Industry: "Arbitrary Judgment Criteria
Intervention by Overseas Platforms Is Overreach"
The Game Rating and Administration Committee has repeatedly taken blocking measures against suspicious adult games uploaded on Steam, the world's largest PC game distribution platform. However, it has taken no action against marijuana cultivation and distribution games distributed on mobile app markets, raising concerns about the ambiguous criteria for game blocking decisions.
According to the gaming industry on the 12th, the Committee requested Valve Corporation, the US game company operating Steam, at the end of last month to block two adult games depicting explicit sexual intercourse scenes.
Valve accepted the Committee's request and made these games unavailable for purchase in Korea, blocking access to their store pages so they would not appear in search results.
The Committee has so far requested blocking for suspicious games on overseas platforms only when they simultaneously meet two conditions: 'Korean language support' and 'content that would not pass domestic review.' The Committee has explained that even if a game seems impossible to distribute domestically, if it does not support Korean, it is not subject to a separate blocking request.
However, the industry criticizes this judgment criterion as arbitrary and argues that intervening in overseas platforms without domestic corporations is an overreach.
For example, games that cultivate, process, and sell marijuana or distribute various drugs while moving between cities have been distributed on app markets for years. These games, which specifically depict the types, appearances, and cultivation methods of various drugs, have even received self-rating classifications and can be downloaded and played by teenagers under Google Play standards.
A Committee official stated, "We are currently conducting a full investigation of self-rated games ranked high in popularity on app markets," adding, "The problematic games are expected to be reclassified as restricted to minors by official authority."
© The Asia Business Daily(www.asiae.co.kr). All rights reserved.
