Pan European Game Information
PEGI logo
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| Abbreviation | PEGI |
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| Formation | April 9, 2003 |
| Purpose | Video game classification |
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Region served
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Europe, Canada (Quebec only), Israel |
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Parent organization
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Interactive Software Federation of Europe |
| Website | http://www.pegi.info |
Pan European Game Information (PEGI, pronounced "Peggy") is a European video game content rating system established to help European consumers make informed decisions when buying video games or apps through the use of age recommendations and content descriptors. It was developed by the Interactive Software Federation of Europe (ISFE) and came into use in April 2003; it replaced many national age rating systems with a single European system. The PEGI system is now used in more than thirty countries and is based on a code of conduct, a set of rules to which every publisher using the PEGI system is contractually committed. PEGI self-regulation is composed by five age categories and eight content descriptors that advise the suitability and content of a game for a certain age range based on the games content. The age rating is not intended to indicate the difficulty of the game or the skill required to play it.
PEGI has five age categories.
The current design was introduced at the end of 2009. Black and white icons were used until June 2009, when the colour-coded PEGI icons were announced, with green for 3 and 7, amber for 12 and 16 and red for 18. Plus signs were removed from the icons, and the background text changed from 'ISFE' from the old, black-and-white icons to 'PEGI' from the new, colour-coded PEGI icons. That design was slightly altered at the end of 2009, by removing the watermark and locking the URL bar underneath the age rating icon. Reprinted games from 2009 or before often still display the old designs.
In Portugal, two of the PEGI categories were aligned with the age ratings of the film classification system to avoid confusion; 3 was changed to 4 and 7 was changed to 6. Finland also used a modified scale, where 12 became 11 and 16 became 15. Finland fully adopted PEGI on 1 January 2007, and the standard ratings were fully enforced as well.
The eight content descriptors are:
Video games rated PEGI 12, 16 or 18 may contain content that encourages or teaches gambling. If a game would offer the option to gamble for real money, it would be subject to specific gambling legislation in every country where it is released. Until today, none of the video games using the Gambling content descriptor have contained gambling with cash payouts.
As of December 2015, PEGI has rated more than 25,300 games. 42.2% of these games were rated 3, 15.8% rated 7, 22.3% rated 12, 12.7% rated 16 and only 7% were rated 18.
Of all the games that were rated in 2015 (1855 games in total):
A consumer survey commissioned by ISFE in 2012 demonstrated that the PEGI age rating labels are recognised on average by 51% of respondents in 16 different countries (highest: France - 72%; lowest: Czech Republic - 28%), while 86% of all respondents found them to be clear and 89% found them useful.
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