A few years ago, the government mandated that the gaming industry put a rating on all American-licensed video games. The first mature-rated video game was the violent yet highly innovative "Mortal Kombat." Yep, from blood and guts to deadly combos and fatalities, this booger apparently had to have some kind of warning label.
As someone who has followed and supported the gaming industry for most of my life, I feel that the ratings produced by the ESRB (The Entertainment Software Rating Board) are semi-stereotypical. Who says that a child of twelve cannot play a video game with a mature rating? Age should not matter; the maturity of the child is the true concern.
Is it illegal for a mature adult to buy a video game for a minor child? NO! For example, if an adult were to take their child to an R-rated movie, there would be no problem with the child seeing the restricted movie. The adult will supervise the child while they watch a restricted movie. However, it seems that adults hardly ever pay attention to the video games their children play. Thus, what gives them the right to say that the video game is giving their children a positive vibe in the first place.
With that, comes the question of maturity level. Many aspects can influence maturity. Foremost, parental influence has the most definite affect on the mind of the child. If a parent curses or uses violence around or towards their child, the child will most likely grow into their teens using the same negative behavior. Thus, if the child were to play a violent video game, their negative parental guidance may come into play, causing the child to be influenced in a negative manner by the video game. However, if parents were to treat a children positively, the child will grow into a successful and morally correct teenager. If this particular child were to play a mature-rated video game, a normal reaction to violence would be that the child would simply see an animated image of violence that surely could occur in real-life, but is no risk to the individual. Children are extremely fragile. The public's perception is that video games of all kinds could cause a child to become hostile if influenced in an incorrect way.
Many parents think that their children are being targeted by the "evil" video game industry, in order to turn them into little monsters. This is far from the truth. Though the law states that mature-rated video games are only for adults, many children play these video games with no negative effects. Simply restated, it depends on the perception that the child has on the negative notions of the video game in general.
John Sherry, a Perdue University assistant professor, states that video games minimally affect kids: "Video games teach logic, hypothesis testing and problem solving," he states. "Granted, as a teenager, I recall some fascination with violent images, but that may not be the major attraction of these games for most kids."
Thus, violent imaging is not all the content in a violent video game. There is a challenge and a positive goal in all video games. This leads directly to the positive influence on all children to set goals and positively live by them until the task is complete. Children do not focus on the violence, they focus purely on the game!
Concluding, if adults expect their kids to become violent over playing a mature-rated video game, maybe they should rethink how they raise their children...
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The RPG Realm is not affiliated with any company or product mentioned herein unless explicitly stated. The RPG Realm was created by Greg Davis on 05/03/1998 and is owned and operated by Alex Wreschnig. |