wraggster
December 4th, 2009, 12:59
The US Federal Trade Commission has expressed concern at the widely differing approaches to age ratings for mobile games within operator portals and app stores.
In a wider report on violent entertainment and children, the FTC looked specifically at how mobile games are marketed.
Its report claims that US operators AT&T, Sprint and Verizon don't carry age-rating information for mobile games on their portals, but that Nokia and Apple do on their app stores.
However, even then the FTC is concerned that these systems don't necessarily dovetail with the existing ESRB ratings for console and PC games.
"Although mobile game sellers should be commended for instituting rating systems for their products, the proliferation of different systems has the potential to create consumer confusion with the ESRB ratings, a system with which parents are already familiar," says the report.
For now, the FTC is advising parents to monitor what games their children are downloading on their phones.
It's a relatively new issue, and one that's been tackled head-on by Apple with its age-ratings system.
However, with handsets now eminently capable of showing hi-res gore'n'violence, the debate around how mobile games should be rated - and using which system - is set to intensify.
http://www.mobile-ent.biz/news/35283/FTC-concerned-about-age-ratings-for-mobile-games
In a wider report on violent entertainment and children, the FTC looked specifically at how mobile games are marketed.
Its report claims that US operators AT&T, Sprint and Verizon don't carry age-rating information for mobile games on their portals, but that Nokia and Apple do on their app stores.
However, even then the FTC is concerned that these systems don't necessarily dovetail with the existing ESRB ratings for console and PC games.
"Although mobile game sellers should be commended for instituting rating systems for their products, the proliferation of different systems has the potential to create consumer confusion with the ESRB ratings, a system with which parents are already familiar," says the report.
For now, the FTC is advising parents to monitor what games their children are downloading on their phones.
It's a relatively new issue, and one that's been tackled head-on by Apple with its age-ratings system.
However, with handsets now eminently capable of showing hi-res gore'n'violence, the debate around how mobile games should be rated - and using which system - is set to intensify.
http://www.mobile-ent.biz/news/35283/FTC-concerned-about-age-ratings-for-mobile-games