New Aliens Vs. Predator Game Doesn't Make It Past AU Ratings Board

An anonymous reader writes "Australia refused to give Rebellion's new Aliens Vs. Predator game a rating, effectively banning it in the country. Rebellion says it won't be submitting an edited version for another round of classifications, however. (As Valve did with Left 4 Dead 2.) They said, 'We will not be releasing a sanitized or cut down version for territories where adults are not considered by their governments to be able to make their own entertainment choices.'"

Comments

Good to see game developers put their foot down

[He Who Has No Name]

Refusal to put up with bullshit like Australia and Germany's ratings boards is the only way to bring them down. Tolerance for censorship only breeds familiarity and further tolerance.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[DiSKiLLeR]

As an aussie.... /agreed!

And anyway, its not gonna stop jack shit. Everyone will just buy the game off eBay.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[lwoggardner]

What are people supposed to do? No politician is going to get elected on the platform of allowing an R18+ category or doing away with censorship.

I suspect these guys hope you are wrong about that.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[Shakrai]

Australian isn't the US, we have a different culture and people in general are quite happy for the government to "protect" us from certain things.

Unfortunately that attitude isn't unique to your country and there are plenty of people here in the states that would willingly surrender their freedom and liberty in exchange for "protection" from various things.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[mjwx]

First off, this was hardly a surprise.

Refusal to put up with bullshit like Australia and Germany's ratings boards is the only way to bring them down. Tolerance for censorship only breeds familiarity and further tolerance.

Unfortunately the publishers boycotting nations will do nothing. It's the citizens that need to act. That being said, I agree with the publishers stance.

In case you don't know, the R18+ rating for video games in Australia is being held up by 1 man, South Australian Attorney General Michael Atkinson. There are already several campaigns underway to remove Mr Atkinson from his seat of Croydon. Video games are the only media in Australia that do not use the R18+ rating so the highest rating a game can get is M15 which is why L4D and AVP were rejected (extreme graphic violence), if they had of been books or movies they would have got the R18 rating and been released under our classification guidelines, because there is M15 is the highest rating our classification board can give to a video game they have no choice but to follow their mandate and give an RC rating to the game. It's the law that must be changed, that means changing Atkinson.

Our Parallel import laws are another thing, this way we can get around these stupid RC classifications as we can order games from the US, UK or Asia (Hong Kong being quite popular) so for PC gamers this isn't so much of an issue, for console gamers you still have to contend with the region locks.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[Mr. Freeman]

"How do you refuse when they are backed with the full force of law?"

You do something illegal. Very simple. Armed rebellion IS a legitimate choice.

I'm surprised to hear all of this "I want to change the government because it is poor and doesn't represent my interests.... but I won't do anything illegal". FUCKING PICK ONE. Either put up with the bullshit, or do something about it, don't sit there and bitch like a whiney fuck.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[Shakrai]

Contrary to the US, most every other civilised country in the world recognises that the average citizen does NOT have some God given right to own a rocket launcher!

Hyperbole. No civilian in the US owns a "rocket launcher", unless you are referring to one of these.

Unfortunately the American gun culture is now being exported (along with rap and like shit) and we're starting to pay the price with a rise in handgun crime.

Yes, it's all our fault. Your criminals were honest hard working folk until they caught a glimpse of the American gun culture, upon which they become violent murderers.

The average American is a sheep being led to the slaughter so some Ruger guy can afford another corporate jet, and the best part is, they have you loving it!

Ruger isn't that big of a company. I actually met their CEO once upon a time. Guess what? He was flying commercial.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[Rennt]

Armed rebellion IS a legitimate choice

Bullshit. The best one man can do to "rebel" is to assassinate an elected leader. Thus derailing the whole democratic process. If you could convince a group of men to resist they become terrorists. If you could convince a whole county or state to resist THEN you might have a legitimate contention, but the fact of the matter is the idea of armed rebellion is quaint and irrelevant today.

But all that aside, do you REALLY believe violence is an appropriate response to the banning of a video game? And what about when you realize the banning is largely symbolic because the game can easily be ordered online? Put down your guns and gain some perspective you psycho!

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[petermgreen]

IIRC the Xbox enforces DVD region codes.
Afaict every console that can play DVDs enforces DVD region codes for them. This does not imply that they use the DVD region coding system for games.

I've just done some googling and it seems the xbox and xbox 360 use the same PAL/NTSC/NTSC-J region system that most other consoles use.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[PopeRatzo]

there are plenty of people here in the states that would willingly surrender their freedom and liberty in exchange for "protection" from various things.

However, this "willingness to give up freedoms for safety" only shows itself statistically when talking about terrorism. Harris Interactive did a poll a few days after 9/11 asking the question and by 80%, Americans were willing to lose some freedoms. A second poll in 2007, halfway through the second GWBush administration, showed similar results.

It's interesting that of all the dangers in the world, the one that turns Americans into quivering masses of fear is something that is so statistically insignificant as to be nearly nonexistent. We hear conservative members of congress, big tough guys who like to swagger and threaten, worry about the 200 Gitmo detainees as if they were James Bond supervillians who could destroy American with their minds. Khalid what's-his-name, the supposed "9/11 mastermind" is actually so dangerous, they say, that he can't even be allowed to be tried in a court of law. Now that's fear.

Seriously, if you listen randomly to a segment of any US "conservative" media, one of the most common expressions you'll hear is "I'm afraid..." or "I fear...".

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[selven]

They aren't acting on behalf of a sovereign state, so they can't be war criminals. They're common criminals. It doesn't matter how heinous their crime is, everyone deserves access to the civilian justice system. Someone who murders his wife deserves access to the civilian justice system, someone who murders 20 college students deserves access to the civilian justice system, and someone who assists in the murder of 3000 people deserves access to the civilian justice system. It's called rule of law, you can't circumvent it just because you fell like it.

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[ultranova]

I don't think it matters how dangerous he is. Enemy combatants whose only connection to our country is the desire to destroy it are not entitled to access to our civilian justice system. It's patently absurd in my mind to treat these people as common criminals.

Indeed. Why, if declaring someone "enemy combatant" wouldn't put them outside the normal legal system, and able to be hold prisoner for as long as his captors desired, then how would the powerful get rid of their enemies? Why, the very thought that "everyone is equal before law" might lead someo to question the divine right of the king and the status of the aristocracy!

Kudos for Khalid, thought; he might be a freedom-hating murdering bastard, but not many people can have freedom die a little bit just by having their name mentioned on an Internet forum.

They are war criminals and deserve to be treated accordingly.

Very well, then bring them before a court. You did know that war criminals get sentenced or released on those, didn't you?

Re:Good to see game developers put their foot down

[Wyatt Earp]

If you have blood on your hands you are doing it wrong.

Guns let you have some standoff distance so you don't get splatter.

Apparently there's an I in democracy

[ghmh]

Quick explanation: Pretty much most of Australia would be happy to have an 'R' rating for computer games.

This guy (Michael Atkinson), however would not. He has the power to veto it and continues to do so.

Due to his geographical location, there's bugger all the majority of Australia can do about it from a voting perspective.

I don't blame game publishers for not releasing stuff here. Effectively we're all just waiting for 'Nanny' Atkinson to become senile and finally leave his post as South Australia's attorney general.

The thing that really worries me is how come they have this veto power for things like this in the first place....

Re:Apparently there's an I in democracy

[bmgoau]

The parent is correct. As a fellow Australian I am just waiting for this guy to move on.

Someone wrote to him a couple of times before getting an extensive reply attempting to justify his position, consider reading it here [PDF]

http://bunnitude.com/misc/files/R18-Michael%20Atkinson.pdf

Quotes
"I think you will find this issue has little traction with my constituents who are more concerned with real life issues than home entertainment in imaginary worlds"
"I am concerned about the impact of this extreme content on children"
"It is true this restricts liberty, however I am prepared to accept this infringement"

It's basically a long winded version of "will someone please think of the children!"

Re:Good

[mjwx]

When Australians decide to start acting like adults they can do something about their government.

Whatever do you mean?

Do you mean that this is something the Australian public wants? That nothing is being done?

Or perhaps you are one of those nuts that believes that if we are not violent nothing will be done. I'd like to remind you that all those guns did not stop an extremely invasive surveillance law being put into place by the previous US government.

Because you are an ignorant troll, you do not actually know what is happening. Right now the R18 rating is being held up by one man, the South Australian Attorney General Michael Atkinson. All the other state Attorney Generals voted yes on R18 for games. Australian law in this case requires a complete consensus, not a majority (this prevents the State AG's from removing or changing existing classifications as well). There are already campaigns to remove Michael Atkinson from his seat of Croydon in the 2010 elections such as the Gamers4Croydon organisation.

Please mod the parent troll, if possible ignorant as well.

Re:As an Australian Resident,,,

[icsx]

You are now mixing kids with adults and this game is not made for kids, it's for adults so your argument goes out of the window right now. Besides, how are the games as you listed wrong? I had tons of fun playing DOOM and Mortal Kombat. Not kids games, but i did play them as a kid, so did you propably but that doesn't mean that every violent game should be banned.

I love violent games. That doesn't mean that i go postal and kill everyone for real. It's entertaining to have some alien go up on a human, smack brains on the wall and go for next victim. It's fun. It's not real. It's a GAME.

Sure, i wouldn't want my kids to see that stuff, when they are kids but there are age ratings for a games for a reason. Why the hell Australia doesn't allow some games for anyone, not even over 18 years old?

Why some games are completely banned? Who are they protecting?

If I worked on AvP, I'd be partying over this.

[zullnero]

If a ratings board bans their game, even if it's a derivative piece of movie-spawned crap, it's pure gold for marketing. There's no way that the Australian government is going to block kids from getting the game...they will find a way one way or the other. But they're definitely doing yeoman's work in promoting the game everywhere by giving it a big "bad" rating. All the ratings system does is provide a free benchmark for a particular genre to strive for because they know that's what will turn heads and sell their product.

I know that if I were representing the company for this product, I'd be scheduling a big party to celebrate the rating and ban, not trying to make a political/free speech point out of it. The ratings system is an amazing helping hand to this particular venue.

Re:As an Australian Resident,,,

[Mr. Freeman]

Jack Thompson, you've moved to slashdot. Your so called "public safety measure" is really censorship.
Normally I'd tell you to get the hell out of my country but, well, you already did. So, good job. I commend you. Most people who live in the US throw away their freedom and ruin it for the rest of us. You actually did the proper thing and moved to a country where you don't have that freedom in the first place.

Thank you, really, thank you.