Australia Could Finally Get R18+ Games

angry tapir writes "Australia may finally get an adults only, R18+ classification for computer games, with the federal government releasing a discussion paper summarizing the key arguments for and against an R18+ classification. Submissions are currently being sought from the community on whether the Australian National Classification Scheme should include an R18+ category for computer and video games. In the past the board responsible for classifying games and movies has banned some titles outright because of the lack of an adults only classification — Aliens Vs. Predator is just the most recent in a long line. The Attorney-General's report on the issue is available online."

Comments

Banning doesn't do what they think it does

[afaik_ianal]

Aside from the usual arguments surrounding the average age of game players and my right to choose my entertainment (within reason), and shoehorning games into less restricted categories (GTA-IV, anyone?), I believe outright banning R18+ games probably increasing the availability of these games to minors.

For games that are available in stores, children are the least likely to be able to afford the games. Relative to adults, your average minor is probably going to pirate a game rather than buy it (regardless of legality and classification).

If you ban R18+ games, then adults are going to pirate the game too - if I want to play a game I can't buy in the store, I know I will. In the day of BitTorrent, more people downloading an item in a geographic area, the more accessible that item becomes in that area.

All they're doing by banning R18+ games, is giving minors more seeders when they go ahead and download it anyway.

Re:Banning doesn't do what they think it does

[williamhb]

Aside from the usual arguments surrounding the average age of game players and my right to choose my entertainment (within reason), and shoehorning games into less restricted categories (GTA-IV, anyone?), I believe outright banning R18+ games probably increasing the availability of these games to minors.

For games that are available in stores, children are the least likely to be able to afford the games. Relative to adults, your average minor is probably going to pirate a game rather than buy it (regardless of legality and classification).

If you ban R18+ games, then adults are going to pirate the game too - if I want to play a game I can't buy in the store, I know I will. In the day of BitTorrent, more people downloading an item in a geographic area, the more accessible that item becomes in that area.

All they're doing by banning R18+ games, is giving minors more seeders when they go ahead and download it anyway.

Evidence, please.

The empirical evidence from the current regime is that where a game is refused classification, the publisher will almost always make the necessary alterations (toning down certain amounts of gore etc) in order to achieve an MA15+ rating. The current system has thus been reasonably effective -- ensuring that games are made suitable for a 15+ audience, and given that anyone in the 15-18 category is unlikely to be prevented from accessing a title simply by its having a higher rating that is a defensible approach (by which I mean "there is an argument for it" not "it is the correct approach").

To respond to your specific comments -

Children in Australia are very easily able to afford to purchase computer games -- at current prices, a game is likely to be around one to two months' pocket money (not counting additional money from a part-time job, which many 15-18 year olds have).

Regarding BitTorrent, the speed with which a title can be downloaded (ie, the number of active downloaders) isn't actually relevant to availability. There's no part of classification law that says "it's better if you have to leave the download going overnight". The speed of the download isn't difficulty-to-obtain, it's just latency-to-obtain, and I doubt anyone would consider a few extra hours of waiting significant.

In reality, the vast majority of items made illegally available to minors are purchased from shops in defiance of 18+ ratings: cigarettes and alcohol. The number of 16 year-olds who can get a PS3 to play an illegally downloaded game, while large, is much fewer than the number who can get cigarettes illegally from the local store. From an evidence-based perspective, if you want to prevent illegal access by minors, it really is physical availability from shops that should be targeted.

Re:Banning doesn't do what they think it does

[CoolGopher]

He has however stated that if the public consultation results in overwhelming support in favour of it, he might reconsider.

If you're in .au - consider downloading and filling in the feedback template and email it back. It'll take 10 minutes of your time. The think-about-the-children zombie horde will obviously spend their individual 10 minutes piping up against it, so if we want to have a chance at getting some sanity, we the .au geeks, nerds, gamers and other sensible people need to do our part. I already have.

Denying sexual maturity

[shadowbearer]

    When does this shit stop?

    Most human beings reach sexual maturity - that is, the age where their hormones are in full swing - somewhere between the ages of 8 and 14 as measured by earth's orbit around the sun.

  At that point they are capable of producing offspring. At that point, their bodies have entered into the physical stages where producing offspring is a *physical imperative* - ie, the hormones that produce the desire to mate are in full swing.

  Now this seems to have worked for hundreds of thousands, if not millions of years. After all, we are still around as a species. This is all very well established scientific biological, and realistic, fact.

  So... this whole concept of offspring not being able to view other members of their species sans clothing, or in sexual congress, or to engage in said sexual congress themselves, surely must be a societal influence. Am I correct so far?

  If so, then if one takes the view of many of those who feel that those members of society younger than a certain age (it differs in various societies, but let's take 18 orbits of the earth about it's star as the number here, because it's what's being bandied about) aren't "ready" to procreate, aren't "ready" to raise those offspring to be productive members of said society, where does the fault lie? Does it lie with the offspring having offspring, or a failure of the society to teach those humans how to raise their own offspring before and during the time when they become physically capable, indeed even when their bodies demand, that they produce offspring?

  Put more simply, maybe instead of telling kids they can't have sex, maybe we as a society should be teaching them *before* puberty what it all means, that they will experience it, and when they do, to guide them thru the process, rather than telling them "Sorry, no, you can't do that. Because we say so."

  Now, wait a minute. One of the driving beliefs amongst many of those in many societies which restrict the ages at which young human beings can procreate is a belief in a supernatural deity who, in the words of their own creed, once said "be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth". Yet the same holders of that belief also tend to be in the forefront of those who tell young human beings that they cannot procreate, until they have reached some arbitrarily decided "age of reason"; which with some of them seems to be any age younger than they are, regardless of the age they have reached.

    Not only that, but many members of that society seem to have reached the conclusion that viewing an unclothed member of their own species seems to fall within some concept called "evil" - which is apparently bad - and which makes one wonder how those members of the species seem to reproduce themselves in such great numbers. Perhaps they do it in the dark. ...

  Does anyone else ever wonder whether or not human society is becoming more and more irrational? Nevermind, redundant question ;)

SB