies, and television have no problems showing camera pans through the heads of suicide victims, women put onto meathooks, gun-toting henchmen having their heads severed in half, sex seems to put the industry in a tussle.
NYPD Blue, a show whose subject is violent homicide, caused quite an uproar when they showed a female breast for a fraction of a second. The violence equivalence of flashing a breast would be to show a quick clip of a knife under someone's jacket. How dare they! In a PG-13 movie, you are allowed to show a gun shooting and have someone falling over in death throes, though you cannot show the gun pointing at someone in the same frame. That's reserved for R. A sex equivalent would be to show someone pointing their "gun" at someone else, and the other person bouncing up and down in pleasure. Not something you could get away with in... For example... Pirates of the Carribbean.
Very few movies have ever received an X or MA for violence, and the few that did were re-cut. Paul Verhoeven is probably the only Hollywood director to achieve such a plateau, but even then the discrepancy shows through. Total Recall had a total of 3 shots altered to achieve an R rating, with no screentime lost. Verhoeven's Basic Instinct had to be re-submitted 7 times before it was accepted, and had 16 minutes altered. It made it to the European market intact. However, his movie RoboCop lost between 4 and 24 minutes depending upon the European market, yet hit the Americans largely unadulterated.
After watching the violence prevalent in, for example, Freddy vs. Jason, it becomes painfully obvious that no amount of videogame violence will draw an AO rating in this country. Not only is violence the core crutch for designers, but no amount of violence will truly exceed the threshold of the movie screen. And while we claim to worry about children's exposure to violence, parents get truly livid when the possibility of sex arises. Ever wonder why we see hostages take bullets to the head in the gritty, realistic world of Max Payne 2, but all sexual activity must be very generally implied?
Simple bloody violence is perfectly OK in this country. Despite most R-rated movies being violence pornography, there is little movement to stop them. When people talk of the sexualization of the youth, they usually point to Brittany Spears or some such. Sex is apparently such a horrific thing that we must protect our youth from the symbols that represent it. Brittany spears doesn't have sex on television. Brittany spears doesn't simulate having sex on television. Many people on MTV either kill or die in their videos.
Theories about the ramifications this prioritization has on international affairs are welcome. However, WRT the subject at hand, Manhunt doesn't achieve the level of violence required to be considered perverse because we have given up all concept that pure violence can be perverse: That there is anything at all wrong with watching a man use a lawnmower against a room full of the rotting undead, or melting a man's skin off his body then running him over with a car is a foreign concept to us Americans.
Show all of the pain you like. Just don't have any characters pleasure eachother.
The ______ Agenda
You seem to have quite a interesting range of ratings in the states.
In Australia, we have a standardized rating system (sorry its called a classification system here) for Games, Music, Movies and most of tv.
It goes like this:
G - General Exhibition
PG - Parental Guidance for those under 15
M15+ - Recommended for Mature Audiences 15 and over
MA15+ - Restricted to audienced 15 and over
R18+ - Restricted to adults 18+
X - Hard core porn
This is used across the board, however it is enforced unfairly. I can't get my friends 17 year old girlfriend into Kill Bill, however she can buy it when it comes out on DVD.
What is funny here is the R18+ category doesnt exist for games. Basically if the game is too violent and/or too much sex - it gets banned (ie GTA3, Postal).
The ratings system here has always been under controversy by one group or another. And the moment some other game gets banned (possibly Manhunt) there will be another gamer's uproar.
I agree with restricted classification for children (but not overkill), but I do not believe anyone has the right to BAN films or games and the such.
Human psych 101:
If something is Taboo, it is desired more
Example:
10 year old wants T or M rated game, say Half-Life. His parents deny it to him because of the rating, ergo he wants it even MORE, eventually getting it off an older friend or someone with more liberal parents.
Violence vs Sex:
American society was hugely victorian at the turn of the century, and with the outlawing of prostitution, sex, depicted in an form became taboo. Granted, society has made several leaps in the past few decades, but the conservatives seem to always prevail, thus the victorian mentality continues here in the US, anything of a sexual nature is restricted to 18+, even though we humans are aware of it's allure from age 12 or so, and because it's taboo, it is desired greatly, leading to misconceptions, and curiosity, and due to the taboos of discussing it in public, we have a massive teen pregnancy rate.
OK, back to the games, violence is more socially accepted than sex for no good reason. I have no qualms in seeing someone get shot up in a bloody mess (very violent), but a scene of a nude body is FORBIDDEN.
What a strange would we live in, eh?
Logistical Chaos Officer http://www.slagg.org - LAN Gaming in Sarasota FL,USA