War Games: The Tanya Byron Report, PEGI, and the BBFC

Here's a followup to my earlier rant reacting to a Times Online report suggesting that the UK plans to slap cigarette-style health warnings on video games. The report behind all that hoopla's now out, and among other things, it calls for BBFC ratings to supplant PEGI ratings on the front of game boxes, and for the BBFC to take a leading role in rating and regulating game sales in the UK.

• Read the 226-page report. (Note: Links directly to PDF.) Be aware that only parts of the report pertain to video games, whereas a good portion of the remainder is devoted to issues of Internet access and use, which is an entirely different animal. I'll only be referring hereafter to the games-related stuff.

• Know that Tanya Byron (pictured above) is a popular UK psychologist who found fame in 2004 and 2005 giving relationship advice on televised parenting shows. I don't know what to make of her professionally, other than to note that like our own Dr. Phil, she seems to see no conflict between the commercialism of taking her practice to docu-soaps and "reality" TV shows, and her academic obligations as an impartial researcher. Also: I tend to agree with Bruce Everiss, who in his own reactions to the news, says:

  Why choose a populist TV celebrity psychologist for this report? Why not Jade Goody? Seriously, this is a political matter of state control over children. There are many far better qualified people who could have written it.

• Game Politics reports that Byron told BBC Radio this morning:

  In the same way you wouldn’t let your 11 to 12 year-old watch the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which is an 18-rated film, you really shouldn’t be letting them play 18-rated video games.

  I agree. Common sense, right? If so, why does the report spend much of its ink criticizing the ratings industry for what's ultimately a parental responsibility? Is it because criticizing parents directly is off limits? Career-damaging because it's too pointed and potentially offensive? Because we're too timid to admonish the real buck-stops-with-them policy makers? That we need intermediary scapegoats to channel professional fecklessness?

• Have a quick look at PEGI if you're not familiar with it. This is the current pan-European ratings system equivalent to the U.S. ESRB, which covers both age-based and content-based ratings notifications on games, ranging from sex and violence to "fear," "discrimination," "gambling," and "bad language."

  Now what Byron proposes in the report, as it relates to video games, is a hybrid classification system, in which:

  - BBFC logos are on the front of all games (i.e. 18,15,12,PG and U).

  - PEGI will continue to rate all 3+ and 7+ games and their equivalent logos (across all age ranges) will be on the back of all boxes.

  Hybrid, then, but only in the unbalanced sense that primary video game rating responsibilities will be transferred to the BBFC. The thinking, plainly, is that the BBFC, which by the way stands for British Board of Film Classification, is more familiar and comprehensible to parents than PEGI, and that the PEGI symbols are too confusing.

  So instead of supporting all the terrific work that PEGI's already done and calling for simple classification reforms like the addition of text labels to PEGI's symbols (e.g. "fear," "sex," "violence," etc. below the black and white pictures), Byron instead argues for classic British protectionism:

  As PEGI is a ‘pan-European’ system, the ratings have to account for the different sensitivities of all member countries. This means that the ratings given reflect a much wider spectrum of views than a national system, catering for just UK sensitivities might do.

  Be aware that the BBFC, which selectively rates some but not all video games, is the organization responsible for banning Manhunt 2 from release in the UK.

• Microsoft's head of corporate affairs in the UK is already on record saying he believes the PEGI ratings system is better than the BBFC's version:

  If there's going to be one ratings system, it should be PEGI. With PEGI, they think very carefully about age [appropriateness], but the BBFC is set up to rate films, and it takes that approach for games when a different approach is required.

  PEGI breaks it down to a different level. If there's bad language it will give you a specific symbol, if there's gambling there's another symbol, and some games will have a whole raft of symbols on the back. It's a different depth, it's more sensible, and it also has a European aspect to it.

• We'd never let the MPAA rate video games in the U.S., and with good reason. Too much power in the hands of any one organization -- especially as relates to aesthetic and cultural standards -- is bad news. The BBFC has already displayed flagrant ignorance by banning Manhunt 2 in the UK. Did you hear the ban was overturned? That's true, but not because the BBFC backed down. No, the BBFC is in fact appealing the decision.

• The one place I'm actually in accord with criticism lobbed by the BBFC at PEGI, is that BBFC raters play games all the way through, whereas distributors reportedly just fill in a tick-box with PEGI. PEGI really needs raters who play the games from start the finish...and so does our own ESRB, for the record.

• With Manhunt 2's fate still uncertain, The Escape Network asks: Could the Byron Report lead to a ban on Grand Theft Auto IV?

• Do video games actually cause violence? Daniel Finkelstein with Times Online's Comment Central has a smart little piece up today pooling information from several sources, and concluding levelheadedly that:

  Tanya Byron's new task force is seeking better information for parents and other users of video games. This seems reasonable. One cannot be enthusiastic about the idea that young children are participating in horrible games.

  But we should keep cool. The evidence justifying a more draconian stance is pretty thin.
  

Replay

Fearless or feckless? Have your say below or pelt me with emails here.

Comments

Thank you for bringing the issue to a mainstream computer magazine!
It needs more public attention!

Bareleif

March 29, 2008

7:58 AM PT

Post a comment Post a comment

0 / 1000 max characters