Couple questions regarding all this: 1. If discoverability for adults was the goal, what evidence suggests lowering the rating will primarily attract adults instead of more teenagers? 2. If 3% of new accounts were already 13-17 under the higher rating, why not simply enforce the existing age requirement instead of lowering the rating? 3. Doesn’t making the game discoverable to 13-17-year-olds inherently increase kid exposure, even if you aren’t “marketing” to them? 4. Could lowering the age rating unintentionally signal to parents that the game is generally for teenagers? 5. Why should adult players believe their experience won’t continue changing because of platform policies? 6. If sexual content was already causing App Store review issues, doesn’t lowering the age rating increase scrutiny rather than reduce it? if you could take your time to read and answer back that would be greatly appreciated.
This game is what, 15 years old? The player base has and always should be adults. Kids lie and we all know it, because a lot of us probably did it to play "adult games" when we were younger. Making these changes feels wildly inappropriate and predatory. At this point your entire player base is going to be frustrated with these insane decisions.
Questions & apologies if this was glazed over and I missed it... I've had coffee and focusing isn't a strong point atm 😅 So here goes... •These invisible to adult youngins, will they be able to join cat/dog/misc clubs? If/when they join a club for parties, how will that reflect club member counts? Will admins get any notifications if they join? If a club requires gifting, how does that play out? •OR would it be more like starter club/upgraded starter club until they age-in, where they can get a feel for the different party styles while incognito? •Is there a way y'all can show us a sample of what they would see vs what adults see? 👀 Thank you in advance! 🙃
They couldn't join an EC club realistically because they can't talk to anyone to ask to drop SD/OD or gift bentos to join. They have zero ability to add anyone, see club walls or chat in any capacity. They could join another club but they'd have to just scroll through the full list of a club and still can't talk or read anything. Examples of what they see: Spoiler
I suppose them being able to still see IGNs also explains why IGNs need to be super clean as well. Not that they need to be any more clean that chat does, but I'm surprised they can still see IGNs and it isn't just like "Someone has left the club" or something.
I honestly thought it was also because IGNs were getting out of control. Not all, but some were uh....yeah. Parts of these might seem overcorrected, but it's a very new change, so things may still be adjusted both ways.
Definitely agree with the overcorrection part, but there is always a chance of ATA loosening the rules a little bit in the future as things change. I do highly agree that things were getting out of control, and while I do understand the new silencing policy has some players afraid to talk in chat, it is definitely super nice to be able to socialize in Campus and not see many of the graphic, explicit requests that were plaguing Pub.
Exactly why I said why not try to perfect the system?? We all knew the problem exists. So if you don’t have a proposed solution please refrain.
I mean, you didn't have a proposed solution either beyond telling them to perfect it. How can they perfect the system without having a starting point, so they can see where the issues lie when in action?
We have been looking into this from the beginning and amazed at all the lies and back pedaling that’s been done by devs prior to this final release. You say that you're not opening up PIMD to 12yo's and keeping it purely a 18+ game, which is confusing me because that’s literally what you’re doing. Kids will be target advertised, they will land in a game that’s literally boring and has little to no functions… so what do you expect them to do? They will get around the age restrictions, get into the full game and spend $` just the way you want. The next argument is "but they are in the game already prior". Yes they are and we all try to get them banned and report them when we find them, yet tbh very little is done, just like when we report Peadophiles in game, ATA doesn't do anything. The reason we get minimal kids in here is because its hard for them to find the app to begin because its 18+, its not target advertised to them. Now that the age restrictions have changed, so will the target advertising. ATA says "We are not changing their marketing strategy" but that marketing strategy includes targeted advertising to all available age groups on app stores as well as targeted ads in other apps. Read between the lines, not changing their marketing is very different to making sure 12yo's won’t be targeted for advertising. So as you can see, many more kids 12+ will now be having this app advertised directly to them. If ATA was really worried about children then they would have built a secondary server to hold the under-age kids completely away from the adult area, with a simple graduation into the adult area when they turn 18yo. But no, they will be putting them in here and enticing them with the 18+ content, UG's and avis to promotes spending, which is what this is all about. Don't let them fool you, their parent company Embracer last year posted a 57% decrease in revenue in the mobile app sector and their share price has dropped 10× from when ATA was brought out in 2020, so the pressure is on them to increase revenue dramatically. But the way they are trying to increase said revenue is onboarding 12-18yo kids and grabbing their money now, which I feel is absolutely shameful. The most laughable part of this whole debacle is ATA saying they need to lower the age restrictions to target the adults that they want to onboard. Targeting kids will not bring more adults, it will simply bring more kids and that 3% they talk about will increase substantially now that advertising is directed at their age groups. Also it’s 12+ on majority of platforms that we have found so far not even the 13+ they are reporting.
Another thing we discovered while looking into this is that on the sale of ATA they were paid an initial price, some in cash and some in shares of their now parent company. After the initial payment ATA has a 10yr schedule of supplementary payments when they reach certain goals/Milestones. We cant see what they all are but it surely would have goals for revenue and download targets. Now remember those shares that were part of the sale? Embracers share price since the sale has plummeted 10× lower, so that `$11m they were given in shares is worth roughly $1m today. You can see even more of an incentive for them to reach these secondary supplementary goals. That’s fine it’s just business.
I know I’ve already mentioned this and I sound like a broken record but this is beyond frustrating when I’m seeing the same thing but I’m an adult when is this going to change? Especially if this happened to me it could happen to others and to make matters worse no one has been responding back to my help ticket this morning smh (ata do better this is unacceptable)
Okay I have a great idea that you Ata can do. Ask for a license for age verification. If they can't show one then put them as 13-17. If they can and of age 18+ . Because no one under 15 has one yet and if they are 15-17 they'd have a learners permit. Or at least American people. Idk about passports showing. But just to find some verification.
Hi. As some others have already mentioned you’ll have to send in a ticket in order to get age issue changed or adjust it yourself on via the App Store. Mods have zero ability to access player accounts or make adjustments to what you can see.
Yes. I can confirm the only thing blocked from buying in the shop is PvP items that cost in game cash. Weird that you can still spend ECS on the smoothies and the “fite bar” which is also PvP items 🤔
First of all, thank you for addressing this! While I actually prefer a non-sexualized game, I'll admit I too was a bit concerned seeing the rating change on the App store. That said, I have a question — it might have already been asked and if that's the case, sorry for asking again; I just don't have the energy right now to read all comments already posted. So, my question: if minors don't have access to any social part, including not being able to write and read club chats, but they can join clubs and take part in parties... does that mean they'll be excluded from EC clubs? Otherwise how will they be able to like claim drops or say what they want to join with and such?