Forum Discussion

Anonymous's avatar
Anonymous
9 years ago
Solved

Cannot play plants vs zombies because of age restriction

So I set up PvZGW2 and set up psn sub accounts for my children. I can't play online now because of age restrictions. I called Sony about the issue and they told me that the game reads the account info and that because my children are younger than the recommended age of the game it will not let me access it. So EA now gets to choose how I raise my children. ITS NOT OK FOR EA TO MAKE CHOICES CONCERNING THE MORALITY OF MY FAMILY! ITS NOT OK FOR EA TO MAKE JUDGEMENTS ON MY PARENTING!
  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    9 years ago

    Thanks to someone else's post - I have just got this working for my sons.

    The solution was found on the Xbox side of things.  See this thread here:  http://answers.ea.com/t5/Technical-Issues/My-son-can-t-join-multiplayer-games/m-p/5214178/highlight/false#M1519

    Here's what I did:

    1. Logged in as myself as the adult.
    2. Go into Settings: All Settings: Account: Family
    3. Choose the child account you wish to adjust
    4. Go to 'Privacy & online safety'
    5. Go to 'Xbox Live Privacy'
    6. The current setting will likely be 'Child Defaults' - Change this to Adult Defaults.
    7. Now click on 'View details & customise'
    8. You can basically go through all the settings in this space and allow/block/change whatever you like.  The only thing you MUST allow is under 'Communication & multiplayer': 'You can join multiplayer games'
    9. Once you have made the privacy settings you are comfortable with for your child, navigate back to the home screen and if your child is currently also logged in, log them out and then log them back in again.
    10. Now load PvZ Gw.  This is where it gets a little shady for my as I had tried so many other solutions based around their EA accounts that each of my kids had slightly different set ups.  You may have to make a new EA account for them or you may not......just follow the on screen instructions and hopefully, whatever happens still works.  For my 3 boys, opening the game for each of them after having done the above steps resulted in a slightly different procedure (because of all the messing around I had done with their EA accounts) but ALL of them worked after I followed the steps.
    11. You should now be able to go to the 'portal' in the game and enter a multiplayer game.
    12. Happy days, happy kids.

    Even though this sets the Xbox settings to the Adult defaults, I am comfortable with the set-up as I was able to customise (read: lock down) their online experiences as if they were still under child accounts......even more so than the Child account defaults.  I am very online safety aware and I am fine with all of this......

    Hopefully this works for anyone reading this and having the same problem!!!!

    Chris

5 Replies

  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    9 years ago

    I have the same problem (Xbox though.....it's platform agnostic) and I am equally frustrated (read p*ss*d off).  I have posted in this forum for a solution with no luck.  There is various forum posts throughout the internet about this 'issue' and the only solution I have found is no longer viable (it involved loading the EA Origin software on your computer and adding your child as a friend....but the software has changed and this no longer works). 

    I have three kids in this predicament who spent their own money to buy this game and can now not play 95% of the game because of this stupid account set-up.

    I wish you luck......I'm out of ideas.  If you find a solution, I'd love to know it and if I find one I'll let you know too!

  • Anonymous's avatar
    Anonymous
    9 years ago

    Thanks to someone else's post - I have just got this working for my sons.

    The solution was found on the Xbox side of things.  See this thread here:  http://answers.ea.com/t5/Technical-Issues/My-son-can-t-join-multiplayer-games/m-p/5214178/highlight/false#M1519

    Here's what I did:

    1. Logged in as myself as the adult.
    2. Go into Settings: All Settings: Account: Family
    3. Choose the child account you wish to adjust
    4. Go to 'Privacy & online safety'
    5. Go to 'Xbox Live Privacy'
    6. The current setting will likely be 'Child Defaults' - Change this to Adult Defaults.
    7. Now click on 'View details & customise'
    8. You can basically go through all the settings in this space and allow/block/change whatever you like.  The only thing you MUST allow is under 'Communication & multiplayer': 'You can join multiplayer games'
    9. Once you have made the privacy settings you are comfortable with for your child, navigate back to the home screen and if your child is currently also logged in, log them out and then log them back in again.
    10. Now load PvZ Gw.  This is where it gets a little shady for my as I had tried so many other solutions based around their EA accounts that each of my kids had slightly different set ups.  You may have to make a new EA account for them or you may not......just follow the on screen instructions and hopefully, whatever happens still works.  For my 3 boys, opening the game for each of them after having done the above steps resulted in a slightly different procedure (because of all the messing around I had done with their EA accounts) but ALL of them worked after I followed the steps.
    11. You should now be able to go to the 'portal' in the game and enter a multiplayer game.
    12. Happy days, happy kids.

    Even though this sets the Xbox settings to the Adult defaults, I am comfortable with the set-up as I was able to customise (read: lock down) their online experiences as if they were still under child accounts......even more so than the Child account defaults.  I am very online safety aware and I am fine with all of this......

    Hopefully this works for anyone reading this and having the same problem!!!!

    Chris

  • realitysquared's avatar
    realitysquared
    9 years ago

    Have you checked the settings associated with your Children's sub-accounts?

    I'm not at home at the moment but if you quoted correctly it seems that the game is reading specific information associated with the accounts of your children so there may be a setting which can be adjusted to allow the game to play. I have kids myself so I can take a peek into their accounts when i have an opportunity and see if I can give you more information but that would be my starting point for trying to find a workaround.

  • GamerBoyz1233's avatar
    GamerBoyz1233
    3 years ago

    Thank you so much! I contacted EA and the person in the chat didn't help me at all. This fix worked for us!!! 

About Plants vs. Zombies™ Franchise Discussion

Zombies trying to enter your house? Keep them in check and discuss the best gardening techniques on the community forum.27,652 PostsLatest Activity: 3 hours ago