Video game content rating in Germany is not for the faint of heart (or the easily confused), according to a report in DW-World:

Legislation recently passed in Germany in July, for example, makes it easier to put [violent] games on the banned list following the introduction of a rating index... Games on Germany's banned list cannot be sold publicly. That includes any advertising and sales through mail order. The decision to flag a game is made by the Federal Department for Media Harmful to Young Persons (BPjM)...

But the labeling system for content rating is run by yet another organization in Berlin, under the sponsorship of two game industry groups:

The labeling system is organized by the so-called Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle (USK) in Berlin... Two industrial associations assumed sponsorship from June 1: the German Association of Computer Game Developers (G.A.M.E.) and the German Association of Interactive Entertainment Software (BIU), both of which are headquartered in Berlin.

...but, despite the industry's involvement, the government has an additional layer of control here, as well:

The decision-making power lies with the federal states. The Protection of Minors Act calls for the Supreme Youth Agencies of the state to undertake the labelling, he said.

 

"And they employ the USK," [BIU spokesman Olaf] Wolters added.

 

The USK functions as a service provider, commissioning a circle of independent experts. These observers first play the game, present their results to a five-person committee consisting of at least four of roughly 60 expert appraisers from the USK, including teachers and employees of the youth agencies. The committee is then completed by a permanent representative of the Supreme Youth Agencies of the states.

GP: It would seem that quite a few bureaucrats are involved in Germany's content rating process...

At GamePolitics, our coverage of political developments related to video games typically focuses on the United States, the U.K., Canada and Australia. One reason is that there is a lot happening in those places. Another is that, sadly, we have no fluency in other languages.

However, video game content issues are a political hot potato in a number of other countries, Germany among them. So we were pleased to come across an excellent recap of German video game legislation published in English by the Internet Business Law Service: 

In response to the [2006 Emsdetten school] shooting, the German states of Bavaria and Lower Saxony drafted legislation that would fine and possibly jail video game developers who create and market games containing ‘cruel violence on humans or human-looking characters...’

 

The Protection of Young Persons Act (PYPA) is a German legislation that protects youth... from the influence of inappropriate movies, games, and certain public places, including gaming places and those selling alcohol. The Act was enacted in 2002... establishes that video games or any other games cannot be publicly accessible to children or adolescents unless they are cleared and labeled for their appropriate age group by the supreme state authority...

Games have been banned and confiscated in Germany:

The County Court in Munich decided to confiscate all versions of "Manhunt" in July 2004... Other games, including... "Dead Rising," were placed in the Index and confiscated by a Hamburg County Court decision of June 2007...

The German experience in World War II apparently is driving some of the concerns over violent video games:

Nonviolence and pacifism form the cornerstone of the modern German society, where the memories of Adolf Hitler and the Third Reich are still vivid... A major cultural and moral dilemma in Germany is how to reconcile its determination to apply the lessons of the past to educating and protecting its youth, while remaining a free and open society.  

If the entire front cover of a video game box was covered by an age rating, do you think parents might notice?

A post over at GoNintendo shows what might be a new trend of plus-sized game ratings in Germany. An illustration at GoNintendo shows poor SpongeBob mostly obscured by the game's USK (Germany’s software rating organization) rating.

Curious, we checked out Nintendo’s German website and browsed through over three hundred games. We found only two that had the enlarged USK ratings: Wario Land and a math game for the DS. The rest were no larger than your run-of-the-mill ESRB, PEGI, or BBFC rating. 

The Marblehead Blog reports on a German ad campaign which uses edgy, Grand Theft Auto-like themes to promote Burger King.

The campaign's "Veg City" theme is centered around the idea of fresh ingredients and giving customers choices in ordering from Burger King's menu.

From the article:

The first thing to remember is this would never work in America. While GTA: Vice City is still the best selling PS2 game of all time, it came with its share of backlash... However, the German culture is quite different than ours and one has to keep in mind the intended audience when evaluating a campaign...

 

The [Veg City] website opens with a Vegas city style sign and fades into a true GTA-style map. Like most interactive ad sites, there are downloads, games, and a backstory.  Each part of Veg City has it’s own unique twist on the freshness and choice themes...

 In the video, the player is portrayed as taking out an old (i.e., not fresh) onion...