Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
Game Design Considerations
When designing any game there are several considerations that you should make.
Target Audience and ESRB Ratings
The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) is the self-regulatory industry organization that
defines and enforces the rating system.
The target age of your audience and the corresponding ESRB ratings can have an influence on your
game design. The extent of sensitive content including blood, violence, nudity, and profanity will
affect the rating of your game, which could potentially exclude it from the audience you intended to
reach if you aren't aware of these standards.
There are three parts to the rating system:
1.
Rating categories
: Similar to movie ratings, these are used to suggest age
appropriateness (Figure
9-1
).
Figure 9-1.
ESRB rating category depictions
2.
Content descriptors
: These provide more specific information on the
particular content of the game that earned the rating. For example a game
may have a rating of E10+ that “may contain more cartoon violence.” If you
think this is pretty vague, the ESRB content descriptors tells you exactly
what they mean by terms such as “cartoon violence” (Table
9-1
).
Table 9-1.
ESRB Video Game Content Descriptors
Content Descriptor
Definition
Alcohol Reference
Reference to and/or images of alcoholic beverages.
Animated Blood
Discolored and/or unrealistic depictions of blood.
Blood
Depictions of blood.
Blood and Gore
Depictions of blood or the mutilation of body parts.
Cartoon Violence
Violent actions involving cartoonlike situations and characters. May include
violence where a character is unharmed after the action has been inflicted.
(
continued
)
