Digital Extremes hasn’t had much luck with our Classification Board. The developer’s Dark Sector had to have dismemberment and decapitation removed before it could be sold here. Now, there are two entries for The Darkness II in the classification database. Does that mean we’re getting a censored version of it too? More »
There was concern that South Korea’s rating board was throwing a monkey wrench in Diablo III‘s certification. If the game went unrated, then Blizzard’s planned worldwide release would go right out the window. More »
Zombie paradise action game Dead Island may have been out since early September, but it’s only now that the Germans at the wonderfully-named Federal Department of Media Harmful to Young Persons have got around to banning it. More »
We often complain about the decisions that The Classification Board makes, but what would happen if some of that power was given to the industry itself? Would a self-regulating industry, or one that co-regulates with The Classification Board, work? This was one of the questions raised at yesterday’s GAME conference at Macquarie University. More »
House of the Dead: Overkill Extended Cut has received a rating of MA15+ after SEGA appealed its original rating of Refused Classification (RC), which effectively meant the game had been banned. More »
A couple of weeks back we were shocked to hear that the Issues Paper for the Australian Law Reform Commission had only received 80 submissions. We’ve now seen a large influx of submissions, but we just thought we’d drop a quick post to let you guys know that today is the last day for submissions. More »
Early this morning the United States Supreme Court finally judged that Video Games were a form of speech, therefore deserving of protection under the First Amendment. In Australia, video games, or any form of media for that matter, are not granted the same rights. Adam Ruch, as an American living in Australia, can’t understand why and, in this compelling piece, discusses the issues with censorship in this country. More »
We’ve just spoken to a representative from Ubisoft, who has confirmed that We Dare, the ‘controversial’ game from Ubisoft has retained its PG rating. According to the Classification Board, the “overall impact… does not exceed mild”. More »
Dead or Alive: Dimensions, which was pulled from sale in Australia just over a week ago, has now been reclassified. More »
Today at Game-Tech, the Assistant Secretary from the Classifications Operations Branch, Jane Fitzgerald, discussed the difficulties involved in classifying thousands upon thousands of apps a rapidly evolving mobile environment. Could we move to a system that enabled the Australian Games Industry to self regulate and make everyone’s job a little easier?
“It’s quite a leap,” she claimed, “but not an inconceivable one.” More »
