How did you get that M-rated game?

[Nathaniel Grey]

We're all guilty of this to degree:

Kid #1 - "Yo ma, can I get that Assassin's creed black flag for my birthday."
Mom #1 - "Sure you can Grey."

She is none the wiser. Aye, no harm no foul, right? Now, this is a topic involving the bashing of video games in the media, so if your tired of that talk leave now...

If you are still here, let us get started. I've been playing M-rated games even before I knew there was an M rating. Some games have had a lasting effect on me while others have not. Any time there is a tie between a shooting, or a statistics report on violent videogames with children my instinctual gut thought is "How did he get a copy of that?" 10 year olds are playing Call of Duty... 10 year olds are playing Call of Duty. How do I know? I play with them. You've probably played with them. Most older people don't like playing with them, but, and this is a big butt, I can't say that they shouldn't have the game. Because at one point in time I was them. It would be hypocritical for me to tell them not to play Call of Duty when I was 8 years old and playing Halo. I've have become increasingly aggravated at the fact that we keep pointing the blame the video game instead of the parent. (Side note: This situation will fix itself as the gaming community continues to grow and we, if we already have not, become the parents. But as of now I'm annoyed by the current situation.) I don't care about your opinion about video games in the media or whether the blame should fall on the parents. But if you have played a game you technically weren't supposed to be playing.

1. How did you get that game?
2. Did that game leave any negative impressions on you?
3. When, and if, you become the parent how will you handle the situation?

 

[tippy2k2]

On my very first system, the NES, one of my first games that I played was "Friday the 13th" (I'm guessing I was six or seven at this time). I grew up watching horror movies and playing violent video games and it hasn't affected me at all.

"No its hasn'tttt. We're perfectly fine....we will KILL ze Hobbitsssesssss...."

Sorry, sometimes my inner voice speaks for me, where was I? Oh yeah, it has had no affect on me at all. Now with that said...

Gaming has changed dramatically since I was young. Grand Theft Auto was a VERY different game back in the day (yes children, there was a version of GTA before 3 came out). Yeah, I played rated M games when I was a kid but my version of M is very different from today's rated M. To treat them the same and to say "well I played it as a kid so it's hypocritical to not allow them to" is just silly.

Frankly, I don't know how I will handle it. It's going to depend on the kid. There are eighteen year old kids that are too dumb to play rated M games and there are plenty of twelve year old kids whom I would have no problem handing them the controller for some Call of Duty.

 

[The_Lost_King]

1. I never really got to play m-rated games. My dad was a gamer, so my parents new that I shouldn't be playing that. Once my babysitter let me play GTA though.

2. not really

3. I won't let them play m-rated games until they are around 8-10 years old. I don't want to let them play too young, but I think 18+ is rediculous. I understand when it's something like the witcher 2 where there is sex, but making it rated M just because there is blood is soooo stupid.

 

[EXos]

Back in my day.
It wasn't that much of a problem yet.

And now that I'm 27... XD

 

[gmaverick019_v1legacy]

1) i didn't disturb my parents with the games I played, so either through my uncle/friends/parents I would get the game in some way/shape/form, and play it in peace so they didn't care really.

2) well at the age of 5, the first resident evil game did scare the piss out of me a bit, otherwise every game is "just a game", so as soon as i turned the game off, that was it (although fucking mario party..that's another story, fucking tug o war on hard mode as a child? literally burned my palm off and was bleeding, stupid fucking game.)

3) I'll let my kid play what they want as long as they don't act like a twat about it or let the game influence the rest of their decisions that day (such as throwing temper tantrums after playing online multiplayer).

Seriously, seeing boobies and shit happened more on tv than it ever did in games, and kids are usually ahead of the curve than what parents think they are in what they know, so i'll keep an open relationship with my kid and hopefully introduce him/her ahead of the curve so they can learn it from me and not ghetto piece of shit #5 at their school.

 

[PolarBearClub]

It depends from kid to kid.

I've been playing games off all kinds since a young age, first console I had was a Nintendo. I probably didn't have anything M rated or equivalent until the Playstation came along, by which point I may have been around 12 or 13. Tomb Raider, Syphon Filter, Hitman, GTA were just a few of the games.

Sure, I get angry with a game from time to time, but nothing that will ever lead to any murderous rage. My parents were never properly clued in to the content of games, or even TV I might have been watching, and though my mum still seems to show me every article related to media and violence, I'm fairly 'normal'.

As for me being the parent, when the time comes it'll be purely down to my judgement if the kids ability to handle mature content.

 

[SoranMBane]

1) As I recall, my first big M-rated game was Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas on the original Xbox, which my mom bought for me when I around twelve years old.

2) Not really. The occasional instances of sex made me slightly uncomfortable, but besides that I had a lot of fun with all of the game's wanton murder and mayhem. But, most importantly, I was mature enough to keep in mind that the game was just that; a game. It didn't effect me anymore than any of the violent books, movies, TV series I was already exposed to.

3) I'd do the same thing my mom did; assess the individual maturity level of my child, and decide if they're ready for a violent game based on that. Most kids can handle a bit more than what some parents would give them credit for, and being open and honest with them about adult subject matter will generally produce better results than trying to shelter them.

 

[Bad Jim]

I'm 35. Ratings on games didn't really exist when I was young.

 

[Tuesday Night Fever]

1. For me it was mostly the old-school shooters, like Wolfenstein 3D (1992), Doom (1993), Quake (1996), and Duke Nukem 3D (1996) to name a few. For reference, I was born in 1988. My parents never really had any problem with me playing these sorts of games, because they felt I was mature enough to do so. They were confident that I could tell the difference between reality and fiction, and they trusted me to know right from wrong. That said, I have great parents. They were always there for my sister and I when we were growing up (even while both working full-time jobs; they always coordinated their hours so one of them would always be home), so we learned a lot from them. I can understand that times are hard for a lot of people today and some parents aren't able to spend as much time with their kids as my parents did... so maybe in a situation like that, things would be different.

2. Not really, no... and I played pretty much every single FPS game that I could get my hands on. And that's not even factoring in all the R-rated movies I had exposure to before I was even 10 years old, like The Thing (1982), The Terminator (1984),Aliens (1986), and Predator (1987). Also, I read comic books like The Punisher. So all-in-all, I'm pretty much the standard media archetype for a potential spree-killer. Yet I never had any problems in grade school, went on to college and earned a degree, held down a job, and never once had a run-in with the law (unless you want to count getting into an argument with a police officer in the parking lot of a cinema over which Indiana Jones movie is best - it's Last Crusade, by the way). So yeah, I think I'm a pretty well-adjusted adult, regardless of media consumption.

3. The same way my parents did. Raise my kids right, and give them the respect that they deserve as human beings. Overly-coddling kids and shielding them from all of the negativity in the world is only going to make them have a harder time coping with it later in life. I'd rather just be honest with them so that they can actually learn a thing or two about life.

 

[TehCookie]

I'd take them from my dad's library. Since he was a gamer he knew what they contained so he'd let me play some but others were off-limits. Not that it stopped me with every game, I still stole Duke Nukem 3D.

The worst thing that happened to me from playing M rated games was my nostalgia goggles made me enjoy Duke Nukem Forever. I was playing them when I was so little I didn't get most of the stuff in them. Not to mention when I was a kid the gore wasn't realistic. My parents didn't let me see graphic gore, but if it was on the level of something you'd see in everyday life it was fine. And I played with dead things so real life was more graphic than the games from that time.

If I become a parent I'd handle it in a similar way. My parents has rules of no games where you can bloodily murder innocents and no online unless supervised. Since I'm a gamer as well I'd know whats in the game I'm buying for them and be able to judge each game for themselves and whether or not my kid can handle it. I'd probably end up being more strict because of the better graphics and much more games are online.

 

[Ratty]

My mom kept a close eye on whatever I played. So aside from a briefly borrowed copy of "GTA: London 1969" on the PS1 the most explicit thing I played as a kid was probably Doom 1 and 2. I think the first M rated game I owned myself was Evil Dead: A Fistfull of Boomstick. I got it by uh, going to K-mart? I was old enough that no one really cared. Bought the Boomstick Edition of Army of Darkness the same day, if I remember right. Good stuff. Don't think any of the games I played as a kid had a negative effect on me, but then I wasn't much of a gamer as a kid anyway.

If I had children I wouldn't let them play M-rated games, I mean, popular FPS servers already have too many annoying kids on them already right? ;P But really it'd be a case by case thing. I'd definitely do some research about a game above their age level before I'd consider getting it for them.

 

[[Kira Must Die]]

1. My first M rated games were actually two: Resident Evil 4 for the PS2 and Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories for the PSP. I just told my dad about them and how good they're suppose to be but how I couldn't get them because they were rated M (I was 12 at the time). Then on Christmas that year I got both of them, which surprised the hell out of me. My dad, though, told me to remember that they're just games.

2. Not at all, actually. In fact, they influenced me in a positive way. When I was a child, I was very prudish, getting nauseous at even the slight sight of blood and being easily scared. These games helped me get over those fears. Yes, RE4 scared the crap outta me, but I still had fun with it and it's one of my favorite games of all time. Now, I flock to that sort of stuff. these games opening all new possibilities for me, and made me who I am now.

3. If I know my child can handle that sort of stuff, then fine. Sure, they might be roudy for a few years, but I doubt by the time they're in high school they'll turn into bloodthirsty murderers. That's just parents really underestimating children. My brother is 10 years old, and for the longest time he's been watching anime with me and watching me play these games, but he's smart enough to know that the things that are happening in these games are wrong. He listens to a lot of cursing, but he never curses. As long as you teach your kids what's right or wrong then there's no need to worry. Just let them be entertained by entertainment.

 

[KarmaTheAlligator]

I'm old enough that games didn't have ratings back then.

1) I do remember when my step dad came into our life and brought his Amiga 600 with him, he had a game of strip poker on it, that my brothers and I discovered by accident. I was about 12 or 13 at the time.

2) The game didn't have any lasting effects, as it was so bloody difficult, I never got too far (my older brother finished it). Since it had boobies in it, it got me excited (but so did anything female shaped), but it never went further than the computer room.

3) What I intend to do if I get kids is to talk to them about, well, everything, and impart my experiences with them, so that they'll know what's what and make their own decisions about things. I'll probably introduce them to several "forbidden" things in a controlled environment, depending on how they are, so they can get first hand experience without all the excitement and build up of doing the same things when it's not allowed. We'll see.

 

[Chester Rabbit]

Mainly my dad. My parents tried their best to be as open as they could be with me about most things as a kid so they didn't try sheltering me from too much. They figured if they exposed it to me early on it would prevent me from seeking it out with a vengeance later on in my life. So with that in mind I was exposed to horror movies like Fright Night and stuff early on, and though my mom tried keeping me away from games like MK at first, my dad would go behind her back and we would rent or buy games like Maximum Carnage, Mortal Kombat, Killer Instinct(in a lot of ways he was like the older brother I never had). Soon my mom caught on and saw I wasn't becoming a psychopath like the news said I would so she just shrugged and let me go and trusted I would be able to decide what I could handle in terms of mature content.

Anyway I have to mention a certain time I got a hold of a M rated game eh? Hmmm

I?ll go with Resident Evil I guess.

How did I get it?

My dad rented it

Did it leave any negative impressions on you?

Yes it left a negative impression on me at the time. I was 8 and had just seen Night of the Living Dead for the first time and had/have quite the vivid imagination mixed with some pretty potent anxiety soooo...I was pretty much worrying zombies were going to break down the door to my house every night. So Resident Evil did help any.
And yet in the same year I ended up becoming absolutely fascinated by that series.

If I made the mistake of becoming a parent how would I handle it? *shrugs* probably the same way my parents did minus my dad?s big brother tormenting and teasing. Actually wait, no I hate kids so lots of tormenting and teasing!

 

[the_great_cessation]

Growing up, I was pretty good for self censoring myself from stuff I thought was "too violent" for me. I remember games like GTA 3 being absolutely huge with other kids my age, but I just didn't find anything appealing about the violence. As a result, my parents sort of just trusted me to make smart decisions when it came to my media consumption habits. I think the first M-rated game I ever got was Prince of Persia: Warrior Within when I was 13. I just sort of approached my parents, I told them what it was and why it had an M-rating. They thought I approached it so maturely that they would give me the benefit of the doubt and we went to the game store and I bought it with the money I had spent weeks saving up. After that, my parents never really took issue with what I played or watched outside of stuff with gratuitous swearing, oddly.

 

[dyre]

1. My parents always frowned a little on my gaming in general (a frivolous hobby in their eyes), but they didn't really care much about the blood content in the game (which is pretty much what most M ratings are about).

2. I don't remember what my first M rated game was...probably some shooter, since I started gaming with shooters. It probably didn't have much of an effect on me since the other shooters I played up to then were also violent, just slightly less graphic.

3. Well, I probably won't start my kids off with shooters. I mean, I did and I ended up fine, but I would hate to accidentally raise my kid into some kind of Call of Duty dudebro. I'll probably start them off with point-and-click adventures (Monkey Island to start, maybe? And then The Longest Journey, followed by some stuff by Daedalic Entertainment), a more refined genre that will encourage them to have fun while solving puzzles. It will also orient them towards an appreciation of good writing. After that I might get them a few classic RPGs (Baldur's Gate 2, probably. I'll save Planescape until they're at least in high school), since I imagine ten years from now all mainstream RPGs will come with obligatory alien sex, and while there's nothing wrong with alien sex, it might be a little much for a ten year old. By the time s/he reaches M rated games s/he'll not even care about silly things like blood, gore, and sex. All part of my plan to raise the perfect high brow gamer!

Ah, who am I kidding. I'll probably just end up buying him/her a decent PC and letting him pick anything within reasonable boundaries.

 

[Snotnarok]

I got the game regardless of rating, my parents didn't really care, I watched Terminator uncut at 12 or younger so that kinda stuff wasn't a problem. Well, getting it from the store from the clerk may have been an issue as my parents were NOT the ones to buy the game, if I got the money I could grab something.

So hopefully I had someone around who'd tell the clerk to hand it over- my grandma helped me with Conkers Bad Fur Day, the guy was desperately trying to get across how vile the game was "Do you want it?" She asked me "Well, yeah" I replied "Give him the game"

The earlier stuff was even easier in the 16-bit because of Sega Channel, download whatever games were around for the Genesis/Mega Drive? Yeah free rain within the limits of what was on the service that week.

As a theoretical parent? I'd likely do it the same way, just have to feel it out based on the kid...Despite all them violent games I've never been in any kind of trouble ...detention? Nope. :|

 

[Dragonlayer]

1. I've always been freakishly tall and had luxurious facial hair from a young age, so convincing store staff I was the appropriate age for Call of Genocide: Medal of Rape was never hard.

2. Unfortunately, being such an impressionable young lad, I was of course moulded into the perfect killing machine by these nefarious influences and even now I eye you all up as potential victims.

3. I never intend to become a parent BUT if I did, I'd pull my children out of the education system and force them to play brutally violent games 24/7.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

On my very first system, the NES, one of my first games that I played was "Friday the 13th" (I'm guessing I was six or seven at this time). I grew up watching horror movies and playing violent video games and it hasn't affected me at all.

You sound eerily familiar... I swear if I find out I'm posting as two people completely unaware of each other, I may freak. Honestly though it sounds as though you and I grew up in the same era with the same influences.

OT: Growing up in the 80's/90's before most games were even close to "adult themed" in the rating terms, its difficult for me to get this. Its up to parents to decide the boundaries they set for kids, and the ones who don't do some research into what their kids are doing are the kind who usually end up with problems. Its not the content that screws up kids necessarily, its that there's no direction from the adults in their life to whats right and wrong. I've got a 14 year old daughter and she's pretty good at disseminating information and knowing right from wrong. That comes from the way my wife and I have raised her, talking to her about things and being honest. She's got a good head on her shoulders and it seems that it comes from our willingness to talk and to listen and be there for her. Thats the best a parent can do, because none of us can really protect our kids from the world like we really want to, but we can prepare them for it. The more we try to shield and shelter them the worse it will be when they're finally thrust out there on their own.
Hell personally I had a lot of PC games growing up and in the 80's/90's those were more mature than console games ever were (aside from the extremely hard to find adult games)