Topic: Independent and Objective Ratings System Initiated

[TheYoungerPlumber]

Current Attractions begins a color-coded game rating system focused on content instead of age.

INDEPENDENT RATINGS SYSTEM TARGETS VIDEO GAME INDUSTRY

A Detailed Analysis of Video Games’ Profanity, Sex, Violence Available at CurrentAttractions.com

Research Finds Ambiguities And Inconsistencies In Current Industry-Run Ratings  

LOS ANGELES, November 30, 2004 – Cutting through the ambiguity of the current industry-run ratings, Current Attractions has begun an objective and quantitative reporting on the Profanity, Sex, and Violence in today’s hottest video game releases.  With Current Attractions’ use of the proprietary PSVratings technology, parents will know exactly what to expect before they purchase video games containing potentially objectionable material for their children.

Until now, video games have been rated only by the software industry’s own Entertainment Software Rating Board, (ESRB), which rates games using a subjective, age-based rating system.  The ESRB attempts to match the content in games to players’ ages, but how many parents know that the Teen-rated best-seller Tony Hawk’s Under Ground 2 shows characters vandalizing buildings and women lifting up their shirts to bare their breasts?

The ratings found on Current Attractions are powered by the PSVratings system, the most comprehensive, accurate and objective ratings system currently available.  They do not suggest what content is suitable to any particular age group.  Instead, they provide parents with the detailed, unbiased information, independent of game manufacturers, necessary to make informed choices based upon each individual family’s  own personal standards of suitability.

Initially devised to evaluate movies, the PSVratings system utilizes the globally recognizable traffic-light symbol to convey three levels – green (suggestive), yellow (explicit) or red (graphic) of Profanity, Sex and Violence. It provides consumers with in-depth information including the exact number of instances and the context in which profanities, nudity, sexual words and activities, disrespectful behavior, character, racial, religious and sexual slurs, alcohol abuse, illegal drug use, tobacco use, threatening behavior and violent actions will be encountered.

Current Attractions’ original research shows that while some of this season’s major releases bear the same game-industry rating, their actual content varies widely.  The inconsistencies found among games with the same ESRB rating can be seen clearly in a side-by-side comparison of four games rated M:

  Game Title   Profanity Rating   Sex Rating   Violence Rating   
  Halo 2         Yellow                   (None)         Red   
  GTA              Red                       Yellow         Red   
  Fable           Yellow                    Green         Red   
  Shellshock   Red                        Green         Red  

“The fact is, parents don’t know the half of what is going on in these games,” said David G. Kinney, CEO of Veritasiti Corporation, the parent company of both PSVratings and Current Attractions.  

“We take it for granted when the rating on the box tells us a game is rated for ‘Teens’ or for ‘Everyone,’” continued Kinney.  â€œA lot of parents might be shocked by what some video game developer has decided is appropriate for their child.  The PSVratings offered at Current Attractions make no value judgments about age-appropriateness.  That is a parent’s job.  We take objective, quantitative research and present it in a way parents can easily understand.”  

In the volatile video game industry, Current Attractions aims to be a comprehensive resource for parents.  The new service will include listings of the most popular video games, a traffic-light style PSVrating, pages dedicated to general information about each game, pages featuring in-depth information about each game and an entire section providing a Parental Guide to Video Games, including a glossary of terms for the uninitiated and links to articles on the effects of gaming on children.

About PSVratings

The PSVratings process is both extensive and objective.  The system operates on proprietary, database-driven technology featuring in excess of 3,000 rules and more than ten million rule combinations. A Standards Board of educators, child psychologists and child psychiatrists, all of whom are parents, assign ratings to each of the rules of the system; thus creating the PSVratings Standard.  Auditors are trained to record instances of Profanity, Sex and Violence in media.  The data then goes through three independent stages of validation.  Proprietary technology then analyzes the complete data and generates the PSVrating, which ensures objectivity and makes the system unique from the industry-based systems that generate ratings based upon the opinions of a subjective group of parents, critics or enthusiasts.  

To learn more about the PSVratings system or for more specific information on these and other video games, please visit www.CurrentAttractions.com   and sample the PSVratings and reviews with a complimentary 30-day pass.

[Ian Sane]

I think this in theory is a great idea.  But it's not very useful as a service though.  The only people who would use such a thing are mature responsible parents and they're not the ones which are creating the "problem".  Plus the main issue with the ESRB is that people just outright IGNORE the ratings on the box.  This is even easier to ignore.

I think the ESRB should include with the age rating a little chart like the colour chart they're using here.  They can change it to numbers or something instead.  Of course people will still ignore it but at least then the game industry can say "we say right on the box that this game has this much violence, sex, and profanity."  People are going to ignore the rating anyway but if they include more detailed info on the box at least they're lowering their liability.

[couchmonkey]

I like your idea, Ian.  It needs to be readable in a short span of time.  Maybe indicate it with colour-coded bar graphs or something, like a short bar that's green is good, a medium bar that's yellow is a warning, and a red bar that's long is bad.  People don't want to read too much.  

As for this system, it sounds okay, but I don't like how it trashes the ESRB.  The ESRB ratings aren't perfect, but they're quick and simple, which is important for getting overworked or over-lazy parents to use the system.

I'm getting fatigue from the sheer amount of anti-videogame violence rhetoric during the past couple of weeks.

[joshnickerson]

"The color coded warning system is brought to you by Tom Ridge*."

Then again, we don't see DVDs slapped with a big ol "R" on the front of the case either.
I think the current ratings system is doing well, though I've always thought there should be an additional rating  between "E" and "T".  

*Fact checking brought to you by Djunknown

[Artimus]

It's funny, everyone knows what 'R' and stuff is, but a lot of people have never even heard of Teen or Mature.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Must game retailers create a little gated alcove where they display all the M-rated games like some local video rental stores did for their pr0n selection? WHY NOT

[Kulock]

I think the ESRB does a fine job, personally. I remember some really poorly thought-out game ratings in the early 90's in reaction to Mortal Kombat (Sega's own was horrid... a 13+ rating for Mega Man: Wily Wars because he flinched when he was hit, that's why it never got a US release, and the equivalent of an M for Switch because there's a joke where the kid grows boobs as one of the bad endings later on, we're talking stick-figure quality anatomy), but most of the ESRB ratings I've not had a problem with. It's just an issue of parents failing to read the warnings, and then later blaming the companies for whatever issue they ran into.

Thanks to them, we have to tap the screen each time we start the DS to pass a Health and Safety warning. -_-;

[nemo_83]

Here is something I watched on CSPAN.  http://www.c-span.org/search/basic.asp?ResultStart=1&ResultCount=10&BasicQueryText=video+games

I don't know if there has been any news coverage of this on any of the game sites, but I thought it was interesting and related.  I'm a news junky, so I watch CSPAN because they cover polotics better than anyone.  It is a shame that the most trust worthy news source is a gov't station.  

[nemo_83]

the JFK game he was talking about.  http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/11/21/kennedy.game.reut/index.html

Liberman is a Republicrat.  

This guy David Walsh is obsessed with teen boys.


It is funny that he mentions virtual reality when Nintendo is said to be the closest to virtual reality.  

David Walsh seems to only be playing GTA and Halo because he says that the best games are violent shooters.  To me the best games are Zelda and Metroid.  


I don't have to say that those kids in those ads were fed those lines about choping the heads off of super-hard pavement queens.

[Djunknown]

Hmmm... looking at their examples, it'd seem that a lot of games would have a Red Rating. Since I'm assuming that most parents screen for violence first, they might think that Fable is just a hack fest (which is half true, but still...) It'd be make games with moderate violence look extra naughty.

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The color coded warning system is brought to you by John Ashcroft

I think we have Tom Ridge and the Department of Homeland Security to thank for that...

Off, topic but wasn't Mega Man for the genesis blocked because Nintendo had a hand? I never thought it'd something so silly about ratings, they were'nt really in full force then....

[Squiggles the Chao]

It's a shame that we can't get an independent ratings board that's less uptight. It seems to me that this organization was founded on the principle that the ESRB wasn't being strict or harsh enough on games, when my view is exactly the opposite.

[Gamefreak]

I don't see how people can complain about games like GTA (I didn't really see any reason to give III and Vice City an M, it really isn't that bloody, there's only moderate cursing that's PG-13 level, and violence is really cartoony and definately not something that's "only for 17 and up") when movies like Bad Boyz II aren't even being mentioned in the news when they are so much worse. GTA is very sharp, well written, funny, and a brilliant parody of American life in the 80's, early 90's, and late 90's. It's also not blatantly over-the-top just to be over the top like the aforementioned Bruckheimer film. The things in GTA are accurate to what they are making fun of. San Andreas has tons of cussing and ghetto talk, GTAIII has the mindset and respect for family that is characteristic of the Mafia and Yakuza, Vice City is very representative of 80's Miami; they are all matter of fact. Haitians complain about Vice City's missions where you kill the Haitians. Well you are allied with the Cubans, I mean Japan isn't complaining that in Rise of Nations you get to pick America and destroy Japanese cities with nuclear weapons. Look at Bad Boys 2 again. That movie just blatantly makes fun of homosexuals, black people, white people, the KKK, Russians, Cubans, Haitians and does it all with so much blood, violence, language, sex, and some downright nasty stuff just for the heck of it. There's no reason for any of it at all except to appeal to the stupidest of teens and 20-somethings. I mean some of the stuff is pretty funny or all but unlike GTA where there is actually a reason and consequence for your actions, as well as a brilliantly told story and witty humor BB2 (and plenty of other movies, but I'm picking on this one because I saw it the other day, I was a fan of the original but after seeing the second I was really shocked at some of the stunts they pulled, and why anyone would rant about games and not this, not that it was that bad or anything, just shocking) is the one that "needs" to be yelled at. Ok, not really, but better BB2 and similar movies than works of art such as GTA.

[Deguello]

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I didn't really see any reason to give III and Vice City an M, it really isn't that bloody, there's only moderate cursing that's PG-13 level, and violence is really cartoony and definately not something that's "only for 17 and up

I think it's the car stealing and the fact that the game allows you to slaughter random, innocent (at least in the game world) people that get the M rating.  And Games and Movies are different.  

If anything I would like for the ESRB to change the M rating.  Calling somebody Mature is a compliment, and rating games using that wording instills positive connotation.  Make the M rating disappear, rate all games that used to be M to Adults Only (It's only one damn year difference) and loosen the restrictions on Adults Only Games so that they can be sold in stores like WalMart and stuff.  Adults Only sends a pretty clear message for enforcement, and it won't be this namby-pamby Parent's permission, beardy-man judgement calls that we have now.  

[UncleBob]

>“The fact is, parents don’t know the half of what is going on in these games,” said David G. Kinney, CEO of Veritasiti Corporation, the parent company of both PSVratings and Current Attractions.

And this guy is hoping to change that?  Parents don't know what's in the games for the simple fact that they don't care.  Red, yellow and green bars on the cover aren't going to change a thing (except maybe getting pre-teen boys to want games that has a large, red bar under the "sex" catagory...)

This seems to make things yet more complicated...  I think the ESRB is okay, but the two changes I would make would be to make the ESRB completly independant from the industry and I'd go with the more understood "G", "PG", "PG-13", "R", and "NC-17" movie ratings that everyone is already familiar with.

"Look mom, can I get this new Pokémon game?"
"No Johnny, it's Fire Red!  It must be way too mature for you!"

[uwvark]

Lots of stupid parents can't even figure out the current rating system. I can't wait to see how they react if this thing goes through.  It is just going to confuse people more.

[joshnickerson]

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Originally posted by: Djunknown

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The color coded warning system is brought to you by John Ashcroft

I think we have Tom Ridge and the Department of Homeland Security to thank for that...

Yes, I was just logging on to correct that. I'm an idiot.