Bahraini to create Middle East standards for video games

Manama : A team of Arab game developers headed by a Bahraini expert will work to create new standards for video games in line with the culture of the Middle East.

“This will help ensure that the games released in the Middle East are socially acceptable,” Bahrain Game Developers Founder Ameen Al Tajer told DT News. 

Currently, developers follow two types of game standards- the European standard and the American standard. “However, they do not take into consideration the Middle Eastern culture,” Al Tajer pointed out. 

“When implemented, the Middle East standards is expected to help gaming companies such as Sony and Microsoft when developing games,” he said. 

Elaborating, Al Tajer said that there is a need for such standards because the culture and the norms in this region are different from the west and the Far East. 

“If a set of standards catering to the region is created, it would greatly benefit the gaming community in the region,” he said adding that they have not yet spoken to the big gaming companies yet. “We will be doing that at an advanced stage,” he added.

“There are games that contain materials that gamers here are not comfortable with. For example, in the game God of War, which is a very popular game, there is nudity and explicit content. The new standards will help gaming companies fine-tune their content before releasing to the Middle East,” he said. 

Al Tajer who formed the team last year is expecting to establish the standards by next year, which according to him would solve a huge problem for the gaming companies. “This is exactly what they need. One of the hurdles that the companies face in entering the Middle East market is their lack of understanding the culture.”

Speaking about his team he said, “We met at an event in Lebanon last year. We had already spoken to each other online but that was our first meeting in person. We have members from all over the Middle East including Morocco, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia etc..”