Project 2025 Video Games: The Impact to Gamers and Developers
Viral posts say Project 2025 would ban video games. It doesn't. Here is what the document actually proposes, which parts could still touch games, and what has happened since.
If you game, you have probably seen the posts: Project 2025 is coming for video games. Some say it bans them outright. Others say it will wipe out online play, mods and chat.
Here is what the document actually says, which parts could still affect games and the people who make them, and what has happened since the 2024 election.
What Project 2025 is
Project 2025 is a policy plan led by the Heritage Foundation. Its centerpiece is a book of more than 900 pages called Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, published in 2023, with chapter-by-chapter proposals for a conservative administration (Heritage Foundation, 2023). Hundreds of contributors worked on it (Brookings, 2024).
Some of its authors now hold power. Brendan Carr wrote the chapter on the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and Trump chose him to lead the FCC (Al Jazeera, 2024).
Does Project 2025 ban video games?
No. The document has no chapter on video games and no proposal to ban or regulate them. Game Developer, a trade publication for the industry, reviewed it in 2024 and drew its concerns about games from other sections, by inference (Game Developer, 2024).
That does not mean games are untouched. Three parts of the plan could reach them.
| What people say | What the document says |
|---|---|
| Project 2025 bans video games | No proposal on video games at all |
| Government ratings will replace the ESRB | No such proposal |
| Gamers will need real-name, ID-verified accounts | No such proposal for games |
| Pornography will be outlawed | True: the foreword says so, and defines it broadly |
| Section 230 will be gutted | Partly: it proposes narrowing protection for dominant platforms that remove political speech |
1. The foreword on pornography
In the foreword, Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts writes that "pornography should be outlawed" and that the people who make and distribute it should be imprisoned. He describes pornography to include the spread of "transgender ideology" (Heritage Foundation, 2023).
Critics, including Game Developer's Bryant Francis, argue that a definition that broad could be used against games with sexual content, or even games that simply include transgender characters. The foreword does not spell out how that would work, so this is a concern about where the language could lead, not a stated plan.
2. Section 230 and the biggest platforms
Section 230 is the federal law that generally protects websites and apps from being sued over what their users post. Carr's FCC chapter proposes that the largest platforms lose some of that protection if they remove "protected political speech," with exceptions for things like illegal content and smaller or specialized sites (Brookings, 2024).
The proposal is aimed at social media, not games. But games with chat, user-made content or streaming tie-ins rely on the same law, so any change to how Section 230 is read could reach them.
3. Kids online
The plan says big tech platforms are harming children's mental health but offers few specific policy steps on it (Brookings, 2024). Child safety is the most likely route for any future rules that affect games.
Supporters of Project 2025 say these proposals protect children and stop big tech from silencing conservative speech. Critics say the same language gives the government a way to police content it dislikes.
What has happened since 2025
Games are still protected speech. In Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association (2011), the Supreme Court struck down a California law restricting the sale of violent games to minors, ruling that video games are protected by the First Amendment (Justia). Any law targeting game content would have to clear that ruling.
Age verification got a green light. In June 2025, in Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, the Supreme Court upheld a Texas law requiring age verification for pornography websites (Bloomberg Law, 2025). The ruling covers adult sites, not games, but it makes more state age-check laws for online content likely. Age checks raise real privacy questions, because they often mean handing over an ID.
The industry is big. Americans spent $58.7 billion on video games in 2024 (Entertainment Software Association, 2025). Rules that touch platforms, payments or age checks can affect a lot of players and a lot of jobs.
Why this matters for women
Broad definitions of "harmful" or "obscene" content have a long history of being used against women's stories and LGBTQ+ people first. When a policy document defines pornography to include transgender identity, the risk is less about one game and more about who gets to decide what counts as harm.
What you can do
- Read the source. The full Mandate for Leadership is free on the Heritage Foundation site. Search it before you share a claim about it.
- Watch your state. Age verification and online child safety bills are moving at the state level. Your state legislature's website lists them.
- Contact your representatives. Changes to Section 230 would have to come from Congress or the courts.
- Check before you share. Posts that say a document "bans" something should be able to point to the page.
Questions people ask
Does Project 2025 ban video games?
No. Project 2025's Mandate for Leadership has no proposal to ban or regulate video games. Concerns about games come from its broad definition of pornography in the foreword and its proposals on Section 230 and kids online.
Could the government ban video games?
It would be very difficult. The Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association (2011) that video games are protected speech under the First Amendment.
Who wrote the Project 2025 chapter on the FCC?
Brendan Carr, who was later chosen by President Trump to chair the Federal Communications Commission.
References
- Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise (2023), Heritage Foundation
- Project 2025: What a second Trump term could mean for media and technology policies (2024), Brookings
- How will Project 2025 impact game developers? (2024), Game Developer
- Trump picks Big Tech critic who wrote Project 2025 chapter to lead FCC (2024), Al Jazeera
- Brown v. Entertainment Merchants Association, 564 U.S. 786 (2011), Justia
- Porn-site age verification law upheld by US Supreme Court (2025), Bloomberg Law
- U.S. consumer spending on video games totaled $58.7 billion in 2024 (2025), Entertainment Software Association
