Game Ratings Legislation

[Zmid]

Personally I agree with restricting the availability of games to minors, or, at least requiring the permission of those minors' parents/guardians, which is why I think this bill is the right thing to do. However, I am not familiar with the setup of the ESRB, so I am not sure if they are the best organisation to do it. Provided they are completely independant from, well, everyone, including the government, then, IMO, yes, they are.

 

Having said that, if a similar bill were to be passed that banned completely such games, that I would strongly disagree with. I also disagree with rating games on mods, as this would essentially mean every single game, no matter what it was, would have to be rated AO, as it would quite probably be possible to mod the game to include explicit sex and violence, even if it was Bambi: The Game.

[Slaiv]

I, too, agree that we need to have a rating system. But the ESRB [and government] is trying to expand its power beyond that of rating games, which is all it should be doing. It's trying to developers to make what they [the ESRB and co.] want.

 

This is just wrong. We have R rated movies, NC-17 rated moves, or 18+, or 16+, or whatever. Youth cannot get access to these without their parent's permission. But they are not banned. What we need is for parents to be more informed about what they are buying for their kids. I don't know how this would or could be done, but it is necessary for gaming to continue without being extremely limited.