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Ask Massively: Reviewing and re-reviewing MMOs
Back in September, Star Trek Online Producer Daniel Stahl gave an interview that proposed to tell game journalists how to do their jobs. That's only fair; we're always telling developers how to do their jobs, right? Stahl told [a]listdaily, "The whole game rating business doesn't necessarily do a great justice to MMOs. MMOs are designed to grow over time and get better with every major release. It might be better if sites like Metacritic could find a way to rate MMOs by releases instead of just the initial day one . . . There are plenty of MMOs that have made huge strides since day one and some that have even gotten worse. Until then, we will continue to offer the game for free and ask for people to try it out and decide for themselves." Quipped Massively reader Matthew12, "If only there were MMO gaming blogs and websites that keep up to date with the MMOs and their updates... oh wait; there are."
Less banhammer, more gaming fun down under as Australia OKs R18+ game rating
Looks like folks from the land down under will be able to enjoy more of those upcoming titles featured recently at E3 2012. Australian gamers can now yell a collective "Get over here!" at more mature video gaming fare after the country's Parliament passed a new law to create an "adults-only" R18+ rating. The new classification puts video games on equal footing with films and other media that already allow mature content to be accessible in Australia via a similar rating. Prior to the creation of the new category, games deemed too mature for an MA15+ rating -- previously the strongest video game classification in Australia -- either had to be reclassified or banned from sale. One high-profile casualty that received a fatality from the old ratings system, for example, was the Mortal Kombat reboot. Lawmakers, however, agreed to pass the new rating law following years of consultation and strong public support for the change. One can only hope the legal tussle occurring in Australia between Apple and Samsung would reach an equally satisfactory resolution. [Image Credit: Associated Press]
Blizzard's battle in South Korea over the real money auction house
Pop law abounds in The Lawbringer, your weekly dose of WoW, the law, video games and the MMO genre. Mathew McCurley takes you through the world running parallel to the games we love and enjoy, full of rules, regulations, pitfalls and traps. Diablo III is one of Blizzard's most ambitious (if not the single most ambitious) launch of a game in the history of video gaming. Blizzard intends on a worldwide mega-event to launch Diablo III simultaneously in every country, with a massive localization undertaking. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been poured into this product. Countless man-hours have been spent toiling behind computer screens and long nights and painful testing. This is the forge where artifacts are made. And as the mighty hype machine churns and the release date comes closer and closer until the game is announced, the best-laid plans of men and Blizzard begin to feel the sting of friction. Chaos exists amongst the order. Back in September, we learned that South Korea had denied a rating to Diablo III because of concerns over the real money auction house, a new, hotly debated feature coming to the game. More specifically, the South Korean raters felt that the ability to "cash out" on real-money auctions skirted too close to the gambling line. This was bad. This was really bad. How could a core feature of one of the most hotly debated and fought-over moves in microtransactions to this day be the cause of release hardships? People frantically checked their backlogs of notes. It didn't make sense. South Korea wasn't an issue, they assured themselves. There was no way.
Australian R18+ rating revision still undecided
Sure, the Australian federal cabinet approves of an R18+ rating for adult-themed video games, but official adoption of the new rating has been stalled at the latest Standing Committee of Attorneys-General meeting in Canberra. GameSpot AU reports that no decision will be made by Federal Home Affairs Minister Brendan O'Connor "before he meets with his Cabinet." O'Connor explained as much during a press conference, during which he noted the importance of an amended ratings system and that "gamers have grown, and we have to deal with the convergence of film and games." Unfortunately, despite the Minister's hopeful words, a cabinet vote during the meeting reflected that not all Attorneys-General supported the measure (no word on who voted for what). Additionally, O'Connor promises to broach the subject once more in early 2011 at the next SCAG meeting. For now, the reevaluation of the Australian game rating system is still in the works -- when it will actually occur, however, remains a mystery. [Thanks, Foetoid]
PEGI gets more official in UK, will be legal 'by Christmas'
Like a butterfly, moments before emerging from its cocoon, the European game rating system PEGI is now only months from becoming the UK game rating standard. Speaking with GamesIndustry.biz, PEGI chairman Andy Payne (no relation to Max, as far as we know) said that the fawncy new rating logos should be on packaging by the end of year holiday sales season.Due to government recess from mid-July to October 12, the Video Standards Council -- the folks in charge of PEGI in the UK -- can't be handed the reins of UK game classification just yet. "In terms of making it absolutely law ... that won't happen until the autumn at the earliest, and there's a whole load of things that have got to happen before that," Payne said. He does, however, expect the process to go through "before Christmas," so those of you chompin' at the bit to get your eyes on some new game classification stickers will just have to hope St. Nick's feeling generous.
ESRB trying to curtail early game reveals
It's the end of an era. For a long time now the Entertainment Software Ratings Board has been a great source for spotting games that had not yet been announced. This was entirely due to the open system that was used by the ERSB's site, which allowed anyone to check a game's rating as soon as it had received one. While this was in keeping with the purpose of the ESRB (to have an easy to access resource for those who needed it; parents mostly), it was not in keeping with the goals of game publishers.In response to requests from publishers, who were likely getting rather miffed at having their game's revealed outside of their plans for such, the ESRB is now offering the ability for games to appear on their site at specified dates. Now, when a publisher submits a game for rating they can fill in a box for the date it will see upload to the main ESRB page. While it was noted that "the ESRB system will not work for consumers if publishers arbitrarily select dates bearing no reasonable relationship to consumer interest in the product," we doubt if there is going to any publisher who doesn't take advantage of the new system and hold back ratings till the latest date possible.Oh well. Thankfully, we still have other countries ratings boards to leak our video game info for us.
How would the ESRB rate your game collection?
I'm very open to all sorts of games, be it genre or game rating. That being said, I've noticed that, more often than not, I'm buying mostly M-rated games. It's not a huge surprise to me. If given the option, I'd rather shoot someone in a game than shake their hand. It is a bit unique to a portable system though, and while I don't only love the PSP because I can play M rated games on it, I do appreciate it. Are you similar to me in this regard? If the ESRB were to give a blanket rating to your PSP game collection, what would it be? Did you get the PSP partly because of the ability to play more M rated games?
Nielsen adds games to ratings matrix
"The value of an entertainment medium is directly proportional to how well it is measured." This is the proposition Nielsen VP Jeff Herrmann put forth for the creation of GamePlay Metrics, a service that will measure just how many eyeballs are glued to the day's hottest games. Such data is of course highly coveted by in-game advertisers, who want to know exactly how many people are being subliminally attracted to delicious Subway sandwiches.This isn't Nielsen's first foray into the game space. For the past three years, the firm's annual Active Gamer Benchmark has surveyed gamers online to find trends in their behavior. The latest such report found that females and social gamers are becoming a more important part of gaming, echoing the findings of other studiesIn addition to measuring gameplay habits, the GamePlay Metrics data will be cross-referenced with Nielsen's data on TV and internet usage, showing what gamers do with the rest of their free time. In news from the future, Nielsen announced next month a program that will place a tiny surveillance chip in all babies shortly after birth, measuring everything they see and do for the remainder of their lives.
