Many people in Toribash community started playing this game as minors, some as young as 10 years old. Due to the age of this game, some have stuck around for years and became adults meanwhile, so I think this is a perfect place to have such discussion.

Today, internet and video games are as accessible as ever. According to NPD, 91 percent of U.S. children ages 2-17 play video games (64 million) and the recent Fortnite craze indefinitelly accelerated this number even further. Many small kids these days can be found playing addictive and competitive games which don't necessarily target youngsters as main audience. And this is where my discussion point comes in, should all games be legally rated before release and should breaching that rating be a legal offense? I am aware that there are some laws in US regarding sales of sexually explicit games to minors, but with today's sales being mostly digital, that is often not enforced or easily avoided.



Pros
Addiction prevention
As of now it has became apparent and proven that gaming can cause an addiction. Most addictive substances or activities that we know of are currently limited under legal age restrictions, such as gambling, sex or alcohol. It has also been proven that children and teens are more prone to addiction than adults. With those facts in mind, it would be logical to limit most games in order to protect children from possibility of early addiction.

Fair gameplay
Many kids can be found playing very competitive games, such as League of Legends, CS:GO, PUBG just to name a few and most of these games require team cooperation in order to succeed. Most kids tend to be incapable of keeping up with competitive gameplay, so more than often they can cost a win to the rest of the team.

If those games were legally limited by certain age rating, competitive gameplay would be more fair and balanced.

Cons
Black market opportunities
With some games becoming illegal to certain age groups, it is certain that a lot of minors will look for alternative ways of obtaining the games. This would definitely open a whole new market for "alleyway sellers" and give opportunity for them to profit from teens.

Punishments
Minors can't be punished by law, so it would have to target sellers or parents. This would put unnecessary stress on both parties, because now parents would be paranoid that their kid is playing games "illegally", and game markets would have to ID buyers, adding extra step to every sale.


So let me know what do you think about it. If this was proposed as a real law, would you be for or against, and why?

Also to make it clear I am not saying that all games should be 18+. Each game would be rated depending on its contents and "addictive" elements to determine which age group it belongs to.

honestly, i don't even think putting such a law will change much, i mean how are they supposed to know the age of the person playing the game? u may suggest forcing people to put their real information but its too easy to work around this, there is no real way to be able to tell if the player is under the recomended age.

second, how in the acual fuck are they supposed to know which games are more addicting than others? everyone has a different taste and even if the game is addicting it could easily fail if its generic or the developers do a poor job with the updates. and if the game is addictive to kids it may not be addictive to adults which is going to make age restriction nothing more than a retarted idea that'll kill the game instantly. in short, you can't stop addiction from spreading unless you kill the game.
third, concerning adult games with sexual content and alot of gore and violance.well i don't think this is going to affect underaged players in anyway, i mean i used to play +18 games like god of war(it was my favorite acually) and prince of persia...ect at the age of 7 and it didn't affect me in any way neither did it effect other people i know.

the argument of restricting age for games is just retarted in my opinion because the only basis it has is adult assumptions, no research nor my ass.
forth (and last), if a kid is getting addicted to a game that he forget about school and pretty much his future i think the responsability should fall on the parents for letting their child play as much as he want to.

There are many things that can harm or cause addiction in children yet are available to them legally such as junk food and television. Parenting is a subjective matter and the decision to allow a child to play certain games should be at a parent's discretion.


Oh come on are we going to start fining or punishing parents because we don't like playing games with kids on our team? Sure it sucks but say one nation does start doing that, you'll still have to deal with the other nation's kids.

I think I didn't get my argument across very well. Yes, you are completely right about that, but as example let's take movies.

If you want to see a horror movie in the cinema you have to show your ID to prove that you're 18+ or whatever. It's still parents' decision if they want to allow their kid to see the movie at home, but publically they can't really do that.

I think it should be the same with video games. Of course it's up to parents to some extent, but in tournaments, schools, game stores and other public places there should be a stricter control than there is at the moment.

The fact that in most countries a 10 year old kid can walk into a shop and buy Outlast or The Witcher is ridiculous considering how much control there is on other potentially harmful media and substances.

I can't agree with having the government control what media children have access to void of any parental discretion regardless of what precedents we have such as movie restrictions. Say both the child and parent are informed about the graphic content of the game, and agree that it is suitable. You're willing to not only condemn the child from playing the game but also hurt the game's potential sales in the process, all because of one's personal morality.

as said above, these laws would be almost impossible to enforce if they were introduced. also, i think it depends on the maturity of the child in general. for example, i was playing games like ninja gaiden and even toribash at about seven years old, but because i understood that it wasnt just about ripping peoples limbs off, it was more of an educational and social rather than a violent experience for me. additionally, you made points about nudity and explicit speech in games. if this law was introduced, what would stop other people saying this through chat ingame?

this could probably work but some games just dont deserve an age rating, such as:
NFS
Minecraft
Roblox
Any Car Game Really
Farming Simulator
The Uncharted Series
Ratchet and Clank
and any other childrens games.


Most of the games ive listed here are childrens games with ratings ranging from 3 to 12.
These games dont really deserve an age rating considering theres no usage of irl money, drug abuse being shown, excessive violence, jumpscares etc.

Of course there are some games that fo deserve an age rating but they shouldnt exactly be HEAVILY reinforced (such as them having a law about video game age ratings).
Some games are too gory for younger people and therefore i approve of them having an age requirement (but as ive said before the age ratings shouldnt be that heavily reinforced), maybe the rules should just be tightened, like a public service announcement warning parents about the dangers of violent video games.

tl;dr minecraft is for kids and is ok, mortal kombat is not. Rules are nice

Or you could not neglect your kids instead. Whether or not I think your child should be playing postal is not important, if they're playing videogames you don't want them to it's most likely your fault for giving them money to buy them or leaving them unattended with the 21st century electronic babysitter that they used to download it.

Let's be honest, there are many shitty parents that don't care about what their kid is doing as long as he's occupied. Majority of families will neglect their kid to the extent of leaving him unattended on computer or mobile phone.

Just like in many other areas, without government's regulations no one will be bothered to even think about it.

Minors can be punished by law in almost all western countries;
take minors carrying illegal substances, committing murder etc;
The only way to make age ratings a law would be lump it with other age-restricted commodities, so minor playing restricted games would have to carry the same reprisals as for example minors consuming alcohol.
Sure, in most of the western world the fallout lands on the parents, but the blemish upon ones record will in some cases be punishment enough cascading into future employment etc;
repeat offenders would also most likely end up with social workers and other instances meant to "cure" these repeat offenders of their "illegal behaviour(s)" and/or "addiction(s)".