The ESRB has launched a new iPhone and Android app that lets you take a snapshot of a game box to bring up ratings information for the title. Just in time for the holiday shopping season, with this app, mom and dad only need to whip out their phone and take a snapshot of the game box to get a ratings summary for the game. They can get the info right there in the store, which sucks for little Timmy as those M ratings are probably going to shut down about half of his wish list.
The ESRB app is available for free on both the Apple App Store and the Android Market.
Also, Blastman III looks like a fantastic game.
Dale North is Destructoid's Editor-In-Chief, a founding editor, and specialist in Japanese gaming. An accomplished musician, Dale was reporting from Japan during the earthquakes of 2011. Luckily, he got the fuck out alive and is home in America now with his wife and beloved corgi, Einstein. Dale is also a co-founder of Destructoid's sister anime site
Japanator. Likes Corgis, Sega Saturn, PSP, iPhone, Photographic tools.
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Contest:
3:00 PM on 12.14.2010 | 
If it's half as good as Blastman II consider me turned on.
Also, isn't rating info on the back of the box already?
YOUR DOING IT WRONG!
Yeah there is a bit more info on the ESRB site than is crammed into the ratings box. But its nominally significant at best. Forinstance if the game is rated M for partial nudity and you don't want your child exposed to that. Does it really matter if its the left or right breast, maybe both? Or do just drop the ball at partial nudity?
The sort of person I see using an app like this is the same type that flock to the stores in droves to buy Imagine products. Which really negates the need for said app.
Happy Holidays! They were going to buy you shovel ware anyhow .... now its going to be 15% more bland, if that's possible.
are people this blind and immune to common sense? or is it really the facist esrb telling us we're all really stupid because we buy games?
what the fuck about movies? they have this one little rating in small text on the back of the box thats hard to see and not on the front of the box!
fuck the esrb. you fucking private censorship extorsion company.
Yep. Blame the videogames.
if a store knows i'm gonna buy a pack of smokes or a 12 back of beer and give it to a minor, the store is at fault for selling them to me just as i am for giving it to a minor! we called it "moral obligation" in my days.
wiiandthekid.com
...while others look at me like I'm some sorta ass jacket.
"Just in time for the holiday shopping season"
Sorry? It's December 14th, (15th since it's after midnight as I type). There are 9 shopping days left before "the holiday". If you've managed to avoid shopping this long, chances are you don't care enough about the gift you buy to look up the info on your phone.
@Qraze
"if a store knows i'm gonna buy a pack of smokes or a 12 back of beer and give it to a minor, the store is at fault for selling them to me just as i am for giving it to a minor! we called it "moral obligation" in my days."
Incorrect. It is against the law to sell alcohol and tobacco products to minors. It is *not* against the law to sell M rated video games, R rated movies or Explicit Language music to minors, (at least in my home state of NY). It may be against the store *policy*, but that's up to the retailer.
Retailers have a "legal obligation", parents hold the "moral obligation". If it's not against the law in your state to sell an M rated game to a minor, then the clerk has no right to deny the sale based on "moral" grounds. He or she may, as in the example given by mrandydixon, explain to the parent that the game may contain material that they may find objectionable, but if that parent does not object who are we to tell them that they are incorrect?
At the end of the day, all this app does is provide an additional tool to people who wish to take a more active and informed role in what children are being exposed to through video games. We're commenting on a gaming blog, so obviously we're already engaged in the hobby. We understand what the ratings mean. Every parent is a new parent at some point, and every system on the market is someone's first system.
If this helps people make better, informed choices about what games they purchase and avoid content that they find objectionable, then perhaps we can move away from the "need" for the clerks at Target/Wal-Mart/GameStop having to take on a "moral obligation" for us and our children.
Parents should be the ones to judge what sort of content their children are ready to be exposed to. Not the government, not the ESRB, not retailers.
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