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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."
If releasing a censored version of Half Life 2 turns out to be the only option in Australia, wouldn't it be catastrophic? It might mean that instead of buying the censored version, kids will rather download the real thing from the Internet. Aren't such restrictions quite pointless in general? Because less sales mean not only less profits for Australian retailers, but also less taxes for the Australia itself.
Sincerely,
Pan Tarhei Hosé, PhD.
"Homo sum et cogito ergo odi profanum vulgus et libido."
does this mean you can heal your character by visiting a prostitute, and then mugging her to get your money back?
I think this is purly agism between the older law makers and the 18-36 type demographics. Do these law makers really believe that adults don't/shouldn't play video games? Are the laws really that out of date? Really, Adults playing video games have been well established for at least 20 years, and adult themed games have been out of just as long. As long as there's a niche, there's a way.
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?
When I begged my mom to buy me a leisure suit larry when I was like 15 she sould read the box and say no, this is smut. I don't know why we can't live with that in today's protectionist world...
Bye!
For a country started by convicts they sure are conservative.
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.
I'm sure you're fishing, but what the hell. I live in Australia, and own PGR2. I bought it at a store, without doing any shady backroom deals, so I'm not sure where you get your info. Technically, we're supposed to have banned Manhunt, but you can still buy it, or could until about a month ago. It's true my country did ban the recent leisure suit larry (though from what I've seen in reviews, that may have been a good thing anyway), but when games such as Doom 3, Manhunt, etc do make it through, I don't see HL2 getting stopped.
This article is based on a box shot of Half-Life 2 that shows an 18+ rating in the UK.
.au rating). Soldier of Fortune 2 is a good example.
As others have posted, there is no comparable rating in Australia. However, this DOES NOT IMMEDIATELY IMPLY that Half-Life 2 will face any problems.
Searching the Euro classification database shows that a bunch of games got Euro 18+ ratings, but were released (unaltered) with an MA15+ (the highest
Most of the Australian concerns are because the OFLC (Office of Film and Literature Classification, the body responsible in Australia for ratings) have refused classification in the past for some titles - most notably, Grand Theft Auto titles and recently the new Leisure Suit Larry game. These titles had problems ONLY because of the sexual aspect (in particular with GTA the combination of sex and violence - specifically, the fact that you can nail a hooker, and then.. uh.. nail her).
It is _hugely_ unlikely that Half-Life 2 will suffer any classification problems unless it contains heaps of sexually explicit content (or messages of racial hatred, etc, etc) - which one can almost certainly safely assume is not going to happen.