The Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) and wireless industry trade group, CTIA, have sent out a press release detailing their new mobile game rating system that was announced over a week ago.
The new system will use the same rating icons used for retail video games. Publishers will submit their games to the ESRB, answer a simple questionnaire that surveys the age-appropriateness of the submitted game, and the official rating will be issued in seconds. However, the ESRB will routinely test the most popular games to see if the initial rating reflects the ESRB’s opinion. Customer complaints will also be monitored in an attempt to keep the rating system as useful to consumers as possible.
AT&T, Microsoft, Sprint, T-Mobile USA, U.S. Cellular, and Verizon Wireless have all signed legal documents to implement the new rating system, and each storefront can apply the new system at any time they see fit. Once this is done, new submissions will receive ratings from the ESRB, and old games will retain their previous rating.
Probably because they don’t want a third party meddling in their app-submission process, heavy-hitters Apple and Google aren’t participating.
Other storefronts have expressed interest in the new rating system, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see the new ratings slapped on new releases by the end of this week.
