Age: 15
Number of children: 0
Country: United States of America
When I play games, it's mostly first person shooters, but really anything that I'm interested in at the time I'll pick up and play. I don't actually play games that often, probably five hours a week at most these days (unless Valve has just released a game or something.)
My hobbies include mapping, and computers in general. Really, anything with technical aspects to it I can pick up on and get into.
I am not a violent person at all. I have never been in a fight, or even come close to being in a fight. I stand my ground when I have to, but that's not common. Some would say I have anger issues, but that never manifests itself in me blowing up at somebody, so outwardly I'm pretty calm.
I believe that it's a very good thing the ESRB is in place. I think it works very well for what it's intended to do: inform parents of the content in games. It's a good device for parents or anyone else to judge the overall content of a game by, but it shouldn't overrule a parent's good judgment. If they feel their child is old enough to play a certain game, that's their choice. Hey, it doesn't get in my way, so I have no problem with it.
I can't see myself even considering having children, but if I did, it would be up to me and my discretion what games they would play. Certainly anything rated T or lower would be fine if they were 8 or younger. Certain M rated games would be acceptable too. By age 10, I was able to handle most any M rated game, and was already playing Vice City when I was 11, so I think the same would apply to most children unless they were brought up in a very sheltered family, and didn't know how to handle fake violence.
I don't think my parents really kept me from playing violent games when I was younger, but I suppose I didn't really have much interest in them. When I was little, I was too caught up in Pokemon to care about more serious games. As I said before, I started playing a lot of M rated games when I was about 10 or 11, and by that time I think my parents trusted I was mature enough to handle them.
Game companies/developers/publishers should definitely not be held liable for teen violence today, in any way. If parents can't tell that their kids are too screwed up to handle make believe worlds with a bit of blood and guts in them without acting them out in real life, then it's completely their fault for allowing them to play those games in the first place. End of story.