Activist Tells Court That Since Corporations Are People, He Can Drive In The Carpool Lane With Incorporation Papers

Australian Milestone: First Game Released For Adults...In 2013

from the space-flight-to-be-achieved-in-3013 dept

Mon, Jan 14th 2013 3:49pm — Timothy Geigner

As Tim Cushing recently wrote, Australia's Classification Board (whatever the hell that is) decided that this was the year. The year for what, you ask? Well, the year to acknowledge that people over the age of 15 exist within their borders. It seems a little silly that, prior to 2013, Australia's governing bodies chose not to acknowledge that the age of the average gamer is something around thirty years old. Emboldening the morality police "for the children" is one thing, but to do so for law-abiding adults is quite another. I think it showed an immense amount of disrespect towards the Aussie public that it took so long to entrust with them their own entertainment choices.

In any case, Australia has followed through and reached a milestone hitherto unimaginable: the very first R18+ game has been classified, and the honor goes to Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor's Edge. According to the Classification Board:

“Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge contains violence that is high in impact because of its frequency, high definition graphics, and emphasis on blood effects.”

So congratulations to Australian adults, who can now play the game as it was meant to be played: bloody, violent, high in impact and in high in definition. I have to imagine that the only thing sweeter for Australian adults than the ability to finally play these kinds of games is the delicious irony in how Australian Rules Football, which is televised, fits the Classification Board's description almost exactly. Foster's all around for everyone!

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: adults, australia, ratings, video games

19 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Divide by Zero (profile), 14 Jan 2013 @ 4:05pm

And as a NZer I say thank fuck, and about time Aussie. Our games were always getting screwed over since the distributors are for Aus and NZ, and so we keep getting your overly censored crap. If we got it at all.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 14 Jan 2013 @ 4:14pm

Regarding fosters
Fosters is the biggest joke a nation ever played on the world. No one drinks that swill here. For export only!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 14 Jan 2013 @ 5:48pm
  
  Re: Regarding fosters
  Not exported to USA any longer by can, by recipe only now. Canada brews and bottles all the Fosters now for North America.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - G Thompson (profile), 14 Jan 2013 @ 6:24pm
    
    Re: Re: Regarding fosters
    Wow.. I'm wondering how they figured the recipe out for Kangaroo Piss or is there somewhere now in Canada a huge underground secret farm with a mighty load of Boomers peeing everywhere
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
    - btrussell (profile), 15 Jan 2013 @ 2:32am
      
      Re: Re: Re: Regarding fosters
      City water.
      [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Fosters employee, 14 Jan 2013 @ 10:34pm
  
  Re: Regarding fosters
  Untrue.
  
  Source: Fosters employee.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - Marcel de Jong (profile), 15 Jan 2013 @ 7:53am
    
    Re: Re: Regarding fosters
    Poor employee, forced to drink that stuff, in order to make the statement of "for export only" untrue.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 15 Jan 2013 @ 12:35am
  
  Re: Regarding fosters
  Last, I checked, Oz referred to it as "poofter beer".
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
Pixelation, 14 Jan 2013 @ 4:35pm

I wonder how many people in Australia have been playing pirated versions to avoid the censoring.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Big Al, 14 Jan 2013 @ 4:49pm
  
  Re:
  If the people I know are anything to go by - lots
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 14 Jan 2013 @ 5:25pm
  
  Re:
  Shhhhh! You'll make darryl's above-average-Australian dick sad!
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- G Thompson (profile), 14 Jan 2013 @ 6:31pm
  
  Re:
  Bugger all if any since it was only released in the EU last week and its exclusively for the Wii U.
  
  Piracy is not the problem so much on Games for consoles in Australia, the major problem (for retailers and distributors) is that Aussies buy games nowadays overseas since it is cheaper by a huge margin. ie: AAA Titles come out average $89-109RRP whereas same game delivered from UK/Asia will set most people back in the range of $45-70. This has nothing to do with the Aussie Dollar either since currently it is on par with the US dollar (if not better), it's all to do with price gouging.
  
  As for the R18+ classification, its highly welcome even though it has been a long time coming
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - vbevan (profile), 16 Jan 2013 @ 10:41pm
    
    Re: Re:
    Was going to say something like this. I buy most of my games from eBay or sites like Zavvi, due to the massive difference in price (often >50% cheaper). The fact I get the uncensored versions is a bonus, though apperently I may have been breaking the law if customs had of checked.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
G Thompson (profile), 14 Jan 2013 @ 6:34pm

is the delicious irony in how Australian Rules Football, which is televised, fits the Classification Board's description almost exactly.

Compared to American Gridiron which is mostly classified as PG.
Though Aussie Rules to me is Aerial PingPong, Rugby League is the real sport of men!!!

*runs before Americans and Victorians catch me*
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Anonymous Coward, 14 Jan 2013 @ 9:02pm
  
  Re:
  thugby or areial ping pong, looking back was very as a kid when parents moved south
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
John, 14 Jan 2013 @ 9:23pm

As an Aussie gamer, I say bloody marvelous... finally. It's about time!

I've got friends who have opposed the R rating, because of the children, several who play Call of Duty and the ilk. Even though I've suggested that someone could arbitrarily pull the pin on any of those games "because of the children" they still don't get it.

Anyway, yippee!

Oh BTW, Fosters isn't Australian for beer, it's Australian for cat's piss. There are many, many finer beers here than Fosters.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Ninja (profile), 15 Jan 2013 @ 4:15am

And suddenly millions of Aussie gamers reached the legal age to see blood and violence.

Honestly I thought 18+ games were like porn stuff, Ninja Gaiden seems quite bland...
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Gregg, 15 Jan 2013 @ 8:28am

where are the real adult games
A ninja game? come off it, bring out the real adult games!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Mikael (profile), 18 Jan 2013 @ 11:16am
  
  Re: where are the real adult games
  Have you ever actually watched Ninja Gaiden gameplay?
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]