Three new case studies added

Tuesday, January 26th, 2010

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.

L4D2 Censorship Comparison

Monday, November 16th, 2009

A conscientious YouTube user has uploaded this video which demonstrates the differences between the censored Australian version of Left 4 Dead 2 and the uncensored international version.

A word of warning: the video contains material that the Classification Board has deemed unsuitable for persons under 15 to watch.

While this may seem excessive, games like Dead Space and Mad World both feature equivalent, if not greater levels of violence, and yet both have been rated MA15+.

The arch-irony of all of this is that it took users all of two whole seconds to figure out the simple steps to unlock the restricted content so that they could play the uncensored version. Now anybody purchasing the game on the PC in Australia will be able to completely circumvent the censoring and play the game as it was originally intended – which just goes to further prove the pointlessness of trying to prevent the flow of electronic information.

Left 4 Dead 2 goes on sale on November 20 in Australia, under an MA15+ rating.

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.)

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!