ESRB Reportedly Will Not (Yet) Include Criteria Unrelated to Content in Its Age Ratings

Christopher Dring, from The Game Business, stated during a discussion with Dirk Bosmans and Ian Rice on his show that the ESRB has no plans to adjust its criteria for age ratings of games in the US. Bosmans is Director General of PEGI, the Pan European Game Information, whilst Rice is Director General of the UK’s Games Rating Authority. The discussion was prompted by PEGI’s surprising announcement that it intends to take factors such as the use of loot boxes into account when determining age ratings in future. 

The ESRB itself has not yet commented publicly on the changes at PEGI. However, Dring said on the show that he was at the GDC Festival of Games in the US at the time of the announcement and spoke to the ESRB there. “They said, that their research found, that it could be confusing if non content related features influence rating category assignments”, Dring quoted the ESRB in his show.  Rice went on to confirm that rating agencies have long held this view. However, he noted that parents’ concerns have changed compared to those of 10 or 15 years ago. Rice therefore expects that the majority of rating agencies will move in this direction.

Bosmans also confirmed that they were aware of the ESRB’s concerns. ESRB’s concerns. He explained: “The context of USK is what specifically inspired PEGI to do this in the context of European regulatory developments.”

In fact, the changes to the PEGI system have been inspired by developments that have already been implemented in Germany. Germany is one of the exceptions in Europe that does not use PEGI due to stricter youth protection laws. Here, the USK – founded as early as 1994 – has been producing rating reports for physical games as a state-recognised body since the ‘killer game’ debate of the mid-2000s.  Like the ESRB and PEGI, the USK is a co-founder of the IARC system for games marketed exclusively in digital form.

As for the US-based ESRB, there is traditionally a different interpretation there regarding the suitability of certain content for minors. Whilst the depiction of violence is assessed much less restrictively in the US, depictions of nudity are deal-breakers for games. On the subject of loot boxes, however, there are also isolated incidents in the US that are increasing the pressure on the industry. New York, for example, had sued Valve for promoting gambling in the form of loot boxes. Even if this does not yet mean that the ESRB will follow the lead of PEGI and the USK, the ESRB will certainly be keeping an eye on what is happening in Europe.