GAMERT (Gaming) Round Table

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------

Hi Shanna,

We shelve our E rated games in youth and our T and M rated games in adult.  It's not a perfect system, since games like NFL 22 and the like are aimed at adults, but end up in the youth section, but we have never had a content related complaint from any of our patrons.  They already have the ratings on them, so we don't add additional stickers.  I think requiring permission slips to check out M games is getting into some sketchy territory.  Our card application clearly states that the parent/legal guardian is responsible for being aware of what their child is checking out and that we don't restrict materials (except a few physical electronic items), so maybe review the verbiage you have for minors signing up for cards to make sure parents are aware of the library's policy.

Good luck with the new collection!

------------------------------
Dan Major
Adult Services Librarian
Orion Township Public Library
He/Him/His
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: Mar 17, 2022 11:37 AM
From: Shanna Hollich
Subject: Rated M video games in collections

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------

Oh hai, Shanna! ;)

The way our system shelves sounds like it's already not applicable to your options as we have (more than) two patron codes for library accounts- Juvenile and Adult. Juvenile patron codes are restricted from checking out materials cataloged as DVDs and Mature-rated video games. We catalog our video games as "All Ages" (E), "Teen" (T), and "Adult" (M). The entire collection is shelved together- not in a designated "age" area but in a "video game" area- but how they are shelved varies a bit from branch to branch. At the location I work at, we have the Mature games on one shelf with Teen and All Ages interfiled in the same section but different shelves. 

The option 2 you listed appeals the most to me, based purely on personal preference.

------------------------------
Elizabeth Brown
Circulation Assistant III
Baltimore County Public Libraries
She/Her/Hers
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: Mar 17, 2022 11:37 AM
From: Shanna Hollich
Subject: Rated M video games in collections

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------

Hi Shanna,

So, video games are in constant flux at my library. I play a lot of video games and keep up with the industry but the others don't and are unsure how to approach video games as a whole. As a result, they're getting shuffled around everywhere. 

As for how my library handles them at the moment...

The YS room is on the second floor and the adults are on the first floor. There are video games on both floors.

• Rated E games are under Children's. The ones that say Rated E with a 10+ are still shelved with the Children's Video Games section.
• Rated T games are under Teens--so they're in the teen corner on the second floor.
• Rated M games are in the adult section. 

Up until several months ago, Rated M games were put together with the teen games. Teen/Mature was still separate from the Children's game section. The only difference is that the Mature games were cataloged a bit differently in that they had a restriction that our R-rated DVDs have--only people 17+ could check them out. 

If a 10-year-old tried to check out Skyrim the system would flat out refuse because of the lock in place. If a 16-year-old tried to check out Witcher 3, the system would still refuse. It was only for 17+ and up...

I don't personally think it's the best solution, frankly, but it's what we already had in place for R-rated movies so it was decided to follow suit.

Since the change patrons have noticed we have "less" games and I have to explain they've been relocated downstairs.  I am personally all for keeping games within the same area so patrons don't have to run all over the place to find everything.  I am not in charge of where they go, however, I can only order video games for the collection.

So, my library is basically doing option 6 already. As I said, patrons have been confused on where to find games because I mean, sometimes you want to play a nice chill kid's game after borrowing something as intense as Dark Souls and it feels a bit weird to have to go to separate sections for a variety of games. The Mature games have been given to Adult Services but they aren't planning on ordering any new games either. There are about ten games there. I'm hoping to convince them to at least get Elden Ring because that's been in demand. 

Hope this helps!

------------------------------
Julia Brennan
Youth Services Librarian
Bethlehem Area Public Library
She/Her/Hers
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: Mar 17, 2022 11:37 AM
From: Shanna Hollich
Subject: Rated M video games in collections

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 3/17/2022 12:37:00 PM
From: Shanna Hollich
Subject: Rated M video games in collections

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 3/22/2022 1:16:00 PM
From: Erica Ruscio
Subject: RE: Rated M video games in collections

Shanna, we do option #6. It is a single shelf next to the adult blu rays. We built our collection with a grant for teen services, and the teen collection is four shelves. It went amazingly well the first year, so I got a real budget for video games, and once I got codes for the new collection, have been buying adult and kids video games (kids is in the children's room and also one shelf, next to the playaway launchpads... it includes Peppa Pig and Paw Patrol and Mario duplicates and lego). We have a lot of families who use the teen collection for mario and pokemon especially since that collection has been around longer, so it is especially important to me to not put M games there. Our adult games are next to the tiny blu-ray collection we have. Not all games that go here are M games even though all M games go here, just to be clear. I have Stardew Valley and a few other not M games with adult appeal. I'm not in the business of managing what my patrons want to read, watch, or play (#2 in ALA's code of ethics). Parents can do that, but I don't want a system that makes it the library's responsibility to manage that. Just as we have no business telling teens they can't check out smut in the romance section, we have no business telling them they cannot check out Elden Ring or GTA, etc. It's important to me to have these games and make them available especially since so many popular xbox and playstation franchises are M. By putting them in the adult section, I'm making a distinction about intended audience but not restricting access. In my experience, this is pretty standard in large library systems (including one I worked at), and it shouldn't be any different for a small library. I hope this helps!

--

Erica Ruscio, she/her

Head of Adult & Teen Services

Ventress Memorial Library, Marshfield, MA 

781-834-5535 ext. 2207, eruscio@ocln.org

Connect with Ventress Memorial Library on Facebook & Instagram

When writing or responding, please remember that the Secretary of State's Office has 

determined that email is a public record and is subject to requests under MGL c.66 §10. 

Currently Reading

Original Message:
Sent: 3/17/2022 12:37:00 PM
From: Shanna Hollich
Subject: Rated M video games in collections

Hello -

I'm hoping to get a sense of what other public libraries are doing regarding M-rated video games in their circulating collections.

We have a very small and very fledgling video game collection that is available for circulation. It is housed entirely in our Teen Library. There are no other libraries in our county or district that collect or circulate video games.

Our Teen Librarian received a video game donation that they would like to add to the collection that includes several M-rated games. There's some question about what we should or shouldn't do with these, and I'm looking for some collective wisdom from the other wonderful folks in this RT.

I've done some cursory research online - there's an old thread in this discussion forum about Elmhurst Public Library doing some work/research in this area, but unfortunately the linked PDF is no longer available and I can't find it anywhere else yet. The other information I have found has mostly been about -playing- M-rated games during events, and that's not really a thing we're interested in exploring yet.

The assumptions that are in place for our specific library:
- all video games are cataloged and housed in the Teen Library. The Adult department has no interest in maintaining a video game collection at this time.
- I'd like to include these in the collection somehow, so I don't need to be convinced about the merits of doing so (or not doing so). Inquiring purely about potential logistical options.
- though we have three separate "libraries," each housed on their own floor of the building (Children's, Teen, and Adult), people of all ages are allowed unrestricted access to the collections on any floor. So children and teens can use and check out materials from the adult library with no issue, and vice versa. But there is this overall sense that everything on the Teen floor is specifically geared towards people ages 13-18, children's floor is under 13, adult floor is over 18. Most of the rated M games specify that they're intended for ages 17+, so they're sort of an edge case.

I don't believe in restricting library materials as a rule, so my inclination is to simply catalog these with the rest of our video games and make them just as available as we make everything else. But I've also seen some case studies where libraries ask parents to sign permission slips in order to loan M-rated video games to patrons under 17, for example.

At the moment, I think my options are something like:
1. Add them to the collection like normal, put them on the shelf with the rest of the video games, don't mark them or draw attention to them, move on with my life.
2. Do #1, but put a special note in the catalog to help make sure the patron knows that these are rated M and what that means. I'm a former cataloger, so this would be something beyond what goes in MARC field 521, since our catalog doesn't make that readily visible - I'm thinking it would be a special note or a pop-up that appears upon check out or something.
3. Do #1, but shelve them in a special place so people know they're rated M.
4. Do #1, but put some sort of sticker on them or a note that says "hey this is rated M!"
5. Add them to the collection but figure out a way to require parental permission, or to verify patron age before loaning (we don't verify patron age for any other materials, so this seems weird to me, and I wouldn't really consider it except that other libraries seem to be doing it).
6. Split the video game collection and have M-rated games in the Adult Library and other games in the Teen Library. We currently do this for graphic novels. We have no collections budget for video games so rely almost entirely on donations, so the video game collection in the Adult Library would basically be like 5 games? But we gotta start somewhere. This also raises the question of if we should split E rated games into our Children's Library.​ There's something nice right now about having all the games in one place and just telling any patron, regardless of age, that they can find games on the second floor.

I imagine this is a question that has been discussed a lot, so apologies for re-treading any old territory here. Thanks in advance for any input and advice!

Best,
-Shanna
​​

------------------------------
Shanna Hollich
shollich@gmail.com
------------------------------