Borderlands Censored for Australian Market?

Friday, October 23rd, 2009

The Left 4 Dead 2 saga appears to have left the Australian gaming community somewhat spooked. Speculation is now mounting as to whether Gearbox Software’s upcoming FPS/RPG hybrid Borderlands has been modified for the Australian market. While hard evidence that this is the case is rather thin on the ground, the controversy does raise a number of issues in relation to Australia’s antiquated classification system.

The initial rumours of censorship stemmed from some peculiarities on the Borderlands page on digital PC game store Steam. While Australian customers could view the page, the ‘Buy’ button was, for a time, noticeably absent. This problem was remedied a couple of weeks later, but those viewing the page from Australian IP addresses noticed that the game was now listed as Borderlands Australia. The only other country known to have a region-specific version of Borderlands listed on the Steam store is Germany. Anyone who has followed the issue of video game censorship will be aware that Germany’s low tolerance for video game violence has seen numerous games (including Borderlands) modified for that country’s market. So perhaps Australian Borderlands fans in Australia do have something to worry about.

At this stage most forum users are willing to be optimistic. After all, Borderlands received an MA15+ rating back in August, and there has been no official word that anything untoward has occurred. But who’s to say a modified version of the game was not submitted for initial classification (as was the case with console versions of GTA IV) in order to avoid the very problems that have plagued Left 4 Dead 2? And what’s in it for the game’s publisher, 2K Games, in letting Australians know that they’re getting a modified version of Borderlands? Surely releasing this information will only drive consumers to either import the game– upsetting the publisher’s local retail partners– or to find a pirate copy of an overseas version.

Optimists have also taken solace in the visual style of Borderlands. The cel-shaded look of the game is far less realistic than that of Left 4 Dead 2, a game which is scarcely life-like to begin with. But looking overseas, the American ESRB rating summary for Borderlands gives some cause for concern. The following is their description of the violence in the game:

The combat is frenetic, and enemies moan or scream when they are hit. Damage from weapons also results in large spurts of blood, dismemberment, and decapitation. When a human or creature is decapitated, an effect resembling a fountain of blood will shoot from the neck for a few seconds and stop. Some weapons cause enemies to split in half, the top being separated from the waist.

Sound familiar? Remind you of a certain other game of post-apocalyptic survival?

All this speculation is probably just a storm in a teacup. It has been suggested that the quirks of the Steam page are simply the result of solving some glitch or other with the store’s listing of Borderlands. Elsewhere, there are claims that the Borderlands developers themselves told visitors to Perth’s GO3 Electronic and Entertainment Expo that nothing has been censored. All this sounds entirely plausible, but the lack off an official statement still leaves lingering doubt. And these seeds of doubt in gamers’ minds will only grow and prosper until an R18+ rating for games in Australia becomes a reality. For every game that is refused classification, publishers will be increasingly likely to modify their games in order to ensure smooth passage through the classification system. In turn, gamers will become less certain that they are getting the genuine article and become less and less willing to part with their money. This can only serve to harm the Australian video game industry at all levels.

Huge thanks to Sam Whitton for writing this submission! If you’ve got something to say, email me.

Valve loses appeal on uncensored L4D2

Friday, October 23rd, 2009

Coming in from GameSpot, it appears that the Classification Review Board has made a decision regarding the unedited Left 4 Dead 2.

And it’s not good.

Any hope that the Review Board might take a more balanced approach, as with the reclassification of F.E.A.R. 2 was dashed yesterday, with the board citing that there was “insufficient delineation between the depiction of general zombie figures and the human figures, as opposed to the clearly fictional ‘infected’ characters.” As a result, Australian audiences will be restricted to a watered-down version of the game, which removes the “depictions of decapitation, dismemberment, wound detail, or piles of dead bodies lying about the environment.”

This is just the latest in the wheel of classification fortune. (Again, the inconsistency of the ruling is bizarre, given that F.E.A.R. 2 pitted you against clearly human adversaries.)

R18+ Discussion Paper “Under Consideration”

Wednesday, October 21st, 2009

An unofficial response from the Attorney-General’s Department to an enquiry from a Senator’s office reveals that the upcoming discussion paper on the issue of an R18+ rating for video and computer games in Australia is “under consideration”.

Under consideration is public-servant speech for “don’t expect any action on it for a long time”.

The discussion paper represents the best chance of the wider public having their views heard on the issues. Once the discussion paper is released for public consultation organisations and members of the public are invited to make submissions outlining their views and arguements on the matter. As it stands the issue of an R18+ classification is just too small for it to be seriously considered by politicians, particularly with other far larger hot topics such as the economy and the recently reignited immigration debate. Once the discussion paper is released, the state governments will no longer be able to ignore the evidence-based arguments being presented by those in favour of the introduction of an R18+ rating.

The Standing Committee of Attorneys-General (Censorship) first agreed in principle to release a discussion paper in March 2008, however this was then nearly derailed by opposition from South Australian Attorney-General Michael Atkinson later on in the year. He then withdrew his opposition on the matter a few weeks later and the departments agreed to prepare the paper with a view to releasing it in early 2009. After they were unable to come to an agreement at the Standing Committee meeting in April 2009, the federal Attorney-General Department took over. It was then planned to be released by mid-2009 under the Minister for Home Affairs, the Hon Bob Debus – however this, too, was cancelled when the Hon Brendan O’Conner replaced him in June of this year.

Since then there has been no news about it, and the latest response from the department indicates it will be a long while until there is.

Thanks to our anonymous inside tipster for this information.

What the Censored L4D2 lacks

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

According to Kotaku, the censored version of Left 4 Dead 2 “no longer contains depictions of decapitations, dismemberment, wound detail, or piles of bodies lying about the environment.”

The Board’s official report states that “…the element of violence in the game has been sufficiently modified and is now able to be accommodated within the MA15+ classification”.

In other words, what was okay in Deadspace and F.E.A.R. 2 is not okay in Left 4 Dead 2. We can only hope that the Classification Review Board agrees, come October 22.

Please welcome Matt, R18+ Games Australia’s newest contributor. Thanks for helping out, Matt!

Censored L4D2 Receives MA15+

Thursday, October 8th, 2009

Yesterday at a Sydney press conference Gabe Newell, managing director of Valve Software, revealed that their publishers Electronic Arts have lodged another, censored version of Left 4 Dead 2 to the Classification Board. Gabe stressed that this was merely a backup version in case the appeal process to have the original, uncensored version classified as MA15+ was unsuccessful, and that they would prefer not to have to use the censored version if at all possible.

This morning, we awake to the news that the Classification Board have granted Left 4 Dead 2 an MA15+ rating for “Strong, bloody violence”. According to Softpedia, this classification applies to the censored version, as the appeal process for the original, uncensored version is not due to commence until October 22.

Thanks to everyone who emailed in this morning with this news!