I was having a twitter conversation with someone recently about GTA5 regarding what was the right age to play it. Within Australia by law you must be 18 or older to purchase the game and a store selling it to anyone underage can actually be fined. When I was a bit younger I never gave any real thought to violence in games, probably as the time when more realistic violence within the medium was coming in was when I was in my late teens to early 20s. However now that im an old codger with a little one I have started to think more carefully about when I introduce gaming to my offspring. Now im not going to pretend that I never did or saw anything that wasnt age appropriate when I was younger such as drink, smoke or watch R rated films but again thanks to being an old bloke I now appreciate those kind of experiences in tottally different and much more enjoyable ways. So I guess at the end of my ramble what im trying to determine is what the peeps of assembler think of age rating on games? Is it something that should be enforced or is it something that just takes up space on the box cover?
If you're dealing with a highly influenceable problem child I'd probably try to keep their hands off mature games, but allowing teen games might be harmless. A good kid without behavioral problems on the other hand I'd probably deal with on a game by game basis. It might be a good idea to play mature games with the child to monitor their reaction to the themes, and also talk out any concerns you have about the material. That might work until they have friends with mature games and are feeling excluded. I had to go through it with Mortal Kombat II, but it's like Itchy & Scratchy compared to today's games...
I was at one of the EB midnight launches and must of seen at least 5 people there that looked like they were under 18 with their gaurdians buying the games for them unfortunatley the rating system means shit all when it comes to younger people getting this material. (There was even a security guard asking for ID and I laughed it off thinking he was joking, apparantly he wasn't, ended up with my copy though lol) Its no diferent with underage drinking or people accessing adult material. Kids are going to find a way, the only real benefit with the R18 rating is that we will be seeing less watered down or RC'ed games.
When I was younger my mother really enforced a "no violent games" policy in our house, which was kind of odd considering she let me watch some r-rated movies and if I wanted to play violent games all I had to do was go to my friend's houses. I don't think the strict enforcement was worth it for her because I still found my way to the medium anyways. My local Gamestop has a really strict policy on ratings though. They card everyone no matter how old they look, even regulars, and inform the adults buying the game for their kids on what kind of game they are getting. It's probably harder to buy a game than it is to buy alcohol there, but if the kids have some money all they have to do is buy it from amazon, who doesn't card. Personally, I think the strict enforcement makes kids want to play violent games more because they're mostly rebellious by default, they like to do what they're not allowed to do.
