State of Decay is a zombie-survival title and it’s currently garnering a serious set of positive reviews but despite the fact it being released in most territories today, an Australian date is nowhere in sight.
On April 25 a member of the development team posted this list on the official Undead Labs forums, the studio developing the game. The list ran through the countries State of Decay would be available in upon release. Back then Australia was listed under ‘pending‘.
Today, in response to complaints about a similar situation in New Zealand, another member of the State of Decay development team stated international releases were being handled by their publisher.
So we got in contact with Microsoft locally.
“State of Decay is not yet available in Australia,” explained a Microsoft representative, “as it’s still waiting for classification from the classification board. As soon as that’s done you will be able to get your hands on it.”
So the issue, at this point, is classification. Were Microsoft late in sending the game in to get classified? Has there been a delay over at the classification board? We got in contact with the Classification Board locally to find out when the game was submitted, but we’ve yet to hear an official response.
It’s relieving, however, to hear confirmation from Microsoft that the game has actually been submitted for classification. Sometimes the cost of classification makes local publishers think twice about releasing smaller titles on digital services here is Australia — the good news here is that State of Decay will be released in Australia at some point but, at the moment, we have no idea when.
UPDATE: We’ve received a statement from the Classification Board stating the following…
The game, State of Decay, has been submitted for classification and is currently being considered. Games that are classified are listed in the National Classification Database on the Classification website at www.classification.gov.au. The database is updated overnight.
Not much more info, but it does seem to suggest the game will be classified sooner rather than later.
Comments
30 responses to “State Of Decay In Australia: Why The Delay?”
Aussie here and I am playing it with my AU Xbox LIVE account. How? Too easy. Create a secondary profile and email address, all details set to the US of A. If you’re having trouble with an address, just Google ‘Rodeo Drive’ and enter one of those addresses.
After the account has been created, you can use the power of the internet to find an online retailer who stocks US Microsoft Points which can be emailed directly to you. Redeem the code with your US account, buy the game, sign in with your AU account and enjoy the game.
Except that’s sort of totally not the point.
Does it have to be?
This commentor may have just releived a bunch of antsy non-waiters and probably saved ’em a few bucks too.
It’s always good to have alternatives and considering that it’s not a co-op game, you don’t really lose anything by not waiting
…. except thats against the Microsoft terms of service (giving false information), hope they don’t read your post.
Good thing it’s just the 360 and not the XBone, it probably could have seen your post and tattled on you.
I for one am very glad you shared this with us, thank you.
I had to do the exact same thing with Walking Dead and Trine 2, kind of annoying having to top up another account with MS points though
Thanks for the the tip. Gonna try this now, but wondering how do I create the secondary xbox profile? Do I just create a new Microsoft account with US details and then log into the Xbox website?
Edit: All good, figured it out 🙂
Dagnabbit!
I had no idea it was coming out so soon – wasn’t expecting it until August.
…and I suppose I’m still not expecting until August… dangit.
It should be here soon. From what I remember looking at yesterday the classification board was looking for some additional information which was submitted, but not till after the cut off for the planned release.
As it stands, Undead Labs were hoping to have the classification set by the next game update
That’s some nice digging work. Me, I’d have just exploded into a rant for a while. …Again.
By the time its classified the PC version will be out 🙂
I hope thats sooner rather than later, only found out about this in the last few days and so keen for a PC version.
Yeah they haven’t given a release date on the PC version unfortunately – but also they said if the game is successful they will be making it into an MMO – co-op goodness.
Now that we have R rated games, how is this moderated with downloadable games?
I’m happy to wait a bit if it means we get a more updated version that hopefully fixes the rampant screen tearing issues.
Uh oh, The Classification Board has seen the word Zombie! BanBanBan.
I can’t believe you people. I guess I’ll have to say it.
State of Decay? More like State of Delay!
Massive missed headline opportunity…
Well if it gets delayed again you know what you must do.
crap like this is why I got rid of my xbox and went back to pc.
You’ll have to wait even longer for the PC version
Just make a US account and purchase it. I have a US account for buying stuff not available for over here. The last thing I bought with my US account was Trine when the developers gave absolutely zero explanation why it was not available in Australia.
Plus you save money cause we pay 30% more for Microsoft points.
I love Trine.
That is all.
I didn’t realise how much it cost to seek approval for a game. According to http://www.classification.gov.au/Industry/Journey/Pages/CGnonA/Step3.aspx the fees range between $890.00 and $2460.00. You can also pay a $420.00 fee to speed up processing.
Aren’t you all glad that Big Brother is looking out for you. You wouldn’t want to play any nasty, scary games… Would you? They might have bad words and stuff in them.
The approval process is for any publication (game, movie, etc). When you take into account that persons applying for the classification are standing to potentially make thousands, if not millions, $2,460.00 is actually a very small price to pay.
Further when you take into account that the $2,460.00 is for ACB paying persons to process the application, and test the product, over a period of up to 25 days – thats only $100 a day…
That is cheap.
Its good to see an article discuss the possibility that it may be the fault of the publisher not submitting in time to the ACB, and not the ACB taking longer than their mandate.
ACB quite clearly state that their process can take up to 25 days (5 application + 20 process) to finalise a submission. They even go on to say that even though they try and minimise the time required to hand down a decision, the Applicant should consider the possibility of the process taking the maximum 25 days, and what effect that could have on their release schedule.
It would be nice for someone to openly state on what day the submission was made…
Now they have asked Undeadlabs for further footage, this will be the second lot of extra footage they have asked for. Rate the game 18+ and just be done with it.
Yeah I have a Japanese and an American profile for just these reasons.. and access to Indie games. However It isn’t the point.. I am sick of being an afterthought Country.. :(.