Also note that the characters portrayed in some stories are high school crowd itself indulging in such behaviour.
Filtering and gating for tweens to protect them from suggestive sexual content is superiorly lacking. The hedonic monetisation tactics mentioned above appeared in the very first story played!. To be fair, it does seem that the developers seem to be cracking down on such stories when they receive complaints but it still leaves room to do a lot more. Youtube is rife with such suggestive and revealing story videos:Īnd it did seem even the game's own community forums erupted with such issues becoming mainstream, below is an example of a complaint by community members: I suspected during my research that young players who create their own stories in order to make them popular (& earn rewards) will resort to include more suggestive, daring & shady plots.Īnd it does seem to be the case. This app could very easily turn in to a soft porn animatics media rather than rich quality content, time-shifted media platform, which will be a real shame. I did not see any such warning in this app.īut here is the real danger: If the suggestive content & deliberate hedonic monetisations tactics are left unchecked can it lead to conversion of this platform to suggestive soft porn content? Having worked in education gaming and created mass adopted educational games for US schools from K-7 to K-13 audiences, I know how strict COPA compliances and laws are for content filtering as well as psychology of this demographics. If not filtered may severely impact the minds and decision making choices of young target audience. Teach impressionable players it is OK to pay up for hiding dirty deeds!. A very direct and extortionist F2P model. Hedonic moments for sensual gratification. Hard Currency sinks seem to be promoting and inserted at most opportune hedonic moments! Any impressionable kid can press accept and get into the app. Are soft references to suggestive adult/sexual content finding their way to young minds? (I will show elaborate examples of this below)Īge gating might be there, but such optional (Are you age 18+ etc?, pop up permission) controls do not guarantee filtering. Are such choices masquerading as a game getting past parent's radar?. 
Is it morally ok to make such suggestions to such a young impressionable player base?.
This can be a more serious issue IMO as a large player base of this app are teens and potential tweens, which raises following questions: Suggestive Adult Content Exposure to Tweens But if not, it should be high on developers radar. UX Take : It might be such filtering of content affecting the storyline in different geographies already exists. This is not only good for the players as it shows the developer respects their local beliefs, but also helps avoid any backlash affecting the apps popularity. Good UX needs to ensure that players with different cultural background see content which they don't find sensitive or offensive. While I tested the app in New Zealand store (where acceptance is high), I am not aware if there is a different sensitivity or filter setting in countries which are not so tolerant.
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