Three new case studies added
It has been a while since two case studies have been added to this site, and now we are pleased to bring you three more.
Duke Nukem 3D was initially self-censored before it was released in Australia, and it contained no violence or nudity. A patch that gave people the uncut version of the game circulated on the Internet, and as a result, the OFLC attempted to reclassify the game before being forced to release the US version of the game.
House of the Dead: Overkill was not Refused Classification, but it is another example of how the Classification Board inconsistently classifies games. It has excessive violence and a high amount of profanity that is available for children aged 15 and over. Meanwhile, overseas rating agencies have classified the game for adults only.
Left 4 Dead 2 was originally rejected for the same type of content that was already present in the original game. Before it was rejected a second time, another version was passed with cuts made by the publishers, such as the removal of dead corpses lying around the environment as well as the amount of violence being toned down. It is now being available in Australia for children age 15 and over.
So grab a sandwich and a cup of coffee and have them while you are reading one of the case studies.
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Peter Wilson says:
There’s been two games that I wanted to play that were edited for Australian markets. I wan’t going to play a cut down version, so bought them online from overseas. A lot of my friends do this. We don’t do it for games that aren’t edited.
Sure I have to wait 1-2 weeks to get the game, but it’s better than playing a censored version. I would much rather buy in Australia and support business here, so bring on the R rating.
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Matt Balcam says:
A game which would be worth looking at for being badly classified is the Role Playing Game ‘Risen’. It was banned in Australia. I puchased a copy online and found nothing bad in it at all.
Smoking gave you experiance (the first one was about 28 Experiance points then each one after that was 1 Experiance point) but killing a single monster would give you more (50 xp)
The only other thing was that if you did a quest for a Bordello worker she would offer to ‘reward’ you. At which point the screen faded to black and reloaded at the next morning. I saw worse then this in Mass Effect(M15+ Rating)!
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Andrew says:
The R18+ video game classification should be treated differently to the R18+ DVD classification as video games have the extra component of the player role-playing violent and/or sexual acts.
It is the hallmark of a civilised culture to restrict certain material and not just have an unfretted free for all. Let’s face it this sought of media has a way of finding its way into the hands of minors or being viewed by minors whilst adults play them.
I think that sometimes the ‘Everything is a Human Right’ argument is a bit abused. I bet that the owner of this site would be the type that would support pornography as ‘freedom of speech’.
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Dave says:
I strongly belive that the ANCS needs to adopt the R18+ Classification for Video Games. The reason is, frankly, simple. The ANCS is there to classify content, NOT to censor or control the content which does come into the country under the pretense that a ten-year-old child may stumble upon ‘inappropriate content’. The protection measures on consoles are there – Passwords and parental locks are integrated into these systems for this reason, and also the games are un-playable without the disc. Furthermore, parents should have control over their children – and if a parent cannot exercise this control the rest of society should not have to suffer for their bad parenting. Australian needs to join the rest of the world and let adults play adult games.
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Tony says:
As a parent and a sales person I believe that Australia needs to fall in line with the rest of the world in the way of an r18+ rating. I see parents come in to stores all the time and a child will show there parent the game and it is ma15+ and the parent would let them take it just because it is ma”15″+. Parents see that and believe it is OK but then they get it home and find it was not suitable. By having this rating parent would see straight up its not for children. It is like pornography, alcohol and cigarettes, you wouldn’t let a child bring that up to you and ask can i have, its for adult. As a gamer I do not let my children watch anything over ma15+ but also do not feel like i need to miss out on the complete content of a game as it was originally created.