Rumor: Xbox Game Room will not feature Teen or Mature-rated titles

According to a report on GamerBytes, Microsoft has submitted the upcoming Xbox and PC Game Room itself to the ESRB for a rating, rather than have each title re-rated by the board. The article claims that Microsoft's upcoming virtual arcade will sport a rating of E10+ -- meaning anything with a rating of Teen and higher will be left out of the Avatar hangout.

Since each game release (regardless of platform or delivery method) must be rated by the ESRB, the process of rating the Game Room itself could save Microsoft time, allow the company to reach its promised goal of "over 1,000 titles," and halt leaks of future titles via the ESRB website. While the current crop of Game Room titles are too retro for the rating decision to matter, other classics like Street Fighter and SmashTV won't make the cut. (Although, both are already available on Xbox.)

While the Game Room's current rating is bundled with the initial crop of 30 titles, it's unclear if the application's rating will ever change to accommodate more recent arcade releases. Joystiq has contacted Microsoft for clarification.

[Via Kotaku]

Reader Comments (81)

Uh, my 360 will still get on Live and play COD last time I checked. I wasn't aware they had taken away these features to make room for the new ones

They shouldn't have even "announced" this, should have just put it up when ready. Now, with all the time passing, the more details and rumors that come out the worse this sounds. I won't be checking it out at all.

Let's not lose site of the fact this is all RUMOR.

i laugh at you pitiful humans from atop my tower of ROM

Will this xbox home have pool tables and bowling as well ?

Talking of home, if you log onto the real home on ps3 and go into the sodium room and play the sodium racing game, im sure you will be pleasantly surprised, its actually very good, and incredibly surprising that something played within a game can play so smooth and fast..

Also go to the audi area and try and win the audi apartment in vertical run, the game is half decent but the apartment is really nice..

Also the presentation podium in ps3 home right now has this whole heavy rain thing running , its showing heavy rain on the screen and has some mini heavy rain teaser game running..

The trailer looks really good

To busy playing MAG for Home to matter.

I started playing it 11pm last night and I stopped about 5 am this morning (its 6 now for me).. I really feel bad for everyone in raven and valor, because they haven't won a single game against sver, practically every match ive played in the last couple of days we've won (im level 27 now ) . I dont think the other teams have clocked onto the team work side of things at all, they just run in and get gunned down

I go into home after massive gaming sessions just to relax, music in certain areas is pretty good get to see some funky lights and just leave my character dancing :) I gotta sort out my sleeping pattern before tomorrow and I have to sort out a iscsi server in a few hours, today is gonna be a rough day, im beginning to hate the game its digital crack..

Level 27? Jesus ... I'm like level 6 and I feel so lost. I'm Raven by the way.

Is your psn id the same as your nick name here ?

I sent a request to add you as a friend if you want some help with it.. my psn id is different, please keep it to yourself :) Its a bit of a rubbish nick name ...

Yea its the same as here. I'll add you and no worries I'll keep it secret. Every game mode I try to play other than suppression (the 64 player death match) I get hammered. For instance, the game mode where you have to secure the vehicles from the other team ... I can never get past or charge those damn turret stations and if I happen to stay alive there I get blasted by mortars. The most XP I've gotten in a single match is probably 70.

It's actually nothing at all like home.
It's not a virtual world.
You don't walk around.
Avatars may pop up in it, but you don't control your own, nor do people control their's.

IN a lot more ways, if you've played 1 vs 100, the lobby in that, before the "game" starts, the Game Room is a lot more like that.

In essence, really, this is just a fancy GUI.

the'll probably add T and M games later but make you pay for them

You already have to pay for all the games. Or do you mean make you pay extra for a rating cap increase on top of paying for the games? That would be ridiculous so yeah you're probably right, lol.

I'm wondering who at microsoft thought this was a good idea.

So, with Nintendo allowing more M titles, MS is going the other way around.

Damn it, when can we stop all these hypocrisy and just bring in those eroge?

When Apple is the center of FAIL, Microsoft just appears with this.

I guess, then, that the world is back to normal.

Since I never liked really old arcade games and this whole concept never really interested me it's not really a big deal.

Am I missing something because I completely don't see the point in Game Room. Why should anybody want to use this?

I love my 360 and the games I own, but I hate Microsoft.

Everything they do is designed to rip you off or limit your rights.

Prime example. If I paid for content and it's on MY hard drive, why the hell should it matter what XBOX I have it hooked up to? The content should be linked to the Hard Drive, not my console. I paid for it I should be able to use it anywhere. Even free stuff doesn't work on a friend's console unless you're on Live. Microsoft's DRM policies are terrible. At least Sony lets you get the content on multiple systems without much hassle.

That pretty much sums up how I feel. Love my 360 and everything it does, as well as the games...can't stand MS as a whole. If they would just be a little more friendly to the customer they could really do well.

If true a shining example of whats ruining most modern industries today

I point at hollywood as a wonderful example, why make a decent rated R-NC17 horror film when you can make a really crappy pg13 horror film and make way more at the box office. Even then your reviews suck and the only reason your making as much money as you are is your target audience has ADD.

Your simply not building a solid customer base

arguably tho there weren't that many T-M rated classic arcade games unless there was an M rated version of centipede that I'm not sure I want to know about =P

At first I thought the Game Room was a great idea but with the restrictive rating system in place I don't think the appeal will last very long unless they can get some hardcore games in there. I think gamers will eventually want games that offer more challenge than a 30+ year old game will be able to offer.

There's only so many times you can play Zaxxon or Pitfall before you start wanting meatier arcade titles like Mortal Kombat, Legend of Kage, Double Dragon, Shinobi, SNK's World Heroes or the original Street Fighter (where Ken has red hair).

Not sure what the power of the Game Room is but these early 80's titles shouldn't be a problem if MS can find a way to get them in with a separate ESRB rating from the entire room itself.

That's great, I'll be over here playing Mass Effect 2.

That $10 month entitles you to a lack of options.

Am I the only one that hasn't heard about whatever the heck this thing is until this very moment?

Just PLEASE have some pinball!!!!

Just get the Pinball Hall of Fame: Williams Collection. $10 at Gamestop, $20 lots of other places, and it's fantastic if you even like pinball.

This makes me wonder how they plan to reach 1,000 games with so many now being excluded based on ESRB. They'll have to dig pretty deep and come up with a lot of games nobody has ever heard of nor cares to play.

And no Primal Rage? Where am I going to fulfill my unsatisfied desire for terrible dinosaur fighting?

The Xbox efforts certainly still beat the PS3 efforts at online media and community but they certainly still have some way to go - this is just another example

Previous 50 Comments

Rumor: Xbox Game Room will not feature Teen or Mature-rated titles

Reader Comments (81)

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 11:03AM The Tim said

Posted: Jan 30th 2010 11:27PM Mystictrust said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:02AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:23AM Uncontrol said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:23AM McDuckScrooged said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:27AM McDuckScrooged said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:38AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:27AM McDuckScrooged said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:42AM Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 2:34AM McDuckScrooged said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:53PM Johnnynumber5 is powered by cell said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 2:47PM Otimus said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:34AM thedisagree said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 9:02AM chuckrich81 said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:45AM CaramelZappa said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:09AM pika2000 said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:30AM Soiden said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 4:26AM armageddon said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 9:00AM chuckrich81 said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 9:44AM NeoCloud said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 10:07AM (Unverified) said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 10:57AM Scuffles said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 2:37PM Scuffles said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:04PM incredibilistic said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:11PM FireFighter214 said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 12:19PM wcarnation said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 1:20PM Capgun said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 4:26PM OpeningNumber said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 5:02PM SisypheanLife said

Posted: Jan 31st 2010 6:49PM kbondelli said

Posted: Feb 1st 2010 8:23AM (Unverified) said

Info

Description

MSRP

Release Date

Genre

Developer

Publisher

Rating

Breaking News

WB conjures up Harry Potter for Kinect this fall

Featured Stories

Silver Lining: I Am Alive's unfeeling world

Game Of Thrones and the paradoxes of adaptation

Super Joystiq Podcast 004: 38 Studios meltdown, Gravity Rush, Civilization 5: Gods & Kings, Dragon's Dogma

Engadget

TUAW

Massively

WoW