Tag Archives: ersb

The first and second Max Payne games have been rated for Xbox 360 by the ERSB, as you can see here and here.

This would probably suggest they’re going to get XBLA releases. Maybe. Given the fact the third title’s now been announced for a winter release, this isn’t the stupidest idea in the world.

We’ll drop Rockstar a line. Thanks, Joystiq and Blerk.

NeoGAF members have discovered that Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 has received an ERSB rating for both PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

The natural assumption is that the arcade fighter will soon be making an appearance on Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network, but nothing is concrete just yet.

Thanks, Kotaku.

By Mike Bowden

According to this Next-Gen piece, the ERSB is to stop posting up information of unannounced games its rated on its website.

Apparently, the body’s to include a new field in its online submission form for publishers to give a date as to when they want certain information from their products heading into the public domain.

“Unless there are specific concerns regarding premature disclosure of a title, we expect this field to be left blank,” said a memo on the issue.

“While we recognize some publishers have concerns regarding earlier-than-desired ‘announcements’ of product on our website, the ESRB system will not work for consumers if publishers arbitrarily select dates bearing no reasonable relationship to consumer interest in the product.”

More through the link.

The ESRB has released a new search widget that enables parents to check a game’s rating before they buy.

The widget is free and is available in English, French and Spanish.

“Our single most important message to consumers, particularly to parents, is that they should always check a game’s ESRB rating when considering a purchase or rental for their children,” ESRB president Patricia Vance said.

“Parents are hungry for this information, and research shows that three-quarters of parents regularly check ESRB ratings when making purchase or rental decisions about which games to bring home. Our ratings search widget makes checking the rating that much more convenient.”

To get the widget go here and click the link at the bottom of the page.

By Mike Bowden

According to this, ERSB raters don’t play the games they’re supposed to be rating. The news comes from an article in EGM, where ex-ERSB tester Jerry Bonner made recommendations on the process of rating games after he left the organisation.

“The ESRB’s current pool of fulltime raters… does not actually play the games that they rate,” he said. “They just watch submitted videotapes or DVDs of someone else playing the game… I would strongly suggest having the raters play the games to completion and carefully log their findings throughout the playtest. I’ve already heard the ESRB’s argument on this one: ‘That’ll take way too long and it will compromise our turnaround time.’ My solution to that is simple: Hire more people.”

That’s… a shame.

In this letter from US ratings organisation the ERSB, president Patricia Vance shows that last year 94 percent of all rated games were pitched at the age of 13 or younger, with mature games accounted for only 6 percent of the market, down from 8 percent the previous year.

Ratings in general had risen by 22 percent year on year, she said.

“While a handful of M-rated titles tend to garner a majority of media attention, the E (Everyone 6+) rating category continues to dominate,” she said. “The E category saw the largest increase over last year, accounting for nearly 60% of ratings assigned overall. The M (Mature 17+) category represented 6% of the overall ratings assigned, down from 8% in 2006 and 12% in 2005.”

Full thing, including pretty charts, here.