Today, the British Board of Film Classification was stripped of its jurisdiction over video games. The United Kingdom’s Department of Culture, Media and Sport has decided to turn over the duties of rating video games in the Empire to PEGI (Pan-European Game Information), a ratings board focused solely on video games that serves most of Europe. With this decision, the release of video games in the UK should be far smoother, and with any luck, we should avoid a repeat of the Manhunt 2 fiasco of 2007. All in all, this is a good day for gamers living under the Queen. However, I can’t help but wonder if this will bring other issues to bear with future games.
A lesser-known problem happened with Mario Party 8′s UK release, which was not submitted to the BBFC since the board only dealt with games for teens and higher. The game was recalled in England, and while Nintendo attempted to pass it off as a production error, it was soon revealed as being a content-related concern, as the game used the term “spastic,” which is a highly offensive term for the disabled in Britain. This was after the same thing happened with Ubisoft’s Mind Quiz.
These are, of course, somewhat minor issues, so it’s odd to bring them up as a counterpoint to using an international rating body. However, the ignoring of cultural differences can be disastrous. My favorite example of this is Valkyria Chronicles. Most ratings boards that looked at it, including the German USK, gave it a rating suitable for early teens. PEGI, by contrast, rated the game 16+. As the game was apparently not rated by the BBFC, gamers in the Kingdom were made to show identification for a game that is, quite frankly, not that offensive, simply because some eastern bloc folks had their tits twisted wrong with the pseudo-WWII setting. Of course, this happens the other way as well, as was the case with Dead or Alive Xtreme 2, but the pont is made. A ratings system is useless if it doesn’t reflect the cultural norms of the society it is being used in. It’s inevitable that a game will offend the sensibilities of the UK, while the continent, which is clearly PEGI’s focus, won’t notice. I imagine The Daily Mail will have a field day then.
The sad part here is that this most likely didn’t have to happen. If the BBFC hadn’t capitulated to the far-right in the tabloid media (like The Daily Mail) and took such an asinine stance on Manhunt 2, they would have never had to undergo the humiliation of being forced to give it a rating, and they likely wouldn’t have come under the scrutiny that led to this in the first place. While it’ll be good for Elizabeth’s subjects to finally have a games rating body that isn’t susceptible to outside interference, it would have been better for all involved if the British Board of Film Classification had realized that they stopped being the British Board of Film Censorship some time ago. I can only hope this doesn’t lead to a PEGI rating causing even more controversy.
