| Onyxmeth said: From what I gather from these proceedings, the government was trying to basically stop children from buying M rated games, which they're not supposed to be buying anyways, and was going to fine places that sold them to children? What have we really gained from that, and what would we have lost? If anything this decision takes the parents out of the equation, because they no longer get to be the facilitator to purchase a game for their teenager or preteen. The kids can now buy it themselves. |
Supposed to be buying, according to who? We have no proof that kids are actually more mentally damaged from playing M-rated games than they might be from playing E-rated games, so why not let the parents decide if their kid should be allowed to do something rather than letting the government decide it?
The ESRB isn't based on any substantial research in the field of how videogames affect people at different ages, it just looks at the different contents and says "Well, kids of this age probably shouldn't be watching this or hearing that.", which in reality means that the ratings are good for nothing other than informing of the contents of a game. That's fine if you're looking to buy a game and you want to know how bad something can get, but as far as the required age goes, you can't compare everyone to the same standard and get a fair result, much less one that should have an impact on the law.
