Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle (Entertainment Software Self-Regulation, abbreviated USK) is the organisation responsible for video game ratings in Germany.

[3] In January 2023, the USK also introduced descriptors indicating additional features in the game, such as in-game purchases and online interaction.

German retail stores, mail order and internet vendors tend to sell only games that do have a USK rating, due to the massive restrictions.

[citation needed] Up through 2018, USK had refused to rate games that contained imagery of anti-constitutional groups, including Nazis, Neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan, as required by Strafgesetzbuch (German code) section 86a, effectively making them unavailable to purchase in retail channels.

[5] In August 2018, USK announced that the German government would relax this Section 86a restriction on video games, as long as the imagery included falls within the "social adequacy" allowance.