Possible Half Life 2 Troubles in Australia

Voodoo Extreme put up a quick piece on possible legal troubles HL2 may face in Australia. "In Australia, no games have been accepted if they fit into the R(18+) category, so this means HL2 needs to fit into at most the highest category of MA(15+), or it will be refused classification."

Comments

hints of HL2 content?

[WormholeFiend]

does this mean you can heal your character by visiting a prostitute, and then mugging her to get your money back?

Australia hah

[weizur]

For a country started by convicts they sure are conservative.

Wow. Thanks Australia!

[node 3]

Thanks for making America look "enlightened" by comparison. It's kind of rare these days.

You kind of overdid it with Howard though. You didn't have to re-elect him just for us.

Re:Some things

[Dark Lord Seth]

Anyways, why can't they just treat the games like movies and have bold warnings on the package and allow the reatailers to self-enforce the restrictions on child use of video games?

Lack of lobbyist organisations. If Aussieland were to ban... Say, the Alien vs Predator movie, the entire aussie equivalent of the MPAA would get worked up and fight the goverment over it. Maybe we should form a gamer's lobbyist group called the Gamer's Network Association of America, or GNAA for short.

Then again, maybe not...

Easy

[maddh]

Its nothing another 6 month global release delay couldn't fix, right?

Re:Some things

[ajd1474]

The worst part is, it ISNT even parents that are complaining! Manhunt was originally classified MA15+ but after a complaint by a Western Australian Minister, Michelle Roberts (the minister for Justice), was banned. If parents were the ones complaining then that would be totally OK, because that means that they are actually parenting. At the moment Manhunt gets banned, but violence like that seen in Doom is A-OK. The fact is that parents dont know what their kids play to know that they should be complaining. Oh the irony.