Age Verification

Thicclady

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17. How about a age verification to game somehow? Its very annoying to play with children at least for me, when I try to be in mature game.

Taleof2Cities

Great point, @Thicclady ... but how do you propose to enforce it?

ESO accounts are created with the age verification ... but then anyone can log in to said account with valid credentials.

gatekeeper13

Pretty difficult to verify that, I guess. They can easily give their parents info and keep playing. Its on their parents court to prevent their kids from playing an 18+ game.

doomette

Anything beyond an input field for your birthday would be creepily intrusive, and anyone can lie on those input fields, sooooo....
Just mute/block the squeakers.

TheShadowScout

Thicclady wrote: »

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17...

If its obvious, report them and let ZOS sort them out.
Not that I expect it would do much, as they are liukely using their parents account anyhow, so any verification would be done by the parents in either case.

A better way might be just ignoring them.

I myself just wish the powers that be would add more to the game to really make the most of the now "18+" rating. I wish I could buy an special "brutaility pack" to refit more gritty violence in my game, or stuff like that...

SinXGreen

Thicclady wrote: »

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17. How about a age verification to game somehow? Its very annoying to play with children at least for me, when I try to be in mature game.

Unfortunately the games rating and context is 18+ but if a parent allows the child to play because they are okay with the content then there is nothing anyone can realistically do about it.

redspecter23

That may be near impossible to enforce. It's a good idea in theory, but you'd have to also suggest a method to do it that will actually work. That would be the hard part.

Asking your age each time you log in would be pointless as you would just lie to get into the game anyway. Outside of ZOS asking you to scan your driver license each time you log in I'm not sure what you would want them to do.

At least for me, I'm far less concerned with the age of the people I play with and much more concerned about their maturity. I've met plenty of 30+ players that I have absolutely no interest interacting with at all.

Katahdin

Aaaannnnd, absolutely no one has ever lied about their age?

Ever? Right?

johnjetau

Interesting.

In Australia the game is rated M. And the official ratings board classification for M rated materials states "Films and computer games classified M (Mature) contain content of a moderate impact and are recommended for teenagers aged 15 years and over. Children under 15 may legally access this material because it is an advisory category."

Under the current ratings system, kids in Australia can play the game.

eklhaftb16_ESO

Age verification serves no purpose anymore. In today's era, many adults don't actually grow up until well into their 30s... and many kids are so mature it is almost scary.

If we are to "sort" the players at all, a less intrusive and more gentle approach would be in order. Perhaps some sort of optional questionary that would allow servers to put you into the same instance with other like-minded people.

Edaphon

If you don't want to play with kids, don't play on consoles.

logarifmik

Thicclady wrote: »

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17. How about a age verification to game somehow? Its very annoying to play with children at least for me, when I try to be in mature game.

Where is nudity and gore in the game, I always wonder? There is no sense in this rate.

Royaji

Here is something straight from ESRB.

ESRB ratings provide information about what’s in a game or app so parents and consumers can make informed choices about which games are right for their family.

Ratings are not laws. They are guidelines.

Loralai_907

While I think my kids would probably like ESO, I don't allow them to play ESO (and my kids are 12,13, and 14). They need to be focused on school at this age, not on an MMO with a billion things to do. Content, quests, the way characters talk, for the most part isn't my problem. Its the possible addiction, and then I worry about other people I don't know bothering the kids, I don't want to have to fight someone to the death right now

Aurie

gatekeeper13 wrote: »

Pretty difficult to verify that, I guess. They can easily give their parents info and keep playing. Its on their parents court to prevent their kids from playing an 18+ game.

It's always up to parents to control what their children do. They should theoretically have the final say on what their kids do with their devices....but unfortunately parenting is apathetic to say the least much of the time. Either they don't care, or they are not prepared to enforce discipline.

We have three kids, all in their thirties. We brought them up to respect parental guidance and discipline, and all three of them say that we did the right thing, and they are doing the same with their own children.

shimm

This is why we can’t have in-game boobies or (even worse!) bare butt.

doomette

mommadani907 wrote: »

...
and then I worry about other people I don't know bothering the kids, I don't want to have to fight someone to the death right now

There was a kid (maybe 8ish years old?, probably playing on someone else’s account to just look around) in zone voice chat gushing about how awesome people’s mounts, pets, and outfits were. It was pretty cute but I just kept thinking “please no one be awful, please no one be awful”. Luckily no one was, yay for that.

Elsonso

Thicclady wrote: »

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17. How about a age verification to game somehow? Its very annoying to play with children at least for me, when I try to be in mature game.

Hmm. Forget the age verification. If they added a maturity filter to the game, this place would be deserted on Friday and Saturday nights...

Katahdin wrote: »

Aaaannnnd, absolutely no one has ever lied about their age?

Ever? Right?

Nope. I actually was born on January 1, 1900.

StormeReigns

https://youtu.be/iypUpv9xelg

Huyen

Thicclady wrote: »

I thought to ask what is your opinion on this matter. ESO is +18years old game according to ToS (with some exceptions). Now obviously theres lot of younger kids from 6-17. How about a age verification to game somehow? Its very annoying to play with children at least for me, when I try to be in mature game.

Age verification is impossible when it comes to stuff online. You cant ask people to send proof that they are said age. Its up to the parents to check if a game is right for their kids or not. Wich in turn makes it so hard to prevent the gambling issues from happening. Here in the netherlands we got a specialized help-center now to deal with this kind of stuff. Really sad if you think about it.

goldenflameslinger

My 12 year old is my dedicated healer. He is better than 80% of the so-called healers I end up pugging with. Age isn’t the defining factor for me, it’s maturity and level of seriousness.

It does seem that younger kids tend to play with mics and don’t know how to mute. You get to hear some crazy conversations between them and their mom about bedtime and cleaning their room and such!

BigBragg

Letting minors in the game is something that I feel should be left up to the parents. Playing with doesn't bother me usually, really just like anyone else depends on their overall personality. I am not playing a game to babysit, but also don't mind helping people out.

MLGProPlayer

This is a problem in every game. There is no way to enforce it.

It's ultimately up to parents to monitor what their kids play.

I'm fine with playing with pre-teens/teens since they are mature enough (I started gaming around that age). Hell, most e-sports champs are <18. Younger than that though and they tend to have trouble with game mechanics, and they expose themselves to potential predators, so for their own sake, if nothing else, they shouldn't be playing these games.

Grimm13

So you want age verification, alright. In order to do this you need to report to your local police where you will be finger printed, facial & eye biometric's will be cataloged for a fee for each place you wish to send your access information to.

Then you will need to purchase all the specialized equipment and install them on your system. Register your biometric id with your game profile so they can then match to what the government sent them. If all checks out and works perfect then you can biometrically login and play each time.

No problem. Of course you might have only a few players that want to do all this. But at least your biometric data will be securely held by your Government...

gatekeeper13

Aurelle1 wrote: »

We have three kids, all in their thirties. We brought them up to respect parental guidance and discipline, and all three of them say that we did the right thing, and they are doing the same with their own children.

This proves you brought them up in the right way and that you were successful as a parent! ;-)

Starlock

Ah, ageism.

The last time I cared how old someone was when it comes to video gaming was quite some time ago. And even back when I was young and ageist, I didn’t care THAT much. Then again, the internet was barely a thing, much less multiplayer online gaming with mics....

Sylvermynx

Katahdin wrote: »

Aaaannnnd, absolutely no one has ever lied about their age?

Ever? Right?

I never have. Why would I? When I was younger, it didn't arise (yeah, I was a literal "good kid" - even a "goodie two shoes" - outside of getting pregnant before the wedding). And now that I'm really old, why does it matter? I'm perfectly happy to tell anyone how old I am, and always have been.

smacx250

From TOS:

... You affirm that (i) You are at least 18 years of age (or have reached the age of majority if that is not 18 years of age where You live) OR You have reviewed these Terms of Service with Your parent or guardian and he or she assents to these Terms of Service on Your behalf and takes full responsibility for Your compliance with them ...

That's not "with some exceptions" - that's completely excepted, given parental assent.

Danikat

If your concern is mature conversation and behaviour then age verification isn't going to do anything because all too often age and maturity have nothing to do with each other. Most of the stupid, infantile drama on my social media and even at work comes from people in their 50s and 60s. Everything from snarky comments and attention seeking to all-out arguments about stupid things (like someone posting pictures of a party their friends weren't invited to...because they don't know the person it was for).

Whereas my younger friends and family are either less likely to start drama or at least know to use private messaging when they do it.

max_only

We need more leeway. There are a few things ESO doesn’t have “because of the children”.

It needs to use that rating as a blessing not a curse.

Bekkael

Edaphon wrote: »

If you don't want to play with kids, don't play on consoles.

Most of my kids are PC exclusive gamers (the youngest currently allowed to play on PC is 10), while their 45 year old mom plays exclusively on Xbox and Playstation.

The truth is, every platform for gaming is a mixed bag, age-wise. If it bugs you, then mute.