According to iGEA chief executive Ron Curry, the change is part of an effort by the industry body to be more targeted in its focus:

“The industry has evolved dramatically and video games are a form of entertainment now enjoyed by an extremely broad range of Australians. The new focus of the iGEA will further take into account the fact that interactive entertainment is now accessed by consumers through a much wider range of entertainment devices and that the devices themselves offer greater entertainment options. Our focus is to ensure that our organisation remains relevant as we continue to see further convergence and divergence across all forms of entertainment.”

So, what does the iGEA do when it’s not reordering new stationary? Its brand new website outlines a new mission statement as follows:

To advance the interactive games & entertainment industry and to further the business interests of our members by:

* Informing and fostering relationships with the public, the business community and governmental bodies on matters affecting the industry;
* Ensuring appropriate legislative & regulatory framework for the industry is in place; and
* Engaging members on relevant matters and to create an environment that drives sustainable growth of members’ businesses

In a nutshell, that means they do things like lobby the government for changes to games classification, push for policies that support local development, campaign against software piracy, and generally lead the way on issues that affect the entire industry.

Long-term readers might recall I once suggested we get Ron Curry on board for a Kotaku Question Time. I might just do that now. If you’ve got any questions for im and iGEA, leave them in the comments.

The unprecedented comments over the past few days on the R18+ rating debate from South Australian Attorney-General Michael Atkinson has prompted a response from the wider games industry. Unsurprisingly, it appears there’s little common ground to be found on the issue.

Writing on behalf of the industry in his role as CEO of the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia, Ron Curry followed up his pro-R18+ stance on the ABC yesterday with the below reply to Atkinson’s recent remarks on Kotaku:

IEAA respects the fact that Attorney-General Atkinson has taken the time to address the comments made by Kotaku readers – kudos to him for that. While we may not always agree with his position we do respect his right to voice it and his candour in doing so.

We agree on a number of issues; adults play computer games, children should be protected and that simulated violence has widespread acceptance. We agree that readers should be able to see what we are arguing for or against (though the caveat we add is that it should be done so in a clear, logical and open manner).

However, there are (obviously) a number of fundamental issues on which the Attorney and the IEAA disagree. I think it’s obvious to Kotaku readers what those issues are as they have been discussed, debated and blogged ad nauseam. Saying that though, it would be remiss if a few of the Attorney’s comments were left unaddressed.

An R18+ classification for video games does not mean we will have this sudden exposure to extreme violence, sexual defilement and rape. This style of content is currently prohibited under the National Classification Scheme and extending an R18+ to video games (the classification itself is nothing new) does not broaden the parameters. To suggest so is disingenuous.

The debate on the impact of violent media on behaviour is an ongoing one, with equal academic arguments supporting views which are diametrically opposed. Proponents on both sides of the debate offer ‘evidence’ selectively and often in an hysterical manner to support their argument. To lower this important and needed debate, irrespective of view, to one of hysterical rhetoric or moral panic, serves no one well.

Lastly, we agree that the present law keeps the most extreme material off the shelves which, paradoxically, makes it even more attractive to children. Bit torrent sites are an easy option for the not overly PC literate to access these games which are then made available in home without any classification markings at all.

Simulated violence, wrongly or rightly, has always existed in society with widespread acceptance. Comic books, slap stick comedy, film, movies, Tom and Jerry and alike have always been part of media consumption. The content doesn’t change, but the delivery model does. As technology accelerates to convergence of delivery methods, we need to focus on content, as to do otherwise is short sighted. We need to future proof the protection of children and ensuring a classification scheme which deals with content equally allows everyone to understand what is suitable only for adults.

We look forward to Attorney-General Atkinson’s final approval of the discussion paper so that the issue may be debated in a wider forum.

PS. We are pleased the Attorney loves his Wii – we now consider him a gamer, just like the rest of us!

Ron Curry, head honcho of the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia, has vowed to maintain the push for an 18+ rating to be introduced into our classification system. Speaking to Jason Hill over on his Screenplay blog this morning, Curry says the public consultation process for the proposed R rating is a “significant move in the right direction”. Also on the agenda for 2009 is an effort to reduce software piracy, including establishing a new website “that will specifically assist consumers to better understand copyright and other IP issues and how it relates to video games”.

Speaking of the IEAA, we’ve lined up Ron Curry to participate in an upcoming Question Time, so get thinking about what you’d like to ask him. More news on that soon.

[Still giving them Curry]

Recession? We don’t appear to know the meaning of the word. The Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia has announced the local industry generated just a smidgeon under $2 billion last year. That’s up a remarkable 47% on 2007. So-called “family games” were the biggest growth area, with GfK sales data showing the genre expanded 137% while G-rated games also grew well above the year’s average. From all that, I think it’s safe to say the Wii had a very good year.

Here’s the full PR from the IEAA:

Buoyant Video and Computer Game Sales Nudge $2 Billion

-Family games drive record sales in 2008-

Sydney, 20 January, 2009 – Australia’s video and computer game industry has shown no sign of an economic slowdown by recording its largest ever sales result of $1.96 billion for the calendar year – an increase of 47 per cent from 2007.

The statistics, compiled by independent market research group GfK Retail and Technology Australia, revealed that sales of ‘Family Games’ have grown by 137 per cent in 2008, making it the number one genre, followed by ‘Action Games’.

Sales of games software in 2008 increased 57 per cent from the previous year, game consoles increased 43 per cent and gaming hardware accessories lifted a staggering 68 per cent.

According to Ron Curry, CEO of the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia, the results highlight the strength of Australia’s video and computer gaming industry and that entire households are now engaging in interactive entertainment.

“Sales figures for the past two years actually show that the industry has grown over 112 per cent since 2006. The industry has really witnessed phenomenal growth, which has largely been driven by people playing games together.”

‘Family Games’ were key to growth with the number of games classified with a G rating growing 58 per cent in 2008, and games rated PG showing a 33 per cent increase in the same period.

“There is a huge variety of games now on the market, with a wide selection for the entire family as well as specifically for adults, and it’s a great way for people to spend time together.”

Curry added that despite other business’ experiencing the effects of a turbulent end to 2008, the increase in sales figures for the games industry demonstrated that interactive entertainment has become as mainstream in popularity, as watching television or surfing the net.

“We have definitely moved past the days of the stereotypical gamer”, he said.

A recent research report by Bond University, titled Interactive Australia 2009, found that the average age of gamers is 30 years old and 68 per cent of all Australians play video and computer games.

*Retail sales figures by GfK sales data cover the period 31/12/07 to 28/12/08. IA9 report commissioned by IEAA was conducted by Bond University in October 2008.

That said, I think we will still have to worry about those politicians who decide based on emotional lobby efforts instead of hard statistical evidence. Numbers like these can’t help but look “wrong” if you still believe that games are simply toys for kids.

The money quote from Dr. Brand after the initial discussion of the methodology:
“This is big audience research by any measure.”

A more detailed run down of the methods, samples and statistical foundations after the jump. Oh, and one more sweet stat… 68% of all respondents identified as playing computer or video games. That’s more the two in every three Australians.

UPDATE: Sample and methods details updated to reflect the much more detailed information supplied near the end of the report.

Level 8. Methods

Stage 1. Introduction
Interactive Australia provides data on who is playing games in Australia, what gamers’ attitudes and behaviours are like compared with those of non-gamers, the nature of the games market, the importance of games in the family experience and the role of online access in game purchasing and play. The study is based on a national random sample of 1614 Australians who responded to more than 75 questions and over 300 data points in a 20-minute online survey run by ACNielsen Surveys Australia. Two units of analysis are explored in the study: the household and the player individual within the household.

Stage 2. Sample
The target sample was set at 1600 households in order to provide sufficient sample size to attract game and non-game households in sufficient numbers for statistical comparison. IA9 is based on a national random sample of 1614 households in July 2008. Multiple units of analysis are explored in the study: the household (n=1614), and all individuals within game households (n=4671) plus the participant adult from households without a game device (n=181). Of the 4852 individuals studied, 3162 (68%) were identified as gamers.
A game household was one which had in it any device for playing a computer or video game, excluding mobile phone, smart phones/PDAs. A gamer was a person who indicated they play computer or video games, simply “yes” or “no.” The response rate was 88%, demonstrating a very high effectiveness of the Your Voice Panel. The margin of error is ±2.4% for the national sample comparing all households and ±1.8% for all gamers.

Stage 3. Methodology

SURVEY CONTENTS
The national survey included 10 sections. The first section explored media and non-media leisure and was completed by all participants. The second section explored Internet and online access (all participants). The third section asked about the presence of game devices within the household (all participants) and was used to identify game from non-game households. The fourth section asked questions about the participants’ own game play behaviours and attitudes (game households only). The fifth section asked about all other household members and determined game-play status of each and the game play habits of one who plays most. The sixth section asked about classification knowledge and attitudes (all households). Section seven asked questions about parents’ monitoring and other uses of games with their children (game households only, parents only). Section eight asked questions about game collections in the home and about
game piracy (game households only). Section nine assessed attitudes toward games, their role in society and the impact of interactivity on media experiences (all households). The last section asked demographic questions including age, education, work status, religiosity, and income.

CONDUCT OF SURVEY
The national random sample telephone survey was designed by a team at the Centre for New Media Research at Bond University. It was designed to take the pulse of gaming in Australia and allow comparisons between game and non-game households, game-players and non-game players. The survey was conducted in July 2008 by ACNielsen Australia in Sydney. The online survey used ACNielsen’s “Your Voice Panel” which draws from 80,000 Australian households with representation in every state and territory. The Your Voice Panel is structured to be representative of the Australian population with the exception of online access by which surveys take place.
Panellists volunteer for and are recruited to be part of the panel and are included in a benefit structure in exchange for their time and quality responses to social and market surveys.

ACNielsen is the world’s leading provider of information and research to the consumer products and services industries. It has offices in more than 100 countries worldwide. In Australia, ACNielsen has been collecting and analysing information on consumer attitudes and purchase behaviour for more than 50 years.

DATA ANALYSES
ACNielsen provided the CNMRE with raw data from the survey for statistical analysis at the CNMRE. The data were analysed by study authors Jeff Brand and Jill Borchard. The data were analysed using SPSS V15 in the Windows operating environment. Statistical procedures included simple descriptive statistics such as frequencies, cross-tabulations,
means and tests of significance such as Chi-square and One-way ANOVA. For the purposes of including results for all members of a given household, the Vars-to-Cases procedure was used to create individual records for all persons identified by the participants in the study.

Data reduction procedures included reducing range for some questions to simplify presentation of responses. Some measures were combined into indices where obtaining a frequency or mean across a combination of measures simplified the presentation of findings. Missing values were eliminated for analysis on a per-question basis unless multiple measures were examined conjointly. For these, the case-wise deletion method was applied.

The GDAA has been very active of late, its most recent move an alliance with the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia on the issues of classification and tax consessions.

But that’s not all the organisation has been up to, so I threw a few questions Crago’s way. He was more than happy to fill in the blanks, and on a few occasions, colour the blanks with green and pink highlighter.Kotaku AU: Greg Bondar recently resigned as CEO of the GDAA. Who is currently handling CEO responsibilities, and when do you believe a permanent replacement will be found for the position?
Tom Crago: For the past few months we’ve had Mike McNabb on board in a full time capacity as COO. Mike has absorbed all of the CEO’s responsibilities, and of course the Board is working a little harder to ensure that the GDAA is flying the flag for the local industry. We will look at appointing a CEO later this year or early next year.

Kotaku AU: Is Game Connect still full steam ahead? Can you tell us what the GDAA has planned for the event?
Tom Crago: Absolutely full steam ahead. There are some details up on the site at present (www.gameconnectap.com) with more to be announced soon. Primarily, this event is about bringing the local development community together. We also try to bring in a number of international speakers to talk about their experiences working on big titles. Another component is the annual GDAA Awards, which recognise the best and brightest from the Australian industry.

Kotaku AU: How will Game Connect 08 improve on last year’s event?
Tom Crago: Naturally we’re hoping to make it bigger and better (as opposed to worse and smaller). I guess the key areas here are the speakers, in terms of both depth and quality. More details will be revealed in the next couple of months. We’re calling for abstracts at present, in fact, and anyone interested should hit the website.

Kotaku AU: What are the GDAA’s priorities at the moment?
Tom Crago: We have six key priorities:
• Promoting the Australian game development industry here and overseas
• Running our national developer conference, Game Connect: Asia Pacific
• Lobbying Federal and State Governments for a better deal for our industry
• Addressing the skills shortage by working with industry and educational institutions
• Providing a voice for our industry in the local and international media
• Arranging for participation and representation at international trade shows

Kotaku AU: What has the GDAA achieved in the last 12 months?
Tom Crago: I’d like to think we’ve kicked a couple of goals in each of those key strategic areas. Obviously the push for a better deal from the Federal Government has been a big priority, and we’ve seen some steady progress there. We also ran a very successful event at GDC in San Francisco. It really is the case that, internationally, Australian game developers are held in higher regard than ever before. That’s a good indication that the GDAA is functioning well as the peak industry body.

Kotaku AU: What avenues do developers have to communicate with the GDAA? What issues does the organisation help with on a day-to-day basis?
Tom Crago: Any member of the GDAA can call me any day of the week! We field a whole range of enquiries, and try to offer help and support both to developers, and to people outside the industry. In a typical week we will be contacted by media outlets, government, and educational institutions, in addition to game developers. There’s a lot of interest in video games. We try to put up a wide array of relevant information on our website, which is a pretty good first port of call.

Kotaku AU: We recently heard that the IEAA and GDAA are working together on both tax and classification issues. How is the GDAA assisting the IEAA with classification, and the IEAA helping the GDAA with tax concessions?
Tom Crago: We’re really glad to be working with the IEAA on a bunch of issues that impact upon both developers and publishers. They support our call for the extension of the tax offset, and we’re right behind their push for an overhaul of the classification system. Of course, we’re both on the same page in terms of stamping out piracy.

Kotaku AU: What progress has been made on the tax concession front? Do you believe we’ll see something put into effect before the end of the year?
Tom Crago: Our goal is to make it into the next budget. We’re sitting down with Government in August to take the next steps towards that goal. There is still a long way to go, but we’re hopeful common sense will prevail, and that video games will take its place alongside film and television as a legitimate screen art.

Kotaku AU: What barriers have prevented the industry from receiving financial support from the government?
Tom Crago: Well it’s fair to say the previous government didn’t have a lot of time for video games. I don’t think they recognised just how many Australians were playing games, and just how mainstream an activity it had become. It seemed a fairly antiquated mentality, which is something we come up against a lot. I see a lot of jaws drop when I tell people that nearly 80% of Australian households have a device for playing games, and that the average age of Australian gamers is 28. And that’s before you tell them that 41% of gamers are female. Gradually, these barriers are being broken down, and I’m hopeful the new Government will have a more up to date perspective. We have our fingers crossed.

Kotaku AU: Are there any issues facing the games industry in Australia at present that you feel haven’t received enough attention, such as employment opportunities, skill demand, etc?
Tom Crago: The skills shortage is the big one. All the major companies are looking for people, and we’re just not finding enough of them in Australia. I’m really hoping that will change. The strong Australian dollar is also a curse for us, as an entirely export-focussed industry. Of course, a near total lack of support from the Federal Government is a factor, but we’re doing what we can to address that. The games business is also intensely competitive and hit driven. To that end, the biggest challenge we all face is ensuring we continue to make games that sell well and that meet the quality standards that gamers demand.

Kotaku AU: Do you have any advice for games developers in Australia? For example, what they should be thinking about in the next 12 months?
Tom Crago: I think all our developers are big and bad enough not to need to take advice from me ;) In terms of general trends, though… who knows? Will the Wii continue to dominate, or will it be Sony’s Xmas? Will mobile finally hit its stride, and what will happen more generally in the handheld space? What about the rise of so called ‘casual games’? So many possibilities, which of course is one of the cool things about being in such a dynamic industry.

It seems the Game Developers Association of Australia and the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia want to make sure our current government continues to investigate the issue and as such, the two organisations have joined forces.

Said Tom Crago, Tantalus CEO and GDAA president:

“Australian game developers cannot be expected to be internationally competitive when global market conditions are ‘not level’. We owe it to the companies themselves to offer these incentives and we also need to make an investment into Australia’s ’smart economy’.”

We know how awesome tax rebates have been for game developers in other countries, so there are no problems as far as logic is concerned. The government just needs to get its act together.

Full release after the jump.

THE GDAA and IEAA CALL FOR TAX INCENTIVES FOR GAMES DEVELOPERS

MELBOURNE, June 12, 2008 – The Games Development Association of Australia (GDAA) and the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia (IEAA) have today announced an alliance to urge the Australian government to offer tax incentives for the local interactive entertainment industry. The GDAA and the IEAA have also aligned to support intellectual property protection and the introduction of an R18+ classification for video games.

According to Tom Crago, President of the GDAA, the local games development community produce world-class games and have worked hard to create a community of innovation and excellence and deserved the support of the Australian government.

The Australian games development community employs over 1400 people and in 2007 generated a total income of $136.9 million.

According to Crago, tax incentives have been deployed in Canada, France and elsewhere in the world, and have been shown to assist local industry to develop its potential. “There are over 300 companies in the video game industry in Canada employing over 8000 people. The growth of the Canadian industry has been in no small part thanks to Government support,” he said.

“Australian game developers cannot be expected to be internationally competitive when global market conditions are ‘not level’. We owe it to the companies themselves to offer these incentives and we also need to make an investment into Australia’s ’smart economy’.”

Ron Curry, CEO of the IEAA says that the popularity of video games rivals, and in many cases surpasses, releases of popular books and film. “Interactive entertainment is a huge, mainstream business and like our home grown film and television industry, it’s vital that our local games developers are given the best chance to be competitive on the world stage.”

GDAA and IEAA will be holding joint discussions and industry round tables to highlight the importance of government support of local innovation for interactive entertainment.

Greg Bondar, CEO of the GDAA said that “the joint GDAA and IEAA campaign will be called “Game-On’ to coincide with the GDAA’s Asia Pacific GCAP conference to be held in November in Brisbane.”

The other industry issues the GDAA and the IEAA will work closely on include the need for an R18+ classification for video games and strategic reforms to address the problem of games piracy.

If there was any game, past, present or future, that shows we’re in dire need of an R18+ rating for video games, it’s GTA IV. Greg Bondar, Chief Executive of the Game Developers Association of Australia, feels it could be the game that pushes us over the line:

“I think the release of GTAIV is a defining moment; it goes to show how far the games industry has come,” Mr Bondar said.

“The ratings system has not kept up.”

A few statistics pulled from studies by Bond University and the Interactive Entertainment Association of Australia also appear in the article. Here’s a sample:

According to the research, 62per cent of people said a games classification had no influence on their buying decision, but it also found there was mass confusion about the differences between M and MA15+ ratings, with 32 per cent believing that MA15+ signified a game was meant only for people 18 or older.

32 percent? That’s no small number of confused individuals. Wouldn’t it be easier if we, like, just had an R18+? Of course it would.

Grand Theft raises R rating prospect [The Australian]