ESRB outlines Commitment to Parents

The Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB) today detailed the Commitment to Parents program in a Washington, DC, press conference with the help of Senators Rick Santorum (R-Pa.), George Allen (R-Va.), and Mark Pryor (D-Ar.).

Technically, the program is the offering of the ESRB Retail Council (ERC), a group of sales and rental chains that collectively make up 80 percent of the US gaming market. The ERC includes Wal-Mart, GameStop, Circuit City, Best Buy, Blockbuster, Movie Gallery (parent company of Hollywood Video), and Target. The Commitment to Parents establishes concrete policies for a number of things those stores were already doing on their own.

All ERC members have pledged to adhere to the nine tenets of the program. In short, they are:

1) Displaying signs explaining the ratings and detailing a policy of not selling M-rated or AO-rated games to minors
2) Enforcing that policy
3) Training employees to enforce the policy
4) Participating in at least two ERC mystery shopping audits every year to determine if the policy is being enforced
5) Providing a full refund or an exchange for an age-appropriate game if the store should sell an M-rated or AO-rated game to a minor
6) Providing the ratings for games in advertising circulars, Web sites, and anywhere else they promote the games
7) Sharing best practices for adhering to the Commitment to Parents with the other members of the ERC
8) Appointing a management-level representative to serve on the ERC and participate in ERC meetings
9) Publicly reporting the status of priority initiatives at least once a year