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It’s easy to forget, especially when you’re an adult that can buy anything, but each video game goes through the process of being rated by the ESRB, and each game’s rating makes it intended for a specific audience. For instance, Final Fantasy 16 pursued an M-rating with an eye on exploring mature themes.
Taking to Reddit, one brave user wanted to know — What (was) the first video game you played with an M rating?
The replies are a trip down memory lane, with gamers young and old sharing the first time their parents let them move past the E-rated and T-rated games into the extremely exciting M-rated side of things.
Can You Recall The First M-Rated Game You Played?
“Halo 1,” wrote the post’s top commenter, referring to Halo: Combat Evolved, which turns 25 in 2026 and will be getting a remake in the form of Halo: Campaign Evolved.
“My mom didn’t let me play rated M games until I was 13 and before then I’d always have to play them at a friend’s house down the alley,” a commenter wrote. “Halo: Combat Evolved was my first one too. Good times.”
Of course, no thread of M-rated games would be complete without one reference to Grand Theft Auto, and either Vice City or San Andreas were a popular pick among commenters.
“I always found it funny how San Andreas was everybody’s childhood game when it had an M rating,” one commenter wrote.
Others cited Conker’s Bad Fur Day, because how would unsuspecting parents know otherwise that the same Rare that made Banjo was also behind this?
“Late night Blockbuster run with my dad, I wanted the game with the orange squirrel on the cover, and the rest is history,” a gamer wrote. “Life’s been different ever since.”
We also can’t forget Mortal Kombat, any version really.
“I accidentally rented that when I was like 7 or 8 because it looked like a regular fighting game (how I was able to do that I don’t know), but my mom was (upset) when she realized it,” one lucky gamer wrote in response.
In perhaps the most recent example of a parent letting their child play an M-rated game, someone said they were able to get Elden Ring this year.
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“Enjoy your journey kid,” someone wrote.
Personally, I, like many kids, were somehow allowed to play Mortal Kombat in all its gory glory, but my parents drew the line at Grand Theft Auto. It wasn’t until 2012 (!) that I got to play GTA when GTA IV came bundled with Max Payne 3 at Target, for some epic reason. The first M-rated game I bought for myself was Advanced Warfare. Yeah, I know. What a pick.
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