Regulatory Issues In The Game Industry

What do I mean by ‘Regulatory Issues in the game industry’, you may ask. I basically mean issues about regulations in the games industry. The basic definition of regulation is: A rule or directive made and maintained by an authority. In Video games regulations are used to protect people from certain things they might need to know about in a video game, like violence, sex, drugs, horror, etc. Regulations are mainly used to help parents choose acceptable games for their children. There are multiple other regulations, but the biggest are concerning age regulations. Age regulations stop people of ages younger than the certified age rating from purchasing the game, this is the most controversial because a lot of people under the required age are still purchasing them from shops.

There are many different organisations around that help regulate video games. In the UK there is TIGA (The Independent Game Association), and in the USA there is ESA (The Entertainment Software Association). Not heard of TIGA? Well, TIGA is made up of representatives from across the UK games industry. It has included members from Blitz Games, Revolution, SCEE, and more. ESA’s members on the other hand are some of the world’s top publishers. ESA run E3, fight against piracy and censorship, and support the ESRB. But these organisations didn’t always exist, before 1994 and the creations of ERSB, video games were rated by the producers and publishers. The ESRB (Entertainment Software Ratings Board) assigns an overall age rating to a product as well as making notes on thirty different topics of content such as alcohol, violence, language and sex.

However some Video games can be considered so bad, it is banned entirely in a country! In Germany, depicting Nazis in games is illegal, as is unnecessary violence. Many games have fallen, including Left 4 Dead 2 in some countries. Culture modifying in games is not uncommon, because it is easier to modify it for different countries than start a whole new project, in China corpses can’t be shown in games so some character skins have be re-adjusted to this region. Games can spend up to 10 years on a banned game waiting list before they are re-evaluated and can be published again. However most video games can be censored, a prime example is Left 4 Dead 2, the Australian version cut down on loads of gore and blood, and bodies vanish after touching the floor, although many people might think this is entirely bad, the Australian version runs 30% faster due to the cutting of the effects from the game.