One man's meat is another man's poison—culturally as well as idiomatically. Game content that one country deems acceptable may be chased out of another country with flaming pitchforks and lawyers, so understandably game ratings boards vary from country to country. Game Developer magazine has taken a look at the difference, examining the percentage distribution of the different ratings across the USA, UK, Germany and Australia.
The rating distributions are surprisingly similar, despite different review procedures and classification systems. Looking at the more controversial mature/adults only titles:
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In the USA, 12-13% received ratings of 16+ or higher, with less than 1% receiving an Adults Only rating.
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In the UK, 15.4% received ratings of 15+ or higher, with 4% containing enough graphic content to be reviewed by a separate board, and only 0.1% of games rated 18+ but not requiring the separate rating.
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In Australia, 10% of games received a MA 15+ rating, with 4 games (less than 0.1%) being refused classification—however, the statistics available were from 1994.
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In Germany, 23% received a 16+ rating, with 4% warranting 18+ and less than 1% being refused classification and possibly banned.
Assuming 1994's games are equally controversial as 2004's, it seems Australia is the most liberal country for games
ratings, and Germany the quickest to certify content suitable for older gamers only. The UK and USA are quite similar,
although a little more information would be useful to see where differences lie—whether every game warranting an AO
rating also got passed on to the UK's BBFC, for instance.
Whether consumers ultimately agree with the ratings on the box, this shows that the rating systems are complicated,
tried and tested, and—it seems—fairly internationally consistent too.
