Videogames ratings? What's that all about? Let us explain
by Simon Sayers - 24th March 2007The Godfathers of the videogames industry talk to Xequted.
We've been speaking to the guys and gals who decide what's what in the video games industry; the current Godfathers are PEGI AND BBFC. Well who were you expecting? Phil Harrison and Peter Moore? Give us a break. We hooked up with PEGI and BBFC to ask exactly how gaming classifications are chosen for video games. One thing's for sure, as video game graphics become more realistic we're going to see more and more 18+ ratings slapped onto the front of those boxes. Hey, we don't care we're way past out teenage years, but it's interesting to know nevertheless...we think.
If you've ever wondered why Grand Theft Auto was given an 18 rating and other, arguably more violent games, appear to have lower ratings then look no further as we attempt to explain the basic principles behind the ratings.
There are two rating systems in the UK, PEGI and BBFC. PEGI is a self-regulation system owned by the interactive software federation of Europe and administrated by NICAM. The BBFC are the UK agents for NICAM.
PEGI uses a purely online system to designate game ratings. The publisher or developer has to sign a contract that agrees to abide by the PEGI code of conduct and guidelines. Each company then appoints a coder who has to answer a questionnaire which involves simple yes and no answers to questions such as, "Does this game feature murder scenes?". Of course, they do have far more taxing and specific questions relating to violence and sex within each game, but they wouldn't tell us what they were...the swines!
Once the questionnaire is in the system the age rating is automatically assigned to one of the following categories: 3+,7+,12+,16+ and 18+. About 15% of those games that automatically received a 3+ or a 7+ rating are checked afterwards, but further up the scale to 12+ more rigorous checks are taken. All of those games that receive 15+ and 18+ rating in the UK are all then passed on to the BBFC before the publisher is allowed to use the rating.
At the BBFC they have a team of around a dozen people working on checking these incoming games. Two examiners are used per game and work together, typically for a day, on coming to an agreement on the classification. They're given a complete walk-through for the game to enable them to access all areas and they thoroughly check the PEGI questionnaires that were received. Once the two examiners have come to an agreement it's then passed onto senior management who have the final say.
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