ESRB vs NIMF

[Revan]

Tainted. Allowing a rogue agent to slip through security has undone talks of goodwill. Valiant efforts were made to curtail the damage. The suspect was detained, but the harm was already done. The prospect of another incident has rallied the watchdogs. They call for invasion. A coup d'etat.

The fallout from Hot Coffee, the sex mini-game imbedded as non-playable code in the PC version of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, has damaged the integrity of the Electronic Software Ratings Board. Lawmakers have redoubled efforts to ban the sale of violent videogames to minors. Critics cry for an independent ratings board. And Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator Joe Lieberman have proposed federal oversight.

Hot Coffee's wake was also the tipping point for The National Institute for Media and the Family. Its strongly worded 10th Annual MediaWise Video and Computer Game Report Card awarded the ESRB an "F" for ratings accuracy and a "C+" for ratings education. More damning was the Report Card's statement: "The so-called 'hot coffee' scandal does not simply reveal the bad faith of one of the industry's most prominent companies; it has shown once and for all that the present rating system is broken and can't be fixed."

It is a dire diagnosis for the Electronic Software Association's 12-year-old self-regulatory body, which is responsible for rating over 1,000 games a year. In 2000 the perception of the ratings board was rosier. The Federal Trade Commission praised the ESRB as "the most comprehensive of the three industry [ratings] systems." Two years later, the FTC said, "there is much in the game industry's rating disclosure requirements that merits duplication by others."

But all this praise was undone by one mistake.

"The Hot Coffee incident was certainly not the fault of the ESRB," said board president Patricia Vance. "In fact, in my view, the Hot Coffee incident showed exactly how forceful the ESRB is in self-regulating the industry. No ratings system would have found the Hot Coffee material."

"Nobody could catch it in the current system," said Blois Olson, spokesman for the National Institute for Media and the Family.

But the ESRB president views such statements as "fairly ignorant criticisms" because "[NIMF does not] understand what actually happened. And they have used the Hot Coffee incident for their own political and personal agendas."

Clearly, this is a war. It's messy. And it is over something as seemingly innocuous as game ratings. Two camps are embroiled in a battle of "he said, she said." For an outsider, it's easy to be swayed by either party's company line. Both make compelling arguments, and neither presents irrefutable evidence. Regardless of corporate and political agendas, it's clear that something is wrong.

NIMF's criticisms raise several relevant questions that become increasingly important as videogames continue to reach larger audiences and grow more realistic. The answers to these queries are essential if the videogame medium wants to be taken as seriously as film -- to move beyond the view of games simply as culturally peripheral product.

That can't happen without consumer trust.

Once the Hot Coffee content was discovered, the ESRB immediately launched an investigation, Vance explained. Concluding that the "bonus" content was a Rockstar creation, the ESRB revoked GTA: San Andreas' rating and demanded that Take-Two correct the content. "We acted swiftly, and decisively to fix the situation and make sure that consumers had correct ratings information once this non-playable content was unlocked," said Vance.

The performance garnered the praise of Senator Clinton for "its quick and thorough investigation" and of Senator Lieberman for its demand for immediate corrective action, but it could not redeem the ESRB's damaged credibility.

A few weeks after the Report Card's release, the Senatorial duo proposed the Family Entertainment Protection Act. Packaged with the proposed federal prohibition of violent videogame sales to minors, and a FTC investigation into Hot Coffee, was the call for an annual, independent analysis of game ratings to "ensure that the ESRB ratings system accurately reflects the content in each game and that the ratings system does not change significantly over time."

At some point, the ESRB should have established a rigid set of ratings criteria, said Olson. A Mature rated game in 2005 is more violent and contains more explicit content than an M-rated game from 2003, he added.

"[NIMF is] in no way any sort of moral police. This isn't about not being able to make these games. This is about rating them accurately," said Olson. "The ESRB has failed at that for the last number of years because they continue to lower the bar. A rating today should mean the same thing tomorrow as it did yesterday, and clearly the ESRB standard moves dependent on what needs to sell to make the industry happy."

An obvious point of concern is the inherent conflict of interest between the ESRB and the ESA. Like the music and movie industries, the ESRB is operated by the industry it is supposed to monitor, which does not inherently breed objectivity.

"There are a whole host of things we do to ensure that the ratings that are assigned are based on the judgment of independent raters who represent mainstream American thought and values, Vance said. "That's what makes our system so valuable to consumers."

Raters "have no ties to the industry whatsoever," she continued. "We only allow them to come two to three hours a week on a part-time basis. We don't want their livelihood to be dependent on the ESRB."

The ESRB FAQ states that game ratings are based on selected footage publishers deem representative of their games.

As industry detractors are quick to point out, videogames are unique in their immersive qualities. Logically, raters would have to actually play the games to judge their true impact.

That said, it's understandable why this is not the practice. Games can take 40+ hours to complete. "You might not be able to get through all the levels if you play it from beginning to end. It's essential that we get raters to see all the pertinent content and by putting videotape in front of them, we can ensure that." The ESRB also rates games that have not been optimized so that titles can receive a rating before shipping to retailers. Therefore, the game "might be buggy," Vance added.

"We want [raters] to be looking at content in a very objective way, and frankly the perspective we want is from a parent," Vance said. The ESRB does not require that its raters be parents, but "we do require that they have some experience with kids," she explained.

And the National Parent Teacher Association, in a limited advisory capacity, occasionally works with the ESRB on ratings, said James Martinez, spokesman for the National PTA. While the ESRB could use improvement, it is "comprehensive and the process is thorough," he added.

But according to NIMF, the process is flawed because raters, nevertheless, view selected footage. "Unless the [ESRB] agree[s] to review all the content in all the games, which they've said they aren't willing to do, it can't be repaired."

Vance has asserted that Hot Coffee "won't happen again." After the scandal, the ESRB changed its policy on disclosing non-playable code. Guidelines now require companies to disclose all questionable game content, regardless of whether it is intended for user access. If these rules aren't followed "there's an enforcement system that allows the ESRB to impose sanctions on those companies -- everything from corrective actions to penalties, including fines, to ultimately the revocation of ratings or the revocation of ratings services altogether," said Vance.

"They have tweaked things," said Olson, "but there is blatant ****ography on the best-selling game of the year. That says that the ratings system didn't work." Due to concerns that retailers are not restricting minors' access to Mature games, many lawmakers want to make the sale of violent videogames illegal to anyone under 18. An easy way to skirt this issue, and escape much criticism, would be to merge the Mature category into Adults Only. It's only a one-year age difference, but it would effectively kill much of the proposed legislation and the debate over child access to violent videogames.

Vance defended the two ratings as a consumer guide that indicated "what type of content and what level of intensity gets introduced into each category." The difference between Mature and Adults only games "is the same as the difference between the R and the NC-17 -- and there's no [age] difference there."

But Gamestop and similar retailers will not stock Adults Only games. "We simply don't carry AO games at all," said Chris Olivera, spokesman for Gamestop Corporation. "It's company policy."

"The AO rating is a death sentence for a game...only 18 games of 10,000 have ever been rated Adults only," Olson said. "[NIMF] acknowledge[s] that more adults play videogames than children today, but then why are we so afraid of the Adults Only rating? If only adults should play these games than why not give it an Adults Only rating? It's a catch-22 that Pat Vance and the ESRB are in."

"We've got nothing to hide, the accuracy of the ratings stand for itself," Vance said. "If organizations want to determine for themselves how accurate the ratings are, we're certainly not afraid of that."

There is no clear solution for fixing the ratings system -- if it actually needs fixing. After all, as Vance explained, publishers have an incentive to get their products rated because, just like AO-rated games, most retailers won't carry unrated titles. And it is the ESA's best interest for the ESRB to provide accurate ratings -- otherwise little Jimmy's mother won't feel comfortable purchasing games.

For every NIMF criticism, whether it is a lack of parental education, the necessity of stricter ratings, or the need for more detailed rating descriptions, the ESRB can counter with its own research. And the ESRB is still the most comprehensive of the ratings systems.

How exactly could you reform something as subjective as game ratings? Are companies willing to stall a game's release until a completed product can be submitted and thoroughly reviewed by the ESRB? If the ratings system were restructured, would retailers carry Adults Only games?

The future holds an interesting balancing act between corporate and consumer interests. But in the present, there is no sign of a truce in this ideological war waging between NIMF and the ESRB. But as more states join the movement towards anti-videogame legislation, the ESRB should consider other methods to fortify its position. If the amount of violently themed videogames continues to rise, the ESRB will be subject to far stronger, coordinated attacks.