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Fallout 3 Edited Version To Hit Australian Shelves
UgLyPuNk contributes this excerpt from Internode Games Network, which might interest Australian readers in particular: "Just last week, we told you that Fallout 3 had been resubmitted to the Classifications Board, in the hope that it would be deemed suitable for Australian audiences.
While the Classifications Board can take between a few days and a few weeks to hand down their decision — it seems that the edits made to the Bethesda Softworks title have been successful, with the second edition of the game granted a new MA15+ rating this afternoon. We don't yet have the details of the decision, but are currently finding out just what was changed in the game in order to secure the new rating — and release in this country."
Some games (like Fallout and GTA) wouldn't be half as fun if they edited out the adult parts. Now, it sucks that the Aussies are getting a watered down version (meaning they'll have to pay a few bucks extra to get an import or just pirate it), but At least the US version might not be total shit.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
All in game characters have been replaced with nannies trying to feed you the Australian bottle of ignorance.
No, but I did throw granola at a deaf person once
The European versions of FO1 and FO2 were edited/censored to remove the ability to kill children. I'm not necessarily a proponent of censorship, but it wasn't like the game was really missing anything.
The Bethesda games (Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, Oblivion) don't feature kids because you can kill anyone in game.
I wonder how this was handled with FO3.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
I'd rather see Wasteland 2. It's been 20 years, don't we get a sequel yet??
They'll all just pirate the (american version of the) game, and if they feel socially responsible, they'll also buy a copy in australia.
Then again, social responsibility may encourage them to boycott the australian release, causing the game to have horrible sales in australia, but phenomenal sales everywhere else in the world... that might make the publisher put some pressure on the classification board, and get them to change their policies.
I'll be importing. Screw the Classification Board.
I did it with GTA IV and saved about A$40 in the process.
the "bloody mess" trait was the first to go.
Since Australians are upside-down, they had to change the title to "Climbout 3".
C'mon guys. You write one sentence that basically just tells us where the info is coming from, and you don't even bother to get the name of the source right? Do you just hit the post button without reading over what you've just written? Who does that?!
Anyway, Internode... not Interode, seem to be one of the better Australian ISPs. I don't think it's really possible to not get raped in the arse on data here, but at least Internode are a little more gentle about it.
What makes you think the US version won't be edited? I remember the US version of Oblivion, for example, had no titties, while all the (continental) european versions did. Also, if you compare US TV with european or south-american TV, you'll find that there's a lot of censorship in the US (even for US shows and films - you can sometimes find whole scenes in the "export" version that were censored in the US). Not to mention the ridiculous american media habit of bleeping out words, as if people couldn't fill in the gap anyway (does the "evil" word become less "evil" if people only hear it in their heads, not their ears?).
I can sort of understand the UK censoring some stuff, like the USA (after all, not _all_ puritans crossed the Atlantic), but isn't Australia supposed to have been built by ex-cons? What exactly are they censoring? Parts of the game without beer?
I've played both the US version and the censored German version, and the censored problem had a few more problems. They hadn't only removed the ability to kill children, they had removed all children from the game outright.
Which now caused a few quests to be broken. E.g., you couldn't find the kid in the well, because there was no kid.
Some things were removed so brutally that it caused even more bugginess than the game had anyway. E.g., at the vault in the north-east, the kid with the doll was missing, but his idle chat would keep happening, because the game script thought he's still there.
Some of the alternate ways to solve other stuff also got broken in the process. E.g., once you got to the next town, now you couldn't have that kid's wrench.
So I'm not saying it was necessarily fatal, but saying that it's not really missing anything... is a bit mis-leading too, IMHO.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
According to what I've read on NMA, one of the major issues concerns drugs in FO3. Not that drugs exist or are used, but that the ones in the game are named for real drugs, such as morphine. They may have to rename the drugs to something fictional to get the game rating changed.
Alotta Aussies are going to be headed to Pirate Bay for thier Fallout copies.
Ohh spiteful one tell me who to smote and he shall be smolten!
While we do enjoy some of the most liberal laws in terms of broadcast medium, we suffer due to the lack of a classification (R+) that would limit the sale of a game to an adult.
Apparently there is talk of a proposal and the govt is seeking comment on an adults-only rating for games.
This surely makes sense as the average gamer is now 28 years old. In fact, 20 per cent of Australian game players are aged 39 and over.
Let's hope this is brought into line with the movie ratings where we enjoy an adult only R rating.
How much DRM the game is going to include?
How painful installation is going to be on average WinXP box, bloated with usual little things which makes Windows usable?
I'm planning an upgrade more or less specifically for Fallout 3. But I kind of do not want to find myself as before with Quake 4 which essentially refused to work on my new PC with SecuRom hanging and giving blank non-descriptive error. Playing with NoCDCrack old truth was proven again: games which are refuse to play, probably are not worth to play at all.
It would be sad if Betheda would spoil the fun with some DRM.
All hope abandon ye who enter here.
It's a way to censor things and still claim you aren't censoring things. You say "Sure, you can release any game you want, freedom of speech and all. However, to sell it in stores, it has to be rated by our government rating agency. Oh, but we can't agree on a high rating, so those games can't be sold. No, no, we aren't banning them, we just can't agree on a rating so you can't sell them."
Why do you think various groups are so hot on government controlled ratings in the US? They could use it in the same fashion to get around the first amendment (or try at any rate). They take over ratings and agree on everything up to T or M. However a sort of hush-hush gentleman's agreement is then reached to continually disagree about higher ratings. Thus they effectively ban things they don't like, all while claiming "No we aren't censoring anything, we just can't agree on the ratings so you can't sell your product."
But it wasn't my kids.
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
I've seen a few clips from Aussie TV on Youtube (such as Chaser's War) and heard more than a few curse words. Yet adults can't play an adult rated game?
I find this very strange.
... But what else have they changed? Am looking forward to details when they emerge.
What's interesting to me, however, is the unrated version of the game should still be illegal in Australia. This means anyone buying their copy from Amazon etc etc online because it's 1/3 the Australian store price - a right guaranteed in the courts by the ACCC several years ago - will be getting an illegal copy.
So, it would seem the classification board has perhaps inadvertently become a party to anti-competitive trade practices.
Someone should get the ACCC onto this...
Firstly - woot, Fallout 3.
Secondly, banned for drugs: http://www.kotaku.com.au/games/2008/07/olfc_report_why_fallout_3_was_banned_in_australia.html
Has now been re-rated, and is ok: http://www.classification.gov.au/special.html?n=46&p=156&sTitle=Fallout+3&sMediaFilm=1&sMediaPublications=1&sMediaGames=1&sDateFromM=1&sDateFromY=1970&sDateToM=8&sDateToY=2008&record=229214
Both links found via Wiki.
When the OFLC refuses classification to a game, it doesn't make it illegal to own it, it makes it illegal for retailers to sell it.
So it's illegal to sell American Psycho in Qld, so while I was in NSW, I bought a copy, its not illegal for me to own it in Queensland, and it wasn't illegal for the NSW retailer to sell it, so noone broke any laws.
The decision to allow R18+ games in Australia has been raised several times, but keeps getting vetoed down by this one religious idiot in government. We're all just waiting for that idiot to leave.