I've been looking around for a while now, and can't find this information (and I'm getting the feeling that I should know this without asking), but what is tolerated in a categorised game (not to be thrown into the sandpit)?

I wouldn't ever use socially discriminant (race, sex, religon, etc.) content unless the story advocated tolerance, but



Can we use profanity? Should it be censored?

Can we include sexually suggestive content?

Can we include violence?



And to what extent can we include anything?
For example, there's an obvious difference between an inherently unsexual object that looks like a certain part of the body and the suggestive flirtation of a character; between a character being beaten to a pulp and having their arms ripped off; between calling someone an a** and telling them to **** off. (sorry if I should not have used that language)


Would it make a difference how much the protagonist (who you play as) was involved?


I am an American; could you possibly educate those who are unfamiliar with the culture of the United Kingdom on what is appropriate, inappropriate, and to what extent?



Thank you very much.

I've actually been wondering about this, too, as a game I'm working on has some moderate language and...um, intimate bits, I guess you could say? Not in any detail, just handled by a sort of textual equivalent of the Sexy Discretion Shot. It's all pretty PG-13 at most so I don't think it would be a problem, but I didn't know or notice any real rigid guidelines, and I was just curious besides.

The only policy is that if the game is only suitable for 18+ then it goes in the Adult category. (And I would ask that you set that as the suggested category when uploading)

Doesn't Adult have certain connotations that other 18+ games might not actually include?

In the spirit of not cluttering the forums, I hope you don't mind me posting here with my own similar questions, since I wasn't able to find information on this topic either (and to hopefully help clarify).

As far as game categories go, it seems as if they are too loosely(/rigidly? I suppose it depends on culture) defined by the connotations of their labels. For example, "Adult" (at least in the USA) usually means sexually explicit, while "18+" is also applied to sexually explicit material. Violence and foul language is classified in much looser terms within existing categories (I know, the USA rating systems are messed up). With that in mind, a Horror game which uses graphic depictions of gore and violence with some foul language would still be classified as just Horror despite the fact that it's probably safe for only 18+ to play for the violence content alone. But in the context of Quest, would such a game be classified as "Adult" or "Horror"?

I'd think that the "18+" type of categorisation would be _in addition_ to the Genre.

So for example you might have:

Horror -- (horror theme, mild in terms of violence etc so suitable for all)
Horror 18+ -- (horror theme, that includes some violence or sex so suitable for 18+ only)
Mystery -- (mystery theme, mild in terms of violence etc so suitable for all)
Mystery 18+ -- (mystery theme, that happens to involve some violence or sex so suitable for 18+ only)

And they I'd say that "Adult" (as in 'an Adult film') is actually a Genre, not an age classification. Because to my mind, "Adult" means that the key theme of the adventure is sexual and/or violent, rather than sex or violence being somewhat incidental to the plot. Obviously due to their nature, all Adult would be 18+:

Adult 18+ -- (adult theme, that involves some violence or sex)

Although to be honest I've not looked to see whether that's already how it's done - it just feels to me to be the way to do it!

Because I for one am usually happy to play an adventure that is 18+, but I would be very unlikely to choose to play one where the main theme is "Adult". Same as I watch 18+ films, but not the ones off the "Blue XXX" channel

psy

You're right, that is a better approach, and it's actually the one I've implemented now since a few days ago. You'll notice all Adult games have two tags now.