http://www.kotaku.com.au/2013/06/breaking-saints-row-iv-has-been-refused-classification/

You can't explain that...

Go go gadget moral police?

This seems like a very slippery slope to me.

Sure I can. It's Australia. Australia has some stupid policies regarding the way video games are priced and handled.

Is everyone in Australia 10yrs old? I see no reason to ban the game, less the plan to ban everything available to over 18's

Censorship. How lovely.

It's unclear whether this game ought to have been banned, but in general these matters are not that straightforward. There is a fairly compelling body of empirical evidence that depictions of sixual violence is a probabilistic cause of sixual violence. It is not unreasonable for the state to think that there is at least a prima facie reason to restrict games that contain depictions of sixual violence, given their harmful consequences. Of course, the overall decision of whether a game should be banned will depend on how we weigh those harmful consequences against the harm of censorship.

THe man who banned it is called Donald McDonald. This is clearly his revenge on the bullies.

The sixual violence must be pretty bad for it to exceed 18+

I wasn't entirely convinced to buy this, but now I'm getting it as a protest towards our government.

His name is Donald McDonald so clearly he is right.

When i read that in the article, i thought this is another knee jerk reaction article, the writer doesnt know the full facts, maybe there is a good reason and trying to say theres a fault with the censorship board without holding the full facts in hand.

But the reason the 18+ was implemented was to let advlts purchase games with advlt content, so id like to know what they saw as specifically offensive.

If someone commits a crime, it won't be because they played a video game (or read a book/watched a TV show for that matter).

Everyone plays GTA, not everyone kills, steals or is involved in drug/human trafficking. Real evidence that game cause crime is unfounded - these crimes existed well before we had underwear.

You're missing the point. Of course playing a game depicting sixual violence is by itself neither necessary nor sufficient for committing sixual violence; it depends on all sorts of other things as well (upbringing, etc.). But that doesn't mean that it doesn't raise the probability of committing sixual violence.

It's like having a very fatty diet. Eating fatty food by itself is neither necessary nor sufficient for suffering heart disease; it depends on all sorts of other things as well (genes, exercise, etc.). But having a fatty diet is still a probability raiser of suffering heart disease.

Edit: but just to reiterate, it doesn't follow that any game depicting sixual violence should be banned. Presumably we also need to consider (i) the conditions under which it increases the likelihood of sixual violence, (ii) how widespread or frequent those conditions are, (iii) how much these games increase the probability of sixual violence, and (iv) most obviously, the harm caused by censorship and restricting self-expression.

I guess Australia doesn't like the gaming industry.

It used to be because we didn't have an advlts rating for video games, but we do now, soooo............ ????

Now we just need advlts.

Agreed, it's totally unclear whether this particular game should have been banned. It may be that should not have been. All I am asking for---although I realise I am fighting an uphill battle on a GAMING forum---is for people to take a step back, not be so dogmatic, and understand that while everyone agrees that censorship is bad, sometimes that needs to be weighed up against the potential harms that material can cause.

Solution: Rename the morphine (or, in this case, diacetlymorphine) to something slightly related and re-apply

(cookie if you get the reference)

I thought they had just implemented a new rating system to allow these sort of games.

Not exactly. They implemented 18+ rating, but they still can refuse classification of materials that are highly revolting and offend generally accepted standards of morality. It includes pedophilia, bestiality, extreme cruelty, promotion of crime etc. Apparently they decided that Saints Row IV promotes sixual violence and drug trafficking.

Fallout 3

Ps: Diacetlymorphine is the chemical name for heroin)

Lucky Australia It looks horrible

Being Australian I'd usually be up in arms about this sort of thing, but it's Saints Row 4, so I don't care.

Here's the thing. This doesnt surprise me. The introduction of an R18+ rating never removed the ability for the ACB to classify games that were too over-the-top as 'Refused Classification'. The R18+ rating still has standards and guidelines like all the lower levels. Games that (for example) might feature elements such as forced sixual assault (e.g. some Japanese AO games) would obviously fit into this catagory. In this instance, we have a game that had Drug Use and sixual Violence that was deemed to be above and beyond the standards of R18+, so clearly there's something serious in this game. The ability to still restrict games was never removed, and it was always made clear than an 'X' rating would not exist for games. So the ACB had classified this game to be even beyond the sort of content of an R18+ film, and therefore restricted it from sale in Australia (which really, means it MUST be extreme, I stopped playing SR3 because I was disgusted with the stuff in it, and that game should never have been released as MA). The guys behind Saints Row try to appeal to the immature "lol sixual assault jokes are funny" demographic (which sadly does exist) in their games, we saw this in SR3. SR3 got a lot of controversy for the stuff in it, so it doesnt surprise me they'd try to push it beyond the boundaries of any possible sense of tact and taste.

We also have to keep in mind the R18+ was never going to fix the Australian Classification System (as I stated in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XpzMBsoft4amazingly-well put together video). The idea of games being a mature media form is still new to the majority of people involved in classifiying our media, so they may have had a knee-jerk reaction and considered this to be another case of something 'too advlt for games'. I've also seen suggestions that the banning of SR4 from sale is a deliberate move to send out the message that "Not everything is allowed now". I can't say that I see any evidence for this, but it wouldn't surprise me either way.

Actually, I might make a video on this

I remember when some Volition representatives took control of a fuel station in Sydney and started giving fuel away for free. Haha.