Users between the ages of 10 and 12 will soon be able to access Meta’s 3D social platform Horizon Worlds with robust parental controls, according to Meta.
As part of allowing preteens to use Horizon Worlds, the company is introducing an age-rating system to experiences so parents can understand what may be appropriate and work with preteens to manage their access accordingly.
For a preteen to access Horizon Worlds, they must use their parent-managed account to request access to the app itself. After approval, they can then request access to specific experiences. Alternatively, parents can blanket-approve access to experiences within certain categories.
The new age categories for Horizon Worlds have been designed specifically to enable preteens to engage with them in a way parents are comfortable with. The age ratings will be ages 10+, ages 13+, and ages 18+ (though Meta notes this may vary by region).
For additional safety, voice chat will be disabled by default for parent-managed accounts, with the ability for parents to grant permission to voice chat to selected contacts. Additionally, preteens will be shown as offline by default and will have Horizon Worlds’ ‘personal boundary’ setting enabled.
Meta announced earlier this month (August) that they intend to continue updating Horizon Worlds as part of their ongoing commitment to the Metaverse.
Horizon Worlds is a 3D social platform and part of Meta’s metaverse, a VR ecosystem for users of the company’s VR headsets. When a user enters Horizon Worlds, they land in the Plaza, a sort of hub area where they can interact with others who are milling around or enter into a large range of ‘experiences’.
Some of the experiences have been created by Meta themselves, and they suggest a few for preteen players to get started with (edutainment like The Space Station or The Aquarium, and games like Citadel and Spy School). However, the vast majority are user-created with the in-game creation tools.
User-created experiences are rated based on information supplied by the creator, and Meta states that they might change ratings, unpublish, or even delete experiences that do not provide complete and accurate information for rating. They also explicitly prohibit certain content across all experiences, such as illegal drug use, anything sexually explicit, and any real-life violence.
Featured image credit: Meta
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